CALIBAN I’ll show thee every fertile inch o’th’ island,
And I will kiss thy foot. I prithee, be my god.
TRINCULO By this light, a most perfidious and drunken monster; when’s god’s asleep, he’ll rob his bottle.
CALIBAN I’ll kiss thy foot. I’ll swear myself thy subject.
STEPHANO Come on, then, down and swear.
TRINCULO I shall laugh myself to death at this puppy-headed monster. A most scurvy monster. I could find in my heart to beat him—
STEPHANO Come, kiss.
TRINCULO But that the poor monster’s in drink. An abominable monster! (2.2.145-156)
More evidence of the dynamics of Caliban’s relationship with Prospero. This is what he did for Prospero, in the early stages of their shared life on the island: as Caliban described it earlier, I loved thee, and showed thee all the qualities o’ th’isle; the fresh springs, brine pits, barren place and fertile. Caliban’s way of showing service, loyalty, love, is to share the riches of the place that he loves, the island. Here, he seems compelled to repeat his actions, and to accept and perform a relationship that is radically asymmetrical, in which he will offer his expert knowledge, the knowledge of how to live on the island, and the power that it confers, in return for subjection and, perhaps, abuse. He seems to abase himself here, perhaps throwing himself to the ground: I will kiss thy foot, be my god, please; I’ll swear myself thy subject. (As protection from Prospero, perhaps; a bully bigger than the one he knows.) It’s the alcohol, partly, that he wants more of – he will worship and serve the master of the bottle – but it’s also the mastery. Caliban has largely, if not entirely, internalised his identity as subaltern. But all Trinculo and Stephano can do is laugh at him, this big puppy-headed monster, with his clumsy protestations. They impute their own petty motivations and self-serving natures to him: he’s just pretending, he’ll wait until his so-called god is asleep and then rob his bottle. They know they’re not worth the attention he’s giving them and, also, that they don’t have the power that he ascribes to them. They too are servants, if not slaves. But now, wholly unexpectedly (and yet not), they are emboldened by the slavish (I use the word deliberately) attentions of one who is apparently even lower than they are. Trinculo contemplates beating him (being the sort of man who has himself been beaten). Stephano is enjoying the prospect of having his foot kissed, of a monster – a person – grovelling at his feet. Trinculo is enjoying the sensation of magnanimity: I could beat him, but I won’t, because he’s in drink. (Unfair to beat a drunk, says someone easily imagined as a drunkard.) Easy comedy, but unsettling when unpacked.
