Margaret Atwood - Hag-Seed

“What kinds of prisons are they? Who’s been put in each of them? And who’s the jailer — who’s put them in, who’s keeping them there?” PRISONER. PRISON. JAILER, he writes. “I found at least seven prisons. Maybe you can find more.” There are actually nine, but let them outdo him.

“If it’s the same actual place, such as the island, but a different part of it, does that make two prisons?” says Bent Pencil. “Or one?”

“Let’s call them unique incarceration events,” says Felix.

“Unique incarceration events?” says Leggs. “Yeah, when I get out, I’m gonna say, I had a four-year poxy, suckin’ unique incarceration event .” Laughter from the company.

“Least it’s not a unique dead event,” says PPod.

“Unique smash your face in event.”

“Unique totally wasted event.”

“Right,” says Felix. “You know what I mean.” They call him out when he talks too much like a social worker.

“What exactly counts?” says 8Handz. “Like, that pine tree Ariel was stuck in?”

“Let’s say a prison is any place or situation that you’ve been put in against your will, that you don’t want to be in, and that you can’t get out of,” says Felix. “So, yes: the pine tree counts.”

“Whoreson!” says HotWire. “Doing solitary in a pine!”

“Whoreson awesome ,” says 8Handz.

“The oak would be worse,” says Red Coyote. “Oak’s harder wood.”

“Is there a score for the most prisons? We get cigarettes for this?” says Leggs.

Wednesday, January 16, 2013.

In block letters, red, Felix covers his whiteboard with the class findings. “You’ve done well,” he says. “You’ve spotted eight…” He pauses. “Eight unique incarceration events.” Let them swallow the phrase this time, he thinks, and they do: there are no scoffing comments. “There’s a ninth prison, however.” Puzzled looks. Skepticism from 8Handz: “No plaguey way!”

Felix waits. Watches them counting, pondering.

“You gonna tell us?” PPod asks at last.

“After we’ve done the play,” says Felix. “Once our revels are ended. Unless, of course, someone guesses it before then.” They won’t guess, is his bet, but he’s been wrong before. “Now, let’s look at the jailers. Three characters are imprisoned by someone who isn’t Prospero: Sycorax, on the island, by the officials of Algiers; Ariel, in a pine, by Sycorax, and Prospero himself, by Antonio, with an assist from Alonso, first in the leaky boat and then on the island itself. Four characters if you count Miranda, but she was only three years old when she landed so she grows up on the island without feeling imprisoned by it. Then, seven individuals are imprisoned in events in which the jailer is Prospero. He would seem to be the top jailer in this play.”

“Plus he’s a slave-driver,” says Red Coyote.

“Not just with Caliban, he’s got his foot on Ariel too,” says 8Handz. “He threatens him with that oak tree. Permanent solitary. It’s inhuman.”

“Plus he’s a land stealer,” adds Red Coyote. “Suckin’ old white guy. He should be called Prospero Corp. Next thing he’ll discover oil on it, develop it, machine-gun everyone to keep them off it.”

“You’re such a poxy communist,” says SnakeEye.

“Shove it, freckled whelp,” says Red Coyote.

“No whoreson dissin’, we’re a team,” says Leggs.

Calm is called for. “I know you hold those things against Prospero,” says Felix. “Especially his treatment of Caliban.” He looks around the room: frowns. Jaw-tightenings. Definite hostility toward Prospero. “But what are his options?”

“Options!” says Shiv. “We don’t give a — we don’t give an earth about his suckin’ options!”

“Watch it with the earth ,” says Red Coyote. “Just sayin’.”

“Not everything’s about you,” says Shiv.

“Give Prospero a chance. Let’s hear about the options,” says Bent Pencil mildly. He likes to play the man of reason.

“I’ll spell it out,” says Felix. “Suppose the ship with King Alonso and Antonio and Ferdinand and Gonzalo had never showed up. It was blind luck that it sailed near the island on the way back from the wedding of Alonso’s daughter. Or, in the language of Prospero, it was the action of an auspicious star and Lady Fortune. But suppose that ship never arrived. There was Prospero, trapped on the island, with a young daughter and a young, stronger male who tries to have sex with her against her will. Even though Prospero has been kind to the wild-child Caliban, the grown-up Caliban turns against him.

“Nobody has a gun. Nobody has a sword. In a match of strength, Caliban could easily have killed Prospero. In fact, that’s what he wants to do as soon as he sees the chance. So, does Prospero have the right of self-defense?”

Mutters. Scowls.

“Let’s vote on it,” says Felix. “Yes?”

Most hands go up, reluctantly. Red Coyote holds out.

“Red Coyote?” says Felix. “He should allow Caliban to run loose and run the risk of being murdered by him?”

“Shouldn’t have been there in the first place,” says Red Coyote. “It’s not his island.”

“Did he choose to land there?” says Felix. “He’s hardly an invader, he’s a castaway.”

“He’s still a slave-driver,” says Red Coyote.

“He could keep Caliban penned up all the time,” says Felix. “He could kill him.”

“Says it himself, he wants the work out of him,” says Red Coyote. “Picking up the firewood, washing the dishes. All of that. Plus, he does the same thing to Ariel. Makes him work, against his will. Won’t give him liberty.”

“Granted,” says Felix. “But he still has the right to defend himself, no? And the single way he can do that is through his magic, which is effective only as long as he has Ariel running errands for him. If tethering Ariel on a magic string — a temporary magic string — was the only weapon you had, you’d do the same. Yes?”

This time there’s general agreement. “Okay,” says WonderBoy, “but why put the others through all that? The harpy scene, the craziness. Why doesn’t he just kill the enemies and take their ship? Leave Caliban on the island, sail back to Milan or whatever?”

Because there wouldn’t be a play, thinks Felix. Or it would be a very different play. But if he wants the characters to stay real for them, he can’t use that ploy.

“I’m sure he was tempted,” he says. “He probably felt like bashing their brains in. Who wouldn’t, after what they did to him?” Widespread nodding. “However, if he enacted that kind of revenge he might get his dukedom back, but since Antonio made a deal with King Alonso whereby Milan is under the rule of Naples, then whoever inherits the kingdom of Naples will naturally bear a grudge. They wouldn’t take kindly to their King and his son mysteriously disappearing, and the sailors would talk. The new ruler of Naples would kick Prospero out again or else kill him, and bring in someone else as the Duke of Milan. Failing that, Naples would go to war against Milan. Naples is bigger. Milan risks losing. What’s Prospero’s best plan?”