What type of person is gonzalo

In one voyage Did Claribel her husband find at Tunis, And Ferdinand, her brother, found a wife Where he himself was lost; Prospero his dukedom In a poor isle; and all of us ourselves When no man was his own.

Literary critic Robert Langbaum writes that Gonzalo's speech sums up the philosophy of the genre of tragicomedy—that we lose in order to recover something greater, that we die in order to be reborn to a better life. Notice the way Prospero associates Gonzalo with "fate"?

Earlier, we saw how Gonzalo believes that "fate" determined whether or not he and the rest of the party would drown during the storm. Here, Prospero directly associates Gonzalo with the workings of "Providence divine," as if Gonzalo is an agent of fate. This is a pretty big deal because, in the play, we get the sense that some force greater than even Prospero's magic is at work guiding the lives of each of the characters.

Gonzalo also makes a big utopian speech that literary critics like to compare to a passage from Montaigne's "Of Cannibals," a famous essay that Shakespeare totally cribbed when he wrote Gonzalo's lines. We talk about this more in " Symbols " so check it out if you want to know more. Parents Home Homeschool College Resources.

Study Guide. By William Shakespeare. Gonzalo is an old adviser to the King of Naples. Due to his honesty, he is fully trusted by the king. Throughout the play, his character shows the good of humanity. When the ship is about to be wrecked, Gonzalo shows his wisdom by the way he interprets the character of the officer of the ship. He has remarkable patience earned with age. Once washed ashore, the whole group is divided under the magic spell of Prospero.

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