This engaging book provides detailed in-depth discussion of the various influences that an audience in 1611 would have brought to interpreting 'The Tempest'. How did people think about the world, about God, about sin, about kings, about civilized conduct? Learn about the social hierarchy, gender relationships, parenting and family dynamics, court corruption, class tensions, the concept of tragi-comedy and all the subversions, transgressions, and oppositions that made the play an unsettling picture of a world attempting to come to terms with capitalism and colonialism while re-addressing the nature of rule.