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Until now critics in their study on “Scylla and Charybdis” have mentioned Caliban in passing or identified Stephen with Caliban in specific passages. But it seems that Joyce extensively identifies Stephen with Caliban explicitly and implicitly in this episode. This study will examine how Stephen as Caliban rebels against Shakespeare/Prospero’s empire. The understanding of Stephen’s theory of Shakespeare heavily depends on his specific audience. They are the Revivalists, who are Anglo-Irish. Thus they could not be said to represent the perspectives or the interests of the native population. The formation of the Revivalists’ perspective on Shakespeare was considerably influenced by Edward Dowden, who was English-oriented. He is similar to Mr Deasy in that the former was a staunch Irish Unionist organizer, invested in English cultural and military imperialism. As Mr Deasy was racist and Anglo-supremacist, so Dowden believed in racial and cultural hierarchy in the Empire. It is Interesting to see that Mr Deasy calls Stephen a “fenian,” for Stephen reads Shakespeare through a fenian lens, resisting Dowden’s point of view. On the other hand, Dowden sees Shakespeare from an imperialist/Unionist viewpoint. “Usurpation” summarizes Stephen’s current situation. His nation and his key to the Martello tower were usurped. It is worth noting here that Dowden diagnoses the usurpation of Caliban’s rights by Prospero as justifiable. Caliban is the colonial subject and can represent Ireland, Irish natives, fenians, and Stephen. For Dowden, the rights of chaotic Caliban should be usurped. Unionists will be of the same opinion about the supposedly more emotional Irish Catholics. Stephen identifies Revivalism as a new variant on an old theme of usurpation. Ironically, even though the Anglo-Irish are committed to the nationalist cause. they drive out the native Irish. He is again classified as a “wild Irish”/Caliban, a barbarian as the other. His theory of Shakespeare is the revenge of a usurped Caliban. Stephen’s critique of Shakespeare is Caliban’s against Prospero and his colonial ideology. Stephen reads Shakespeare as a jingoist whose work stoked the fire of British imperialism. Stephen links Shakespeare directly to the Boer War. The bard’s pageants and histories show his extravagant enthusiasm for the glories of British imperial expansion. Stephen’s comment on the Boer War also shows the brutality of the imperialism with which Shakespeare is identified. His historicized reading of Shakespeare is opposed to the Revivalists’ idealization of the bard in the historical void. Stephen attacks Dowden’s theory of Shakespearean reconciliation by saying that there must have been first sundering. Thus, he collapses the pretension that Prospero, imperialist master, can impose poetic justice on Caliban. More important, by putting emphasis on separation, Stephen seems to rebel against the Revivalists/Unionists who favor the continuation of the union between Ireland and the empire. As a fenian/Caliban, Stephen calls for the separation of Ireland from England. Irish Caliban feels unfairly usurped of a territory rightfully his, and he dreams of revenge against his master/imperialist. As Caliban rejects Prospero’s sovereign language in his first revolt against his master, Stephen rejects imperialist discourse of Shakespeare/Dowden. He learned, like Caliban, “how to curse” his masters. For Dowden, Shakespeare indicates the cultural authority of the Empire, before which the colonies should be submissive. But Stephen aspires to be his equal as a writer, as he implies by equating Dublin with Stratford.
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James Joyce, Ulysses, Scylla and Charybdis, Shakespeare, Caliban, empire. Tempest, Revivalism
