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howlsmovinglibrary's review against another edition
3.0
Miranda is a lonely child. For as long as she can remember, she and her father have lived in isolation in the abandoned Moorish palace. The wild boy Caliban is a lonely child, too; an orphan left to fend for himself at an early age, all language lost to him. When Caliban is summoned and bound into captivity by Miranda’s father as part of a grand experiment, he rages against his confinement; and yet he hungers for kindness and love.
I received a free ARC from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
Miranda and Caliban is a retelling of Shakespeare’s Tempest, which is a) a really good play, and b) a colonialist fantasy told from the perspective of a powerful white man. The play’s protagonist is Prospero, a magician who can control all of nature and bend it to his will, which he uses to ‘civilise’ the Moorish (read African) island on which he is shipwrecked, and its inhabitants, in order to enact his revenge on his evil usurping brother. He has a daughter, Miranda, and a slave called Caliban, who is the son of a demon worshipping witch. Prospero explains in one scene that he tried to ‘civilise’ Caliban, but was unable to due to Caliban’s inherently evil blood, which led Caliban to attempt the rape of Miranda, the crime which is now used to justify his slavery.
Miranda and Caliban¸ as the name obviously suggests, takes this play and rewrites it without the colonialist ideology of Prospero – Miranda is now the narrator, and we see the world through her eyes, rather than her father’s. Some chapters are also written from Caliban’s point of view, and that means we get to see Prospero specifically as a slave master and coloniser. I really enjoyed this choice of focalisation, as it takes a critical stance on Prospero: he is made into the antagonist of the narrative, stubborn, racist and set in his ideals of Western civilisation, which he uses to dictate both Miranda and Caliban’s behaviour against there will. When Miranda, rather than her father, is allowed to tell her story, what happens is a romance: one that Prospero cannot understand because he has placed his daughter, the only figure of feminine gentility on the island, on a pedestal, and it is unthinkable that she would have feelings for a ‘monster’ like Caliban. It attempts to take a postcolonial stance on the play, criticising 16th Century ideas of femininity and of race.
Things I liked about it:
· The writing style is really beautiful. The dialogue is written in a semi-Shakespearean tone but still makes sense, which lent it authenticity.
· The book draws on a lot of postcolonial/feminist theory surrounding the play, which as a lit graduate made me very happy. But specifically, ideas of womanhood – like Miranda having to be a gentle and feminine noblewoman despite living on a freaking island with no one but her father to judge her – are interrogated, and giving Caliban a voice means that he’s no longer just the evil black demon worshipping slave. Making Prospero the antagonist was awesome, as it is portrayed all the damaging influences of patriarchy and embodied them in one character.
· Miranda has a lot of agency. She’s a magician in her own right, and strong willed. This is nice, because in the play she’s a little bit of a wet blanket, and not one of Shakespeare’s best written heroines. Similarly, some of the twists in the Carey’s plot explain away the problems with her character, specifically, the instalove between Ferdinand and Miranda.
Things I didn’t like about it:
Generally, I just I don’t think it goes far enough as postcolonial retelling. The first half of the book is amazing and merciless in picking apart Prospero’s version of events, but then things start to go downhill….
· A lot of this book deconstructs the racist image of Caliban as an animalistic, uncivilised slave. However, some stereotypes endure: for instance, he is more overtly and crudely sexual than Miranda. Oversexualisation is obviously a huge issue and I feel like Carey should’ve avoided it, particularly if you look at Othello, where Othello’s overt sexuality and sexual desire are portrayed as part of his inherent violence as a black man. And then the murder plot of The Tempest is kept in the book, which is basically just perpetuating this stereotype of violence.
· Further in this vein, the second half of the book is pretty much just a straight forward rehash of The Tempest, but from Miranda’s POV. The first half of the book is really interesting, as it offers something additional to the Tempest plot, looking at Miranda and Caliban’s childhood and the friendship they develop – stuff that Prospero only talks about, but we never see, in the play. But after that it just reverts to the Shakespeare story: it just felt a bit dull and boring to simply go through the play scene by scene. If I wanted that, I could reread the play.
· The ending. This book just kind of…finished. It’s not just that not much from the original plot was changed, or scrutinised in any way. It isn’t even the position the characters are in at the end, which is definitely not happy. It’s just that….nothing new happened. The book pretty much finishes where the play finishes, in a way that places Caliban at a serious disadvantage. It kind of undid all the work the first half of the book: Miranda is given more agency, but Caliban is left a powerless slave, and I just don’t get why no one saw how super problematic that is.
I received a free ARC from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
Miranda and Caliban is a retelling of Shakespeare’s Tempest, which is a) a really good play, and b) a colonialist fantasy told from the perspective of a powerful white man. The play’s protagonist is Prospero, a magician who can control all of nature and bend it to his will, which he uses to ‘civilise’ the Moorish (read African) island on which he is shipwrecked, and its inhabitants, in order to enact his revenge on his evil usurping brother. He has a daughter, Miranda, and a slave called Caliban, who is the son of a demon worshipping witch. Prospero explains in one scene that he tried to ‘civilise’ Caliban, but was unable to due to Caliban’s inherently evil blood, which led Caliban to attempt the rape of Miranda, the crime which is now used to justify his slavery.
Miranda and Caliban¸ as the name obviously suggests, takes this play and rewrites it without the colonialist ideology of Prospero – Miranda is now the narrator, and we see the world through her eyes, rather than her father’s. Some chapters are also written from Caliban’s point of view, and that means we get to see Prospero specifically as a slave master and coloniser. I really enjoyed this choice of focalisation, as it takes a critical stance on Prospero: he is made into the antagonist of the narrative, stubborn, racist and set in his ideals of Western civilisation, which he uses to dictate both Miranda and Caliban’s behaviour against there will. When Miranda, rather than her father, is allowed to tell her story, what happens is a romance: one that Prospero cannot understand because he has placed his daughter, the only figure of feminine gentility on the island, on a pedestal, and it is unthinkable that she would have feelings for a ‘monster’ like Caliban. It attempts to take a postcolonial stance on the play, criticising 16th Century ideas of femininity and of race.
Things I liked about it:
· The writing style is really beautiful. The dialogue is written in a semi-Shakespearean tone but still makes sense, which lent it authenticity.
· The book draws on a lot of postcolonial/feminist theory surrounding the play, which as a lit graduate made me very happy. But specifically, ideas of womanhood – like Miranda having to be a gentle and feminine noblewoman despite living on a freaking island with no one but her father to judge her – are interrogated, and giving Caliban a voice means that he’s no longer just the evil black demon worshipping slave. Making Prospero the antagonist was awesome, as it is portrayed all the damaging influences of patriarchy and embodied them in one character.
· Miranda has a lot of agency. She’s a magician in her own right, and strong willed. This is nice, because in the play she’s a little bit of a wet blanket, and not one of Shakespeare’s best written heroines. Similarly, some of the twists in the Carey’s plot explain away the problems with her character, specifically, the instalove between Ferdinand and Miranda.
Things I didn’t like about it:
Generally, I just I don’t think it goes far enough as postcolonial retelling. The first half of the book is amazing and merciless in picking apart Prospero’s version of events, but then things start to go downhill….
· A lot of this book deconstructs the racist image of Caliban as an animalistic, uncivilised slave. However, some stereotypes endure: for instance, he is more overtly and crudely sexual than Miranda. Oversexualisation is obviously a huge issue and I feel like Carey should’ve avoided it, particularly if you look at Othello, where Othello’s overt sexuality and sexual desire are portrayed as part of his inherent violence as a black man. And then the murder plot of The Tempest is kept in the book, which is basically just perpetuating this stereotype of violence.
· Further in this vein, the second half of the book is pretty much just a straight forward rehash of The Tempest, but from Miranda’s POV. The first half of the book is really interesting, as it offers something additional to the Tempest plot, looking at Miranda and Caliban’s childhood and the friendship they develop – stuff that Prospero only talks about, but we never see, in the play. But after that it just reverts to the Shakespeare story: it just felt a bit dull and boring to simply go through the play scene by scene. If I wanted that, I could reread the play.
· The ending. This book just kind of…finished. It’s not just that not much from the original plot was changed, or scrutinised in any way. It isn’t even the position the characters are in at the end, which is definitely not happy. It’s just that….nothing new happened. The book pretty much finishes where the play finishes, in a way that places Caliban at a serious disadvantage. It kind of undid all the work the first half of the book: Miranda is given more agency, but Caliban is left a powerless slave, and I just don’t get why no one saw how super problematic that is.
ljcostel's review against another edition
3.0
Beautifully written. The story poured off the page and I could hardly stop reading. But if you've read The Tempest, you can guess how it won't end...
morgandante's review against another edition
5.0
[pasted from blog]
Be not afeard; the isle is full of noises,
Sounds and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not.
Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments
Will hum about mine ears, and sometime voices
That, if I then had waked after long sleep,
Will make me sleep again: and then, in dreaming,
The clouds methought would open and show riches
Ready to drop upon me that, when I waked,
I cried to dream again.
Jacqueline Carey's Miranda and Caliban is a retelling of Shakespeare's final drama The Tempest. It assumes that Miranda and Caliban had romantic feelings for one another prior to and during the course of the play's narrative.
The Tempest, next to Titus Andronicus, is my favorite Shakespeare play. I enjoy the redemption and journey of forgiveness of a complex character, Prospero, though I can acknowledge he is a racist colonialist and Caliban's fate is an issue, since he essentially presumes the master-servant relationship. The racist and misogynistic parts of Prospero's character are further explored in this novel, as well as detailing his abusive nature and how he orchestrated Miranda and Prince Ferdinand's love without much consideration for her own thoughts on the matter. He has softer moments to keep him complex, but his actions are abhorrent, and he doesn't seem to quite grow past these transgressions even when given what he wants to reclaim.
The prose is beautiful and fits the surreal, magical environment beautifully. Carey, as usual, excels at lyrical descriptions. However, the book's greatest trick is how it treats Caliban's POV. I was not aware this was a dual POV book, but it is, and it goes with Miranda being the one to teach Caliban language, as it was in the play. Caliban's sentences start off as fragmented and binary, but as he learns language, his thoughts are conveyed with more winding imagery and contemplations. I found this narrative technique to be extremely clever and an important aspect of the Miranda and Caliban's relationship.
In the play, Miranda was indeed his kind teacher, and Caliban attempted to rape her and threatened to, essentially, use her as a broodmare, which very much ties into the "aggressive, hypersexual black man attacking white woman" trope that Shakespeare portrayed and, in Titus Andronicus and Othello, explored. Miranda and Caliban sidesteps the attempted rape and Caliban's threat by making everything gentle and consensual, though Caliban does consider murder because if he is treated as a monster no matter what because of his skin color, he may as well be one and find freedom. (On that note, I'm glad to see an adaptation that acknowledges the imperialist overtones of Prospero's actions and Caliban being a man of color, since his mother was from Algiers, and her being blue-eyed is an Elizabethan reference to pregnancy, not her actual eye color.) However, the actual The Tempest section of the novel is brief and Caliban remains devoted and kind to Miranda. The halfway part of the story perhaps has one of the most explosive revelations (and additions) to the novel, but I wish the climax as Caliban plots against Prospero was more detailed.
Also, while I appreciate that the relationship was a bittersweet slow burn, it seemed like it just begun before the conclusion occurred. I think perhaps it is meant to be a mostly-chaste courtship, but I did wish for more payoff and risks. I do think the characters, especially Miranda, weren't quite pushed enough. While, yes, if you follow the trajectory of the play, the ending is inevitable, I did want her to fight her papa more. I can sympathize with her reticence till the last few pages because of the extensive emotional manipulation she endured under her father's control, and I understand her defiance is subtly done, but I hoped for more of a push against the characters' boundaries.
I do like how Carey brought the characters to life, and so Miranda is more complicated than the good maiden she is in the original play. Ariel, too, goes from a character I didn't pay much attention to to an especially vile, mischievous character who incites much of the midway conflict. Kudos to Carey, and I mean this, for making me go from being indifferent to a character to loathing them. That belies a strong reader reaction.
Overall, if you love beautiful, dreamy prose, I'd recommend Miranda and Caliban. However, if you can't stomach fictional depictions of abuse or ritualistic animal death, this may be a difficult read.
The art above, which is part of the book cover, can be found here.
Be not afeard; the isle is full of noises,
Sounds and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not.
Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments
Will hum about mine ears, and sometime voices
That, if I then had waked after long sleep,
Will make me sleep again: and then, in dreaming,
The clouds methought would open and show riches
Ready to drop upon me that, when I waked,
I cried to dream again.
Jacqueline Carey's Miranda and Caliban is a retelling of Shakespeare's final drama The Tempest. It assumes that Miranda and Caliban had romantic feelings for one another prior to and during the course of the play's narrative.
The Tempest, next to Titus Andronicus, is my favorite Shakespeare play. I enjoy the redemption and journey of forgiveness of a complex character, Prospero, though I can acknowledge he is a racist colonialist and Caliban's fate is an issue, since he essentially presumes the master-servant relationship. The racist and misogynistic parts of Prospero's character are further explored in this novel, as well as detailing his abusive nature and how he orchestrated Miranda and Prince Ferdinand's love without much consideration for her own thoughts on the matter. He has softer moments to keep him complex, but his actions are abhorrent, and he doesn't seem to quite grow past these transgressions even when given what he wants to reclaim.
The prose is beautiful and fits the surreal, magical environment beautifully. Carey, as usual, excels at lyrical descriptions. However, the book's greatest trick is how it treats Caliban's POV. I was not aware this was a dual POV book, but it is, and it goes with Miranda being the one to teach Caliban language, as it was in the play. Caliban's sentences start off as fragmented and binary, but as he learns language, his thoughts are conveyed with more winding imagery and contemplations. I found this narrative technique to be extremely clever and an important aspect of the Miranda and Caliban's relationship.
In the play, Miranda was indeed his kind teacher, and Caliban attempted to rape her and threatened to, essentially, use her as a broodmare, which very much ties into the "aggressive, hypersexual black man attacking white woman" trope that Shakespeare portrayed and, in Titus Andronicus and Othello, explored. Miranda and Caliban sidesteps the attempted rape and Caliban's threat by making everything gentle and consensual, though Caliban does consider murder because if he is treated as a monster no matter what because of his skin color, he may as well be one and find freedom. (On that note, I'm glad to see an adaptation that acknowledges the imperialist overtones of Prospero's actions and Caliban being a man of color, since his mother was from Algiers, and her being blue-eyed is an Elizabethan reference to pregnancy, not her actual eye color.) However, the actual The Tempest section of the novel is brief and Caliban remains devoted and kind to Miranda. The halfway part of the story perhaps has one of the most explosive revelations (and additions) to the novel, but I wish the climax as Caliban plots against Prospero was more detailed.
Also, while I appreciate that the relationship was a bittersweet slow burn, it seemed like it just begun before the conclusion occurred. I think perhaps it is meant to be a mostly-chaste courtship, but I did wish for more payoff and risks. I do think the characters, especially Miranda, weren't quite pushed enough. While, yes, if you follow the trajectory of the play, the ending is inevitable, I did want her to fight her papa more. I can sympathize with her reticence till the last few pages because of the extensive emotional manipulation she endured under her father's control, and I understand her defiance is subtly done, but I hoped for more of a push against the characters' boundaries.
I do like how Carey brought the characters to life, and so Miranda is more complicated than the good maiden she is in the original play. Ariel, too, goes from a character I didn't pay much attention to to an especially vile, mischievous character who incites much of the midway conflict. Kudos to Carey, and I mean this, for making me go from being indifferent to a character to loathing them. That belies a strong reader reaction.
Overall, if you love beautiful, dreamy prose, I'd recommend Miranda and Caliban. However, if you can't stomach fictional depictions of abuse or ritualistic animal death, this may be a difficult read.
The art above, which is part of the book cover, can be found here.
laura_mcloughlin's review
3.0
This was a hard book to finish because if you are in any way familiar with The Tempest you know that the ending cannot be a happy one.
I will read anything that Jacqueline Carey writes. And like all of her books this one is beautifully written. I'm just at a point right now where I prefer to read books with a happy ending so I'm probably a little harsher on this book than it really deserves.
I will read anything that Jacqueline Carey writes. And like all of her books this one is beautifully written. I'm just at a point right now where I prefer to read books with a happy ending so I'm probably a little harsher on this book than it really deserves.
julshakespeare's review against another edition
5.0
5/5 stars, full review to come! I’ll come back and share my thoughts when I’m done crying ✌️
Plot: 5/5
Characters: 5/5
Pacing: 5/5
Writing: 5/5
Enjoyment: 5/5
Plot: 5/5
Characters: 5/5
Pacing: 5/5
Writing: 5/5
Enjoyment: 5/5
jlaney's review against another edition
2.0
!! I'm NOT leaving out any details in the spoiler tags, click at your own risk. !! Also I had this all typed up and my browser signed me out and I'm sad. Now it's not articulated nearly as well.
I'm so torn on how to rate this. At times I felt like I couldn't stand it and others it seemed I was really enjoying it. Even though at times the speech patterns alternate between more modern and slightly more archaic, I really liked the prose.
Also, it's no big deal, but the agreement between Miranda and the fire salamander felt like it was going to lead up to a bigger deal than it did. And I felt like I was enjoying the book more before the kids hit puberty. I stg if I have to hear thoughts about a 13/14 year old girl's "tender" tits or a 17/18 year old boy's "rod" getting hard again, it'll be too soon. 2.5 stars rounded down for creepy boners.
I'm so torn on how to rate this. At times I felt like I couldn't stand it and others it seemed I was really enjoying it. Even though at times the speech patterns alternate between more modern and slightly more archaic, I really liked the prose.
Spoiler
Prospero is a good villain. He's easy to hate, but his reasons aren't so far out there as to be unwarranted. His obsessions over revenge and his seeming dislike of Miranda make sense, given his brother's betrayal and her mother's death. Miranda's and Caliban's suffering at the hands of Prospero is tragic, but nothing else really happens and what little defiance the kids (especially Miranda) show has little to no lasting effect. Early on, Miranda disobeys Prospero and is punished for it within an inch of her life. She's slowly nursed back to health by Caliban and is just beginning to be slightly disenchanted with her father, but then promptly gets over it when Prospero invites her into his sanctum to do some minor work alongside him once she begins to menstruate. When Miranda and Caliban are caught tumbling around half naked on the bank of a creek, and Prospero, who already ruled the two with an iron fist, becomes even more dangerous to disobey, she contemplates her father's death (while admittedly feeling guilty about it), but after Caliban attempts to take matters into his own hands and rid their lives of Prospero, she's cross and, although she rescues him, she coolly sends him away. Even at the end when she's horrified and disgusted with the way Prospero has used her as bait and manipulated the lives of her and everyone around her, and he has seemingly given up (most) magic and therefore no longer untouchable, she sits by and allows herself to be whisked away to the land of her father and bewitched betrothed.Also, it's no big deal, but the agreement between Miranda and the fire salamander felt like it was going to lead up to a bigger deal than it did. And I felt like I was enjoying the book more before the kids hit puberty. I stg if I have to hear thoughts about a 13/14 year old girl's "tender" tits or a 17/18 year old boy's "rod" getting hard again, it'll be too soon. 2.5 stars rounded down for creepy boners.
vkm13's review against another edition
5.0
Anyone who knows me knows that I'm a huge Jacqueline Carey fan, mainly due to my eternal love for the Kushiel's Legacy series. While I've enjoyed her other books as well, nothing ever quite came close to being as good as that series. But this book comes very close.
Carey is one of the best when it comes to first person narration and this book uses character voice perfectly with its dual narrators, Miranda and Caliban. The latter especially has a unique voice and you can see so much of his character just in his word choice. The relationship between these two characters develops in such interesting ways over the years and I am glad to have gone on this journey of joy and despair with them.
I haven't read The Tempest in years, though I did read its Wikipedia entry to remind myself of what happens. I shall probably re-read it again soon, to see how this book changes my interpretation of it. I have a feeling I'll never look at Prospero the same way again.
Definite must read for fans of Carey and Shakespeare (doubly so for people like me who are both).
Carey is one of the best when it comes to first person narration and this book uses character voice perfectly with its dual narrators, Miranda and Caliban. The latter especially has a unique voice and you can see so much of his character just in his word choice. The relationship between these two characters develops in such interesting ways over the years and I am glad to have gone on this journey of joy and despair with them.
I haven't read The Tempest in years, though I did read its Wikipedia entry to remind myself of what happens. I shall probably re-read it again soon, to see how this book changes my interpretation of it. I have a feeling I'll never look at Prospero the same way again.
Definite must read for fans of Carey and Shakespeare (doubly so for people like me who are both).
aluhealz's review
4.0
From what I learned before going into this book, it is a re-imagined telling of The Tempest by Shakespeare. I have not read it, nor am I honestly very familiar with the story. I chose not to research it before reading either so I could go into it without any expectations.
I actually really enjoyed reading a moderately slow paced fantasy. The entire story is told from the perspective of children/young adults. I enjoyed the simplicity of that while at the same time seeing how complex the world seemed to them despite the fact that the world to them was nothing more than their small island. The characters were well written and I found myself really caring for them. Caliban especially was an interesting character. I loved feeling like we were learning with him as his chapters being taking on more complex thought.
The love story aspect was heartbreaking and innocent. I really felt the emotional connection between them. It was also very heartbreaking to experience Caliban dealing with his growing affection and attraction alone and ignorant to what it meant. I also found myself enjoying the ambiguous ending.
Overall I highly recommend this story. It's not exciting or adventurous by any means but is very heartfelt.
I actually really enjoyed reading a moderately slow paced fantasy. The entire story is told from the perspective of children/young adults. I enjoyed the simplicity of that while at the same time seeing how complex the world seemed to them despite the fact that the world to them was nothing more than their small island. The characters were well written and I found myself really caring for them. Caliban especially was an interesting character. I loved feeling like we were learning with him as his chapters being taking on more complex thought.
The love story aspect was heartbreaking and innocent. I really felt the emotional connection between them. It was also very heartbreaking to experience Caliban dealing with his growing affection and attraction alone and ignorant to what it meant. I also found myself enjoying the ambiguous ending.
Overall I highly recommend this story. It's not exciting or adventurous by any means but is very heartfelt.
raciethereader's review
3.0
3.5 as a good Tempest re-tell, with all the magic and tragedy. I needed a slightly longer ending to feel satisfied.
rgreatreader's review
4.0
Very dark, and I really disliked the children's perspectives at the beginning of the novel that went on far longer than they should have. Long swathes from the perspective of a child don't quite belong in an adult book - that makes me uncomfortable. Which was perhaps the point, in which case well done, but I still didn't like it.
The rest of the book was quite good, parts of it were even lovely.
The rest of the book was quite good, parts of it were even lovely.