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Who Is Caliban?
Shakespeare's The Tempest is a tale of revenge, romance, and magic. The play's main character (or protagonist), Prospero, the rightful Duke of Milan, is stranded on a mysterious island after his brother Antonio betrays him. After spending years on the island with his daughter Miranda, Prospero uses magic to create a storm that shipwrecks Antonio and his cohorts on the island. Prospero's story, however, isn't the only story in The Tempest.
In the play's dramatis personae (the list of characters that appears before the text of the play), the character Caliban is described as 'a savage and deformed Slave'. The son of a witch named Sycorax and the devil himself, Caliban is certainly a 'deformed' and monstrous figure, but as a character, he is much more than a slave.
Essentially, Prospero is saying that Caliban is as ugly inside as he is on the outside. Using physical appearance to make judgments about a character's personality is called physiognomy. Still, even though Caliban is a monster, physiognomy isn't enough to capture the complexities of this character.