GONZALO If in Naples
I should report this now, would they believe me?
If I should say I saw such islanders
(For certes, these are people of the island),
Who, though they are of monstrous shape, yet note
Their manners are more gentle, kind, than of
Our human generation you shall find
Many—nay, almost any.
PROSPERO [aside] Honest lord,
Thou hast said well, for some of you there present
Are worse than devils.
ALONSO I cannot too much muse
Such shapes, such gesture and such sound, expressing
(Although they want the use of tongue) a kind
Of excellent dumb discourse.
PROSPERO [aside] Praise in departing. (3.3.27-39)
Gonzalo is still filled with wonder: who would believe this back home in Naples? But what he is explicitly impressed by is the courtesy of the islanders. He does not hesitate to describe them as people, the people of the island, even if they are, in fact, spirits. (This is their place.) They may be of monstrous shape (a costume note? masks, perhaps?) But they still, like Caliban and Ariel, have to be played by human actors: in 1611 their costuming would have been fantastical, and most likely recalled, or recycled, the kinds of costumes associated with court masques. But there has to be a contrast, I think, with the masquers in the following scene, who are identified as Nymphs and Reapers, although they are presumably played by the same actors. Gonzalo’s response, immediately according human dignity to these people, though they are of monstrous shape, is also contrasted with the earlier way in which Stephano and Trinculo described and interacted with Caliban, as monster, moon-calf, a strange fish. He has been impressed by their manners, their gentleness (which also means gentility, politeness) and their kindness, in welcoming the exhausted shipwrecked men to the banquet: these are, in fact, some of the nicest people he’s encountered anywhere, even if they look a bit different. (Here, Gonzalo has been reading Montaigne.) Oh yes indeed, comments Prospero from upstairs—and I’m on to the bad guys here, the ones who are worse than devils (like my brother). (This is the first time that he and Antonio have been, sort of, in the same scene or space.) And Alonso, crucially, sides with Gonzalo, agreeing that they have been wonderful (I cannot too much muse; I cannot exaggerate, wonder at more) in appearance, in their actions, their dancing, and in their music. If the spirits have sung, their song has, perhaps, been wordless, or simply in a language, a tongue, that Alonso does not understand. They have communicated without words, an excellent dumb discourse. Prospero’s praise in departing is partly ironic—Alonso and Gonzalo, and indeed Antonio and Sebastian, are being free with their compliments now that the spirits have gone—but also because he is presumably aware that something a little less pleasant is about to happen…
