CALIBAN        Art thou afeard?

STEPHANO    No, monster, not I.

CALIBAN        Be not afeard. The isle is full of noises,

Sounds and sweet airs that give delight and hurt not.

Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments

Will hum about mine ears; and sometimes voices,

That if I then had waked after long sleep,

Will make me sleep again; and then in dreaming,

The clouds, methought, would open and show riches

Ready to drop upon me, that when I waked

I cried to dream again. (3.2.133-143)

Be not afeard. This made me cry even Before. If it makes you cry too, as you read, now, take a deep breath and read it again. Familiarity can breed indifference, but on rereading, perhaps feel your heart-rate slow. Be not afeard.

I want to consider this gently, to wonder (Tempest word) at its calm, poised beauty. It matters more than anything that these lines are Caliban’s. He could be mocking – art thou afeard? at Stephano and Trinculo’s panic at this unseen music. But it could as well be genuine astonishment – wonder – that they could be frightened by something that he is so accustomed to, something – music – that he loves. There’s nothing to be afraid of; this seems more a genuine attempt to console and reassure, not a jeering bravado. The injunction not to be afraid is a godlike one; it’s encountered often in the Bible, when God reassures his people that all will, in time, be well. The isle is full of noises – and then those noises resolve into music, sweet airs, tunes, via sounds. Noises, sounds, sweet airs. It resolves like a harmonic progression; we hear what Caliban hears, music out of noise. I don’t think that Caliban is saying that he’s never afraid – he’s afraid of Prospero, of the tormenting hedgehogs, of spirits and devils – but of music? Never. Music makes him feel safe; music means that he is at home. Music gives delight and hurts not. (Sometimes, Caliban is very hurt.) Then an exuberant swerve – a thousand twangling instruments? A suggestion of strings, perhaps – Ariel’s lute? but stranger, richer, more abstract. They hum; not quite singing, wordless; the vibration of a string as it fades away. But there are voices too – voices that lull me back to sleep, when I have waked after long sleep. And the dreams they send! Such visions… as if the clouds would open and show riches ready to drop upon me. A dream of revelation, of plenty, of peace, all the more moving for its lack of specificity, too beautiful for words. I hadn’t noticed before how Caliban’s vision is also Prospero’s, much later in the play – but Caliban’s is unmediated by theatre; no masquing stuff here, but only words, and music. (A word that Caliban does not use.) And it melts, it fades, it slips from the grasp into waking – so that I cried to dream again. Let me have that dream again, with all its hope and potential. And the larger context: Be not afeard.