CALIBAN I say, by sorcery he got this isle.
From me he got it. If thy greatness will
Revenge it on him—for I know thou dar’st,
But this thing dare not—
STEPHANO That’s most certain.
CALIBAN Thou shalt be lord of it, and I’ll serve thee.
STEPHANO How now shall this be compassed? Canst thou bring me to the party?
CALIBAN Yea, yea, my lord, I’ll yield him thee asleep,
Where thou mayst knock a nail into his head.
ARIEL [in Trinculo’s voice] Thou liest, thou canst not.
CALIBAN What a pied ninny’s this? Thou scurvy patch!
I do beseech thy greatness, give him blows,
And take his bottle from him. When that’s gone,
He shall drink nought but brine, for I’ll not show him
Where the quick freshes are. (3.2.50-65)
Caliban is clear, stark, unequivocal: Prospero got the island by sorcery. From me he got it. (This island’s mine, by Sycorax my mother.) And some more calculated, calculating flattery: if thy greatness will revenge it on him – I know you’re brave enough, daring enough, valiant enough – unlike this thing, Trinculo (and Stephano laps up the praise: that’s most certain, he wouldn’t have the guts) – if you do it, then you will be lord of the island, and I’ll serve thee. (Some editors and productions suggest that Caliban is naively infatuated with Stephano, not least as the controller of the bottle, the celestial liquor. Possible, entirely, but it seems to me so calculating and controlled, not least in the switch into verse: Caliban has the measure of Trinculo and Stephano, the cowardice and weakness of one, the vanity and carelessness of the other, and he is exploiting it.) But how, asks Stephano, how now shall this be compassed? (He means accomplished; he is speaking with some pretensions to dignity.) Canst thou bring me to the party? (He means: where’s your master, monster?) And Caliban, eager: yes, yes, he’s sleeping, I’ll take you to him – and you can knock a nail into his head. Commentary notes dutifully cite the biblical heroine Jael, who killed Sisera like this in Judges 4. But Caliban’s nothing like Jael (who gave Sisera refuge in her tent, gave him milk to drink and covered him with a blanket, before killing him) and Prospero is nothing like Sisera, who was a powerful general with nine hundred chariots of iron at his disposal. This doesn’t have to be Jael and Sisera, and it’s nastier if it’s not, a precisely imagined murder, blunt and brutal: of course the log-carrying slave knows where to find the hammer and the nails. So Ariel, again, Thou liest; no, you can’t do that. Caliban is not going to have some jester, some pied ninny, wearing the particoloured garments of a fool, a scurvy patch, interrupting. (Patch was the nickname of Sexton, first Cardinal Wolsey’s fool and then Henry VIII’s; it might be for this reason that patch was used more generally for fools. Yes, I am currently reading the new Hilary Mantel…) Beat him, your greatness, says Caliban (that’s clearly what masters do); take his bottle from him. I don’t like him, I won’t help him find lovely fresh springs when he has nothing else to drink; he can make do with brackish water. But I’ll show you, my new master.
