In this paper, I focus on an offstage character in Shakespeare’s The Tempest, Claribel, the Neapolitan princess who is given to the King of Tunis by her father King Alonso in an arranged marriage. First, I emphasize the significance of this union in terms of the sexual and political dynamics of the play. Drawing attention to the exchange value of women in establishing hierarchies or alliances between groups in patriarchal societies, I argue that Claribel’s miscegenated union with the African king undermines the play’s overconfident postcolonial interpretations based on the Prospero-Caliban relationship. Reading the play against the historical and political conditions in the Mediterranean, which is the play’s topography, in the second part of the essay, I speculate on the young princess’s possible future in Tunis. Claribel’s story is suggestive of the hundreds of Christian maidens that populated the Islamic harems in this period. While most of these women were acquired through abduction, not through exogamy, their stories and the esteem and power they attained in Muslim royal families may be helpful in envisaging a destiny for Claribel.

中文翻译：

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“我们对国王美丽的女儿克拉丽贝尔知之甚少”：《暴风雨》中伊斯兰教的挑战

在这篇论文中，我关注的是莎士比亚的《暴风雨》中的一个幕后角色，克拉丽贝尔，那不勒斯公主，她的父亲阿隆索国王在包办婚姻中送给了突尼斯国王。首先，我强调这种结合在戏剧的性和政治动态方面的重要性。提请注意女性在父权社会中的群体之间建立等级或联盟的交换价值，我认为克拉里贝尔与非洲国王的异族结合破坏了该剧基于普洛斯佩罗-卡利班关系的过度自信的后殖民解释。在文章的后半部分，我阅读了这部与地中海历史和政治条件相反的剧本，也就是剧本的地形，我推测了这位年轻的公主在突尼斯可能的未来。Claribel 的故事暗示了这一时期居住在伊斯兰后宫的数百名基督教少女。虽然这些女性中的大多数是通过绑架而不是通过外婚获得的，但她们的故事以及她们在穆斯林王室中获得的尊重和权力可能有助于设想克拉丽贝尔的命运。