Miranda—The Tempest
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ART AND IMAGES IN PSYCHIATRY SECTION EDITOR: JAMES C. HARRIS, MD Miranda—The Tempest ...OhIhavesuffered with those that I saw suffer—a brave vessel, (who had, no doubt noble creatures in her) dashed all to pieces! O, the cry did knock against my very heart... Miranda, The Tempest1(act I,scene 2,p13) We found it to be the dangerous and dreaded island, or the islands of the Bermuda....Theybecalled com- monly the Devil’s Islands and avoided of all sea travelers alive above any other place in the world. William Strachey, 16092 N 1609, SEVEN SHIPS AND TWO cent had died during the winter of 1608- of cultures, with the Powhatans seeing pinnaces (light sailing ships) left 1609, known as the starving times, when them as intruders and having no inten- Plymouth, England, to supply men ate plants and their horses and a few tion of being colonized.4 the newly established Jamestown turned to cannibalism. The colony had The food brought from Bermuda Icolony in Virginia. On July 24, 1609, suffered from lack of leadership after saved the colony from starvation but was within 7 or 8 days of their expected ar- Jamestown’s early and renowned leader insufficient. Seeing the hopelessness of rival at Point Comfort, the gateway to John Smith was evacuated to be treated the situation, a decision was made to Jamestown at the mouth of the James abandon the colony that was only River,2(p4) the ships were caught in a averted when Thomas West, Lord de la tropical hurricane off the Azores and Warr, the permanent governor of the separated from one another. The flag- colony, arrived with 3 new supply ships. ship, Sea Venture, carrying on it the act- William Strachey was assigned as sec- ing governor, Sir Thomas Gates; the ad- retary of the colony. Strachey, as secre- miral of the fleet, Sir George Somers; and tary, wrote a long letter about the colo- the governance plan for the colony, was ny’s survival with details of the Bermuda battered for 4 days by wind and rain. The tragedy. Completed on July 15, 1610, it sky became pitch black; “it was a dread- was taken to London by Gates. ful storm and hideous,” an “unmerci- On his arrival back in London in Sep- ful tempest.”2(p4) To the consternation of tember 1610, Gates’ unexpected news those on board, the ship began to leak that everyone aboard the Virginia com- with water rising on the deck, requir- pany’s Sea Venture had survived an At- ing continuous pumping around the lantic hurricane, and that nearly all had clock and the dumping overboard of reached Virginia, was widely publi- much valued cargo. The passengers were cized. Strachey’s letter was circulated in frightened and awestruck to see St El- manuscript in 2 or more copies and later mo’s fire, created by static electricity, on published as True Reportory (“A True Re- the mast. Finally, Somers saw land. Mari- portorie of the wracke, and redemp- ners knew the land as Devil’s Island for Figure. Ariel, ca 1800-1810. tion of Sir Thomas Gates, Knight; vpon, its threatening rocky inlets and strange and from the Ilands of the Bermudas: His nighttime sounds. Remarkably the ship for severe burns. The colony could not Comming to Virginia, and the estate of reached the island and wedged in be- cope with the influx of new settlers from that Colonie then, and after, vnder the tween rocks, initially remaining up- the 5 other ships and 2 pinnaces that sur- gouernment of the Lord La Warre”).2 right. All 150 men, women, and chil- vived the hurricane. Both settlers and William Shakespeare is believed to have dren on board survived. Passenger local Indians suffered from lack of food been familiar with the letter. His play The William Strachey, an aspiring play- in a drought that winter, the worst in cen- Tempest contains striking similarities to wright, was on board and recorded the turies. The colonists had expected to find Strachey’s narrative account. Although lives of the survivors over the ensuing gold in Virginia but did not; they had Shakespeare used several sources, the 10 months while they built 2 new small hoped to find the Northwest passage con- play’s debt to Strachey has drawn the ships, Deliverance and Patience, which necting the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, most comment. Those similarities con- allowed them to finally reach Jamestown the sea route to Asia, but learned from the firm the traditional dating of The Tem- 10 months later in May 1610. Many did Indians that there was none across North pest’s composition to 1610-1611. not want to leave Bermuda, for it was not America. They had expected to trade for Strachey’s True Reportory is central a Devil’s Island but had an abundance food with the Indians, but the drought to the organization of The Tempest.It of fish, wildlife, and pigs; the mysteri- also affected the Indians, who were sus- provides the basic plot for the play with ous night sounds were those of birds that picious of their coming and hostile to the background for the shipwreck. It re- made sounds unfamiliar to them.3 their settlement. Moreover, Jamestown Is- peats many details of the storm, the gen- Their doubts about leaving Ber- land did not have a good source of fresh eral features and details of the island, muda were confirmed on arrival to water. The Powhatans, the term settlers similar conspiracies to those that oc- Jamestown. The colony was deci- used for the local Algonquin tribes, con- curred in Bermuda, parallel word us- mated, with only 60 survivors among the strained them from moving further in- age in similar or the same contexts, ref- original colonists and those from the 5 land. They were tolerated on the island erences to magic, and a love story ships of their original convoy that landed but often attacked when they sought to (Miranda and Ferdinand, shown below following the hurricane. Eighty per- move further inland. There was a clash Ariel in Figure). The interactions be- (REPRINTED) ARCH GEN PSYCHIATRY/ VOL 67 (NO. 1), JAN 2010 WWW.ARCHGENPSYCHIATRY.COM 7 ©2010 American Medical Association. All rights reserved. Downloaded From: https://jamanetwork.com/ on 09/30/2021 tween Prospero and Caliban are simi- I pitied thee, Took pains to make thee speak, The Tempest, now considered one of lar to events that occurred between the taughttheeeachhourOnethingorother...But Shakespeare’s major romances, is a re- settlers and the Powhatans. The play thy vild race (Though didst learn) had that in’t minder of the tragic events that under- was not simply a work of fiction from which good natures Could not abide to be with. lie the founding of the first permanent Therefore wast thou Deservedly confin’d into Shakespeare’s imagination but one this rock, Who hadst deserved more than a settlement in America. Astronomers have with elements derived from indepen- prison.1(act I,scene 2,p39) memorialized the characters by nam- dent accounts of actual events by ing the moons of the planet Uranus af- Strachey and several other contempo- John William Waterhouse (1849- ter them.3(p191) The story of the original rary sources. Although Bermuda is not 1917) painted Miranda from The Tem- Jamestown settlement is again current, the play’s setting (Shakespeare locates pest early in his career and again in the reaching new prominence in 1994 when his story on a Mediterranean island),1,5 last year of his life when he was gravely Jamestown was essentially rediscov- reference is made to the “still-vexed ill with liver cancer (cover).6,7 Water- ered after long being thought underwa- Bermoothes.”1(act I,scene 2,p29) house, best known for his paintings of ter.8,9 A grand 400-year centennial cel- Shakespeare’s play is an imaginative women in dramatic settings, was one of ebration took place in 2007 accompanied reconstruction. One striking example is the last of the Pre-Raphaelite artists. He by the opening of a museum on the is- the figure of Ariel and the St Elmo’s fire was most productive toward the end of land to show thousands of artifacts. episode (Figure). Strachey reported: the 19th century and the beginning Among them is William Strachey’s sig- of the 20th, persisting in the Pre- net ring.3 There is renewed interest in Sir George Somers...hadanapparition of a Raphaelite style long after its origina- the settlement with the release of the little round light, like a faint Starre, trem- tors. The Pre-Raphaelite brotherhood films The New World and Pocahontas, bling, and streaming along with a sparkeling were artists who scorned the elegant in which serve as reminders of its compel- blaze, halfe the height upon the Maine Mast, painting. They found the style of Re- and shooting sometimes from Shroud to ling history. Shroud, tempting to settle as it were upon any naissance artists like Raphael and Miche- Ultimately the gold discovered at of the foure Shrouds...running sometimes langelo to be mechanistic. Known as “the Jamestown was tobacco, known then as along the Maine-yard to the very end, and then modern Pre-Raphaelite,” Waterhouse in- the leaf of gold. That crop that finan- returning...thesuperstitious seamen make corporated techniques borrowed from cially sustained the first permanent many constructions of this sea-fire...itmight French Impressionists. Typically Pre- settlement in America ironically has 2(pp12,13) have strucken amazement. Raphaelites painted scenes from Greek proved to be a mixed blessing for later and Arthurian mythology and from dra- generations.