ARIEL I prithee
Remember I have done thee worthy service,
Told thee no lies, made thee no mistakings, served
Without or grudge or grumblings. Thou did promise
To bate me a full year.
PROSPERO Dost thou forget
From what a torment I did free thee?
ARIEL No.
PROSPERO Thou dost, and think’st it much to tread the ooze
Of the salt deep,
To run upon the sharp wind of the north,
To do me business in the veins o’th’ earth
When it is baked with frost.
ARIEL I do not, sir. (1.2.246-256)
Ariel retreats, is respectful, measured, polite. And they also change the scale, and the dynamic, to a relational one: no fire-starting, flying, diving, mercurial spirit here, outrunning sight, but simply a loyal servant, who did worthy service, was honest, got things right, and – perhaps most importantly – did so without or grudge or grumblings, with neither grudge, being begrudging, graceless, or grumbling. Complaint – unless they’re being ironic – is not Ariel’s style, and therefore their protestations here are unusual, extreme, and well-founded. Prospero had promised to shorten the term of their service – undefined, but apparently both long-standing and nearing its end – by a whole year– but is now not going to honour that. And a tantalising hint of back-story – dost thou forget from what a torment I did free thee? Still to be fully explained, but, given that we’ve seen already how lively, and powerful, Ariel is, this is sinister. What kind of power could imprison this mighty spirit? And Ariel’s monosyllabic reply – No – I haven’t forgotten – is potentially fraught with remembered trauma. But Prospero can’t cope with anyone else feeling hard-done-by, or with potential ingratitude, or with the possibility of betrayal or disloyalty (his trauma is in his own betrayal by his brother; it has deeply wounded him): you have forgotten that I freed you, he says, and so you’re complaining about what I’m asking you to do, and exaggerating. This is dense: is Prospero describing what he asks Ariel to do, running along the ooze of the sea-floor, flying in the icy winds of the north, even penetrating the earth and its veins (its rivers?) when they are frozen, when the ground is solid with ice? Or, is he suggesting that Ariel is acting as if that’s what they’re being asked to do? It’s striking that Prospero’s account of physical hardship is one of extreme cold, and there’s perhaps a recollection here of Claudio’s anguished imagining of death in Measure for Measure: ‘to reside | In thrilling region of thick-ribbèd ice; | To be imprisoned in the viewless winds, | And blown with restless violence round about | The pendent world’ (3.1.121-5). Prospero is winding himself up; Ariel is almost monosyllabically polite: I do not, sir. The sense of shared enterprise and intimacy, even affection, has gone, as if a switch has been flicked. This is a profoundly unequal relationship, and Prospero has gone back on his word.
