![]() ![]() ![]() Given its varied and enduring themes of racism, love, jealousy, betrayal, revenge and repentance, Othello is still often performed in professional and community theater alike, and has been the source for numerous operatic, film, and literary adaptations. The story revolves around its two central characters: Othello, a Moorish general in the Venetian army and his unfaithful ensign, Iago. It is based on the story Un Capitano Moro (A Moorish Captain) by Cinthio, a disciple of Boccaccio, first published in 1565. Othello is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1603. The Tragedy of Othello, The Moor of Venice, William Shakespeare This is Othello's fatal error, and Desdemona-and Othello himself-pay dearly for it. Othello cannot see the reality of the evil beneath a mask that in some ways is similar to his own, and instead misinterprets each frank gesture of his devoted wife as proof of the diabolical mask of an accomplished adulteress. Iago's mask hides the fact that he is a sociopath motivated by jealousy and rage. Othello's mask hides a snake's nest of fears, fears bred from the insecurity of being a black man in an alien white society. Iago wears a similar mask: the mask of the thoroughly professional military subordinate who is frank and blunt and incapable of dishonesty. Othello is a man who always wears a mask in public: the mask of the thoroughly professional military leader who is far too noble to be moved by emotions which might cause others to be petty or untrustworthy. During this reading, however, I began to realize that Othello is much more than the greatest of melodramas, and that the key to appreciating its depth lies in the concept of the public mask. ![]() ![]() Shaw remarked that Othello is written "in the style of Italian opera," and it shares with Verdi and Donizetti the same big emotions, the same clear demarcation of good and evil, that give Lucia and Trovatore their emotional intensity-and their lack of essential seriousness too. All Rights Reserved.I have always admired this play as Shakespeare's most theatrical tragedy, but I also feel that it often veers too close to melodrama. Before this, all the characters, whether male or female, were played exclusively by men. This production is of particular importance because it marked the first time a woman was accepted on the English stage. One performance of Othello, produced in 1660, starred an actress by the name of Margaret Hughes in the role of Desdemona. Players in your housewifery, and housewives' in your beds. Saints m your injuries, devils being offended, The purest of all sentiments is, in his mind, a mere "lust of the blood and a permission of the will." It is utterly foreign to his nature indeed, we cannot even conceive of lago's loving anything." Read on.Ĭome on, come on you are pictures out of doors,īells in your parlors, wild-cats in your kitchens, Hudson says, Iago is "severely introversive," and is only satisfied by dipping what is good into his own vileness and bringing it forth reeking in the filth of his own evil nature. All things pure and noble in their nature are looked upon as far beneath his "learned spirit." As Mr. He neither respects moral beauty as seen in Desdemona, nor the grand nobleness of the mighty-souled Othello. Probal to thinking, and, indeed, the course When this advice is free I give and honest, Shakespeare Quotations (by Play and Theme)Īnd what's he, then, that says I play the villain? Seneca's Tragedies and the Elizabethan Drama Shakespeare and Race: The Relationship Between Othello and Desdemona Iago's Motives: The Relationship Between Othello and Iago The Play of Othello as a Whole: Its Rank Among Shakespeare's Roderigo, Emilia and Shakespeare's Secondary Characters The Moral Enigma of Shakespeare's Othello Play Construction and the Suffering and Murder of Desdemona Shakespeare's Iago Compared with the Original A bedchamber in the castle: DESDEMONA in bed asleep Please see the bottom of each scene for full explanatory notes.Please see the bottom of this page for helpful Othello resources.The complete text of Othello: Scenes from Shakespeare's Othello ![]()
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