Enter PROSPERO, FERDINAND and MIRANDA

PROSPERO     [to Ferdinand] If I have too austerely punished you,

Your compensation makes amends, for I

Have given you here a third of mine own life,

Or that for which I live, who once again

I tender to thy hand. All thy vexations

Were but my trials of thy love, and thou

Hast strangely stood the test. Here, afore heaven,

I ratify this my rich gift. O Ferdinand,

Do not smile at me that I boast her off,

For thou shalt find she will outstrip all praise

And make it halt behind her.

FERDINAND                                       I do believe it

Against an oracle. (4.1.1-12)

A swift cut from Alonso, Ferdinand’s grieving father, to Prospero, his future father-in-law and substitute father. On the page in particular, we might notice that Miranda has no lines in the first part of this scene; that this is a textbook example of early modern marriage as a contract between two men, with Miranda here explicitly identified as a rich gift. (Shakespeare is, as ever, well-read in classic anthropology.) In performance, it can be softened, with Miranda an active, albeit silent, presence in the scene. This is a moment of considerable self-exposure for Prospero: an apology, first, for his harsh treatment of Ferdinand—all that log-carrying—which he characterises as austere punishment, and not only apology but compensation, redress, amends: Miranda. A moment of anticipated grief and already-felt loss: I have given you here a third of mine own life, or that for which I live. A third of mine own life can be used to calculate age (Miranda is 15, and so Prospero is 45 – not old!) or else could be a reference to the three things that he prizes most in the world, his dukedom, his art (and his books), and his daughter. Whatever, she is that for which he lives, his world. He has engineered this marriage and welcomes it, but he knows the price that he must pay, and this sense of the cost to him is folded into his terms, amends and compensation, here. Prospero is, it seems, again performing a handfasting, a ceremony of betrothal, for Ferdinand and Miranda, joining their hands; tender here is business language, too, but it cannot entirely lose its affective note, of loving kindness, gentleness, care. I was just testing you with all thy vexations, all those things I did to annoy you and make you suffer. And you’ve passed, strangely, exceptionally well, with flying colours. And so – afore heaven, in the sight of God and in the face of this congregation, as the marriage service in the Prayerbook has it; the audience, of course, are the congregation – Prospero gives his daughter, this rich gift, to Ferdinand. A good note for Ferdinand, who must be grinning away; I’m not exaggerating, says Prospero, I do not boast her off (there’s some editorial quibbling as to whether this might be her of, that is of her, or even hereof): she will outstrip all praise and make it halt behind her. This is a nicely active image for Miranda, as if she’s able to outrun praise itself, which can only limp by comparison. I do believe it, promises Ferdinand, even if the most authoritative source, an oracle, were to proclaim otherwise.