IS THERE AN HOMAGE TO FORGIVENESS IN THE TEMPEST? (AUDEN’S VIEW).

IS THERE AN HOMAGE TO FORGIVENESS IN THE TEMPEST? (AUDEN’S VIEW). I think the review by Hilton Als of THE TEMPEST is quite wonderful, and agree with many of his judgments, and yet I want to note another disagreement with him. He says that if all the actors had interacted, the production might have been “a kind of homage to forgiveness.” I think THE TEMPEST can be said to be about the difficulty of forgiveness. Auden in his LECTURES ON SHAKESPEARE (which Als cites) says: “THE TEMPEST ends, like the other plays in Shakespeare’s last period, in reconciliation and forgiveness. But the ending in THE TEMPEST is grimmer….[Antonio and Sebastian are] … spared punishment, but they can’t be said to be forgiven because they don’t want to be, and Prospero’s forgiveness of them means only that he does not take revenge upon them.” At the moment of forgiveness in the current production, Mandy Patinkin gives Antonio a kiss that is charged with ambiguity.