Flaws Of Gonzallo

In William Shakespeare’s The Tempest, Gonzalo, an old lord, describes how the island could be a utopian world and how this world would function. He gives it characteristics that people enjoy but does not take into account how difficult it is for people to adjust to these sorts of changes. The world is as splendid as he can conceive, yet it has problems that he did not considered. These flaws turn his ideal world into one that is not believable.
Gonzalo envisions a utopian world as a plantation where he would be the king. In act 2 scene 1, he describes the way this world would exist. He would govern his people with perfection and would bring the land into a golden age. He would not have any trade coming to the island since the island would

As Gonzalo said, “all men idle, all; / and women too.” (1, 2, 154-155) He does not want anyone to obligate anyone to work. This is where the problem comes in because “unless the commonwealth were comprised of supermen, he and his comrades would need to labor for food and shelter, despite the fact that he negates the need for toil” (Farrar 62). People would require food, meaning they would need to work to collect the food. Nature could provide some forms of shelter, but to create real homes would also require labour. There is no way to prevent someone from doing some kind. The land itself is capable of producing a specific amount without care. If the society was just taking from the land and not replenishing or caring for the land’s needs, the land would stop reproducing in abundance. This would likely lead to shortages of food and maybe even starvation. Although nature could produce food in abundance, she would not be able to support a multitude of people regardless of her initial abundance. People would destroy the surplus by taking all the resources that remained. It is absurd to think “that Gonzalo’s society [can] create plenty out of idleness” (Farrar 62) when everything in his real life requires

“Sword, pike, knife, gun or need of any engine / would I not have” (1, 2, 161-162) clearly expresses Gonzalo’s views or violence. The world would need to have all of the evil, especially evil of humanity’s making, removed from it in order to be even semi functional. It seems as though he believes that he can eliminate it from his world by banning a few features. In this world, “Gonzalo disposes of evil by preventing it from coming into existence” (Seiden 8). This concept is not possible, as even without weapons or work, people will still find ways of expressing evil. “If there is to be no “sweat . . . treason . . . gun, or need of any engine’’ among these “innocent people,” then evil... does not exist even as an idea” (Seiden 8). Since there is no toil, only idleness, working in itself would be an evil. This means that if anyone ‘broke’ Gonzalo’s rule of not working, that person would be allowing evil to enter the realm. This would destroy the place’s utopia, making the rest worthless. Gonzalo’s world would require that “all the vices of all people are eradicated” (Farrer