Caliban’s ironic and ineffective method of understanding theology in “Caliban Upon Setebos” is the basis of my comic strip. My cartoon introduces the irony of Caliban’s theological speculation in “Caliban Upon Setebos” during the first four panels. The beginning of my comic strip is an accurate illustration of Browning’s poem that emphasizes Caliban’s ironic perception of Setebos and the Quiet; I included the phrase “ill at ease”—a direct quote from “Caliban Upon Setebos”—to demonstrate that my depiction of Caliban remains true to Browning’s poem (Browning 31). In order to further emphasize this irony in Browning’s work, my cartoon analogously depicts Miranda—another character from Shakespeare’s The Tempest--employing Caliban’s ironic method of understanding supreme beings. Just as Caliban infers from his misery that Setebos and the Quiet are brutal beings in Browning’s poem, Miranda concludes from the beauty of mankind that God is generous in my cartoon.
Miranda is an ideal character to illustrate the irony of Caliban’s method in Browning’s poem because her view of the world is obviously juxtaposed to Caliban’s rightfully pessimistic worldview. While Caliban understands the island as an inescapable and miserable prison, Miranda acknowledges the beauty of mankind at the end of The Tempest. In order to emphasize the fact that Miranda and Caliban hold opposing outlooks in The Tempest, I included direct quotations from Shakespeare’s play in my comic strip. The first panel of my cartoon features Caliban hoping “the red plague rid[s]” Prospero for being a horrible master, and the fourth panel of my cartoon depicts Caliban asserting that he must obey Setebos and the Quiet because their “art is of such power” (Shakespeare 1.2 365, 373). In order to emphasize the contrast between Miranda and Caliban, my comic strip features Mirada being awestruck by the beauty of mankind: “ O Wonder! / How many goodly creatures there are here! / How beauteous mankind is” (Shakespeare 5.1.183-5). Moreover, my cartoon takes advantage of this point of contrast between Caliban and Miranda in order to illustrate the irony of Browning’s means of understanding theology in “Caliban Upon Setebos.”
In addition to emphasizing the irony of Caliban’s means of comprehending theology in Browning’s poem, the contrast between Caliban and Miranda that my cartoon emphasizes reveals that Caliban’s method of understanding theology in Browning’s poem is ineffective. Since Caliban’s perception of theology is dependent on his circumstances, it follows from the fact that Mirada and Caliban have opposing outlooks that the two Shakespearean characters have contrasting theological conclusions when employing Caliban’s empirical method; Caliban—in accordance with Browning’s poem—believes the theological hierarchy is cruel, while Miranda would infer that it is generous. Since the theological hierarchy cannot be both cruel and generous, my transformation of Miranda to mirror Browning’s Caliban reveals that Caliban’s method of understanding theology in Browning’s poem yields inconsistent and therefore unreliable results. The last panel of my comic strip featuring God—which is larger to symbolize God’s superiority to both Caliban and Miranda—is intended to clarity my cartoon’s implications about the irony and ineffectiveness of Caliban’s method of understanding theology in “Caliban Upon Setebos.” In this sense, the concluding panel of my comic strip limits readers’ interpretations of my cartoon.
Works Cited
Browning, Robert. “Caliban Upon Setebos: Or, Natural Theology in the Island.” Web. PDF.
Shakespeare, William. The Tempest. Ed. Virginia Mason Vaughan and Aldan T. Vaughan.
London: Bloomsbury, 2014. Print.
Toondoo. <www.toondoo.com>. Web.