Tempest fights awfully hard with Richard III for being my favorite Shakespeare play, and it is obvious why.



The location, the characters, and the masterful storytelling all meet and give Shakespeare's most well-rounded play in his career. There is a literary masterpiece in the lines of the piece. Wonderfully complex, Shakespeare gives his viewers (or readers, as the case may be) a walking chess game with Prospero and Alonso being the kings of both sides.



Hidden within are the conflicts of slavery, conquest, utopian desires, and a myriad of other jewels that it is difficult to see how anyond can count this play as anything lesser than extraordinary.



Seeing it on stage is almost a different experience, and both are definitely worth your time. Julie Taymor is coming out with a movie rendition soon, and after seeing her fantastic handling of Titus Andronicus, her Tempest will be nothing short of Shakespeare's original visions.