My brother and thy uncle, called Antonio –
I pray thee, mark me – that a brother should
Be so perfidious! – he whom next thyself
Of all the world I loved and to him put
The manage of my state; as at that time
Through all the signories it was the first
And Prospero the prime duke, being so reputed
In dignity, and for the liberal arts
Without a parallel; those being all my study,
The government I cast upon my brother
And to my state grew stranger, being transported
And rapt in secret studies. Thy false uncle –
Dost thou attend me?
– William Shakespeare
The Tempest, Act 1, Scene 2. In a lengthy speech, Prospero dominates the conversation with his passively listening daughter Miranda ("Doest thou attend me?"), as he explains how they wound up on the island. He explains that he gave over the day-to-day government to his brother Antonio, while he focused his attention to studies in the art of magic – "rapt in secret studies." But his brother turned out to be false and deceitful. Since Prospero realizes that he lost his dukedom because of his relentless pursuit of magic, this foreshadows the decision he will later make to renounce his magic so that he can take back his position of Duke of Milan. There is also use of a travel metaphor in "being transported And rapt in secret studies" to describe Prospero’s intellectual voyage.