Summary
Prospero insists that Caliban get to work or else face a beating, saying, "Beating is the only language you really understand." Before Prospero goes, Caliban tells him that he will not be answering to Caliban anymore, since it is the name Prospero gave him. He tells him he wants to be called "X" to reflect the fact that his life has been stolen.
After Caliban exits, Ariel enters as a sea-nymph, and Prospero tells him to scare the people on the boat, but spare their lives. Prospero tells him that he wants to rise above the disputes of the past and make peace with them. He then says, "I have a daughter. Alonso has a son. If they were to fall in love, I would give my consent. Let Ferdinand marry Miranda, and may their marriage bring us harmony and peace."
Ariel sings a song, which Ferdinand hears. When Ferdinand sees Miranda, he is immediately enchanted, and asks if she's a goddess. He tells her he is a prince, before realizing he is now a king, since his father died in the shipwreck. Miranda comforts him and offers to show him the island. They are interrupted by Prospero, who calls Ferdinand "a traitor, a spy, and a woman-chaser to boot!" He makes Ferdinand his house servant immediately. Ferdinand agrees, realizing that by being Prospero's servant, he will remain close to Miranda.
Act 2, Scene 1. Caliban is singing a song about Shango, as Ariel enters. Ariel tells him that they both want their freedom, but that they have different methods for achieving it. He then warns Caliban that Prospero "is planning horrible acts of revenge against [him]." Caliban calls Ariel an Uncle Tom and suggests that his pliability only makes Prospero exploit him more. Ariel tells him he does not believe in violence. He tells Caliban that "Prospero is the one we've got to change. Destroy his serenity so that he's finally forced to acknowledge his own injustice and put an end to it."
Caliban insists that Prospero has no conscience, but Ariel thinks that one day they could all work together "like brothers." When he hears this, Caliban insists that Prospero only feels something when he is crushing someone. They say their goodbyes and move along.
Scene 2. Gonzalo, Sebastian, and Antonio explore the island. Gonzalo suggests that, "If there were anything poisonous, an antidote would never be far away, for nature is intrinsically harmonious." They talk about bird droppings, "guano," and how they are good fertilizer. Gonzalo suggests that they ought to irrigate the fields with guano and it will be good for crops. They discuss the fact that if they farm, they will need people to work the land.
Gonzalo offers a cautionary tale about colonization, saying that if they do colonize, the natives must "stay as they are: savages, noble and good savages, free, without any complexes or complications." Alonso tells Gonzalo to shut up, as Prospero enters, invisible to the visitors. He carries a laden table and moves it around, so the visitors think that it is magic. The men sit down to eat at the table.
Analysis
Prospero is even more abusive towards Caliban, the black slave, whom he calls an "ugly ape," as well as a number of other derogatory and violent terms. It is through Caliban that we see some of Césaire's most searing critiques of racism and colonialism. When Prospero insists that Caliban would not even know how to speak without him, Caliban counters that the only language he taught Caliban to speak was his own, so that he could give orders. Then, when Prospero suggests that Caliban's mother, Sycorax, a tree god, is dead, Caliban delivers a sharp critique of colonial entitlement: "...you only think she's dead because you think the earth itself is dead... It's so much simpler that way! Dead, you can walk on it, pollute it, you can tread upon it with the steps of a conqueror." Here, we see Césaire articulating a critique of colonialism that is about its violence not only towards other humans, but towards the earth itself, and the colonizer's ignorance about the ways that the earth is actually a living entity.
Indeed, Caliban's complaints about Prospero illuminate the historical struggle between the colonized and the colonizer from many different angles. Caliban complains about Prospero's disrespect for the natural world, his unearned sense of superiority, his exploitation of Caliban's expertise in order to learn more about the island itself, and Prospero's paranoid fantasy that Caliban tried to rape Miranda. These encompass many of the racist and supremacist structures that have historically characterized colonial relations, including perceived superiority of the white colonizer versus the perceived savagery of the non-white slave, exploitation, heartless enslavement, and sexual panic about the safety of white women in the face of non-white sexuality.
In this section of the play, the two young lovers of Shakespeare's play come face to face. Ferdinand is immediately seduced by the beautiful Miranda, comparing her to a goddess. They have an instant connection just as Prospero predicted, and suddenly there is a romantic storyline in this supernatural epic. The stakes of this romance are upped even more when Prospero turns Ferdinand into his house servant, which promises to bring Ferdinand and Miranda together, but also prevent any consummation of this romance. Indeed, it only sweetens Ferdinand's affection towards Miranda, as he calls her his "own sun."
At the beginning of Act 2, Caliban and Ariel, the two slaves, share some words about their different strategies for dealing with their enslavement. Where Caliban believes in violent resistance, Ariel insists that he can get the upper hand by being compliant with their master. These are two different approaches to subjugation played out by two non-white slaves, one biracial and the other black. Caliban characterizes Ariel's attempts to please their master as "Uncle Tom" behavior and suggests that it only subjects him to more oppression. Ariel, on the other hand, sees Caliban's violent resistance as counter to liberation, as it only leads to harsher punishments.
In this section of the play, we also hear a white, European perspective on colonization, that confirms many of Caliban's suspicions about their untrustworthiness. Gonzalo suggests that they ought to colonize the island and employ the labor of the natives. However, he is careful to say that they must not "import [European] shortcomings," but help the natives to remain "noble and good savages." Gonzalo imagines that indigenous non-white people need to be subjugated and never integrated into white society, but kept simple and compliant.
