TRINCULO      Ay, but to lose our bottles in the pool.

STEPHANO    There is not only disgrace and dishonour in that, monster, but an infinite loss.

TRINCULO      That’s more to me than my wetting, yet this is your harmless fairy, monster.

STEPHANO    I will fetch off my bottle, though I be o’er ears for my labour.

CALIBAN        Prithee, my king, be quiet. Seest thou here;

This is the mouth o’th’ cell. No noise, and enter.

Do that good mischief which may make this island

Thine own forever, and I, thy Caliban,

For aye thy foot-licker.

STEPHANO    Give me thy hand. I do begin to have bloody thoughts. (4.1.208-221)

Not quite the passage of lyric beauty and profound humanity that I might have chosen for Shakespeare’s (traditionally assumed) birthday and (known) death day. But it’s the first movement of a pivotal moment in the plot, the projected attempt on the life of Prospero. First, however, some more comedy at the expense of the woebegone, smelly drunks. They have lost their bottles in the stinking pool, a catastrophe not because of the loss of their contents, although that’s bad enough, but because they need the bottles in order to be able to carry away more of the wine from the barrel which washed up, which has been stashed by Stephano in a cave. (Of course, given the state of them, they could have finished the barrel already, and their bottles could well have held the last of the supply.) And so they continue to be very sorry for themselves: the disgrace and dishonour of their drenching is bad enough, but to lose the bottles is more than their wetting, an infinite loss. Bathos, the stock in trade of the sodden drunk. (The phrase harmless fairy seems to be being repeated here for its inherent comedy value.) Stephano is about to make a sudden, decisive move: I will fetch off my bottle – I’m going after it in the pool, though I be o’er ears for my labour, although it’ll mean diving into that horse-piss pond again. Caliban, though, steers them back, with more iambic pentameter and some well-placed flattery: prithee, my king, be quiet. (Shut up, you fool.) (King is a reminder of Stephano’s earlier declaration, in 3.2, that he would become king of the island by killing Prospero; Caliban has remembered, and Stephano needs reminding.) So Caliban spells it out: this is the mouth o’th’ cell. Make no noise: go in and do that good mischief – a diplomatically euphemistic way of describing murder – which you need to make this island thine own forever. And a final, genius touch (which might be adoring, sycophantic, or calculated, a final appeal to Stephano’s vanity and ambition): I will be thy Caliban, and thy foot-licker (again, as he promised in 3.2) for aye, for ever. I’m in, says Stephano; give me thy hand. I do begin – said with a swagger – to have bloody thoughts…

Happy birthday, Shakespeare. Thanks for, well, everything.