Shelley’s Sleeplistening: Democratic Sorority in Act IV of Prometheus Unbound

I interpret “sleeplistening” in Act IV of Prometheus Unbound as a decisive motif in Shelleyan poetics and political thought. Following this concept complicates the scholarship’s predominant reading of Act IV as hyperbolically positive. Through an analysis of Ione and Panthea’s dialogues, I show that their sleeplistening sorority contrasts sharply with the Demogorgon’s fascist “wakelistening” regime. Drawing on Peter Szendy’s theories of listening and reflexivity, I argue that the sisters’ sleeplistening stages not a pure recording surface but a democratic multiplicity of competing dreams, whereas the Demogorgon’s permanently awake regime attempts the closure of history and the annulment of Shelley’s future.