Prometheus Unbound. The Regeneration of a fallen God

Prometheus Unbound (1820) is a lyrical drama in four acts by Percy Bysshe Shelley, and is considered one of his major works. With this drama, Shelley rewrites Aeschylus' Prometheus myth and incorporates it into a larger mythic vision of mankind's potential to create a new golden age. The following analysis is a close reading of the first act of Prometheus Unbound, where Prometheus' character development through this act will be explored. It will be shown that Prometheus can be said to have lost his divinity, and struggles through the first act to restore it. In the critical reception of Prometheus Unbound, the numerous allusions and literary references to both Milton's Satan and Christianity's Jesus Christ have lead many critics to view Prometheus' regeneration as a transition from a Satanic to a Messianic figure. It is also common to view this regeneration as happening quickly and at the beginning of the drama. The following thesis will challenge both of these interpretive trends, and present an alternative interpretation of Shelley's Prometheus. On the one hand I argue that it is not necessary, and can even be detrimental, to rely too strongly on the allusions to Paradise Lost and the Bible when analyzing Prometheus' character development. On the other hand I argue that Prometheus' transformation is a moral, emotional, and intellectual process of growth, which spans the entirety of the first act