Hag-Seed: William Shakespeare's The Tempest Retold

Part 3 follows Felix’s process as he casts and rehearses The Tempest with the Fletcher Correctional Players. The prisoners are cast in dual roles, though they are unaware of Felix’s true intentions. Along with their characters, they will play goblins literally (in costume) and figuratively, as Felix’s unwilling and unknowing minions. Felix takes a page out of Prospero’s book by using goblins to create a tense environment in which to conduct his revenge plan. This dehumanizes the prisoners and places them in a precarious situation. If the prisoners are involved in a situation that endangers ministers, their release dates could be compromised. Felix does not consider this, demonstrating his lack of empathy for his student actors. When he employs 8Handz to rig Tony’s viewing room with security cameras and microphones, he engages 8Handz in an illegal activity that could threaten 8Handz’s well-being as an incarcerated person. 8Handz plays Ariel in The Tempest, and he also fills the role of Felix’s Ariel in real life, creating the stage for magic that Felix cannot. In exchange for his help, Felix makes the same agreement as Prospero: If 8Handz helps him create his mirage, he will organize 8Handz’s early parole. How Felix will do this is unclear, as is the question of whether Felix intends to follow through on this agreement.

Atwood titles her novel Hag-Seed, the slur that Prospero uses to refer to Caliban. “Hag-Seed” means the child of a witch, an insult that held more weight in Shakespeare’s time than in Felix’s contemporary world. Nonetheless, it is notable that the title is Hag-Seed and not a direct allusion to Prospero, who is the main character of the novel. In Part 3, the prisoners reappropriate this slur in the role of Caliban to reclaim Caliban’s dignity in the face of his oppressor. This foreshadows the prisoners reclaiming their dignity from Felix, who uses them for a dark plan they know nothing about.

Another parallel between this novel and The Tempest is the relationship between WonderBoy, who plays Ferdinand, and Anne-Marie, who plays Miranda. In The Tempest, Ferdinand and Miranda are potential spouses; their union would solidify Prospero’s path back to power. However, Miranda is also a beautiful and intelligent girl who is often subject to the lewd male gaze. Though WonderBoy is not crude with Anne-Marie, his romantic attentions towards her parallel the relationship between Miranda and the men in her life. Both Felix and Prospero are aware of the attention their respective Mirandas receive: Prospero views men with suspicion because he assumes they want to rape Miranda, and Felix views Anne-Marie with a paternal instinct that makes him suspicious of WonderBoy.

Part 3 of Hag-Seed evokes elements of the Shakespearean third act, though Atwood also subverts expectations. Act III in a Shakespearean play typically contains the climax of the story—its culmination, the most exciting or heightened moment. Atwood has implied that the event referred to in the Prologue will be the climax. Instead, Atwood holds back this moment. The climax, then, becomes Felix’s full transformation into Prospero. In Chapter 29, Felix finally dons the Prospero costume, coming into his own as the embodiment of Prospero. This is Felix’s climax—the moment in which all his work, feelings, and resentments culminate into his embrace of the flawed role model.