The Tragedy of Othello the Moor of Venice

1. The Tragedy of Othello the Moor of Venice First lecture

2. The Renaissance Studies major • An interdisciplinary major for students interested in the literature, art, history, music of the 15th, 16th, 17th centuries. See <english.ucsb.edu/faculty/oconnell/renstudies> • We’ll have the occasional visit of other Early Modern faculty for mini-lectures. • Prof. Jon Snyder (Italian) will talk about the image of Venice in the early 1600s (next Thursday). • Prof. McGee (History) will talk about kingship and King James while we’re discussing Macbeth. • Prof. Fumerton (English) will talk about ballads in the context of The Winter’s Tale. • And if anyone is interested in learning to sing 17th cent. Ballads, check out Music A 70B being taught this quarter (Tues-Thurs, 4-5:20 in Music 2224) by Revell Carr, the Music Specialist for the Pepys Ballad Archive.

3. The tragedy’s particular character • The most painful of Shakespeare’s four “great” tragedies? • Like the mythical old lady in the theater, we want to shout, “Stop, you fool! She’s innocent!” • The fastest moving of the tragedies. • With a single line of action – no subplot, no distractions. • And no comedy (except the opening of Act III, scene 1; is this a bit lame? Would we advise Sh. to cut this?) • And a compressed time scheme – sometimes referred to as a “double time scheme.”

4. Dating, text, leading actor • Perhaps written as early as 1603, but certainly by autumn of 1604 (November), when it was performed at court. • But not printed until 1622 – in quarto -- six years after Shakespeare’s death). • Then a text that differs somewhat from the quarto was published in the First Folio of 1624. • Folio is the better text; Pelican text is edited from the Folio. See “base Judean” (F) against “base Indian” (Q) in O’s final speech. • Role of Othello was written for Richard Burbage, the most powerful actor of the King’s Men, and the greatest tragedian of his day. • Burbage had played Hamlet and other leading roles for the King’s Men.

5. Source • Shakespeare got the story from a collection of Italian stories, the Hecatommithi (One Hundred Tales) of Giradi Cinthio (1565). • Which had not been translated into English by 1603. • So it seems Shakespeare could read Italian. Did he travel to Italy in the 1580s? • In G.C., the valiant Moor is not named. Sh. Invented the name Othello. • And “Iago” (also not named in G.C.) has motivation for his actions: he had been in love with Disdemona, but was rejected by her. His plot is his vengeance. • And Disdemona’s death happens differently: in collusion with the Moor, “Iago” beats her with a sand-filled stocking, then he and the Moor make it appear that the ceiling has fallen on her. • The time scheme is less compressed in G.C. • It takes a while before the truth of the murder comes out.

6. The Moor • “The Moor”: scholars have gone around and around about what this means. • But it seems clear that a Moor was someone from North Africa. • And the play makes clear his racial difference: he is “black Othello.” • Iago calls him “an old black ram” (I, 1, 97), Roderigo refers to him as “the thick lips” (I, 1, 65), and Iago as “a Barbary horse” (I, 1, 110). • Brabantio refers to “the sooty bosom of such a thing as thou art” (I, 3, 70-71). • Moors were not a part of the London population, but Londoners had seen them in the embassies of N. African nations. • Moors were exotic, strange, were Muslim in religion. • And so racially and religiously “Other” from white, Christian Europeans.

7. Othello the Moor • But Othello has converted to Christianity. • And devoted himself to the service of Venice. • I’m reminded of a Borges story, “The warrior and the captive,” where he tells of Droctulft, a Lombard warrior, who during the siege of Ravenna in the 6th or 8th century, went over to the Roman side. • Droctulft left his own companions, who were attacking the city, and joined the defense of Ravenna – converted by the beauty and symmetry of the Roman city. (Labyrinths, p. 128) • Can we similarly imagine Othello, also an outsider, the Other, converted by the beauty and the civility of Venice, and so “converted” in every sense to what it represents? • Like Droctulft for Ravenna, Othello seems to have a special reverence for Venice.

8. Othello the Moor • Portrayed in entirely negative terms in the first scene: • He’s foolish, Iago suggests, • having chosen Cassio, “a great arithmetician,” as his officer instead of the more experienced Iago. • And both Iago and Roderigo cover him with racially charged epithets. • Which is tinged with a sense of sexual distaste – or envy? • Desdemona has been brought “to the gross clasps of a lascivious Moor” (Roderigo). • “Your daughter and the Moor are making the beast with two backs” (Iago). • We’re led to believe that a monstrous black man has stolen a beautiful white girl.

9. And Othello’s actual appearance . . • In I, 1? • Quiet, confident, assured of his position with the signiory of Venice. • Revealing his own aristocratic background (“I fetch my life and being/ From men of royal siege, and my demerits/ May speak unbonneted . . . ) • He has married Desdemona only because of his love for her. • His calm in the face of the armed crew that Brabantio brings. • “Keep up your bright swords, for the dew will rust them.” • His courtesy to Brabantio. • How does he handle the racial animus against him?

10. The “Othello music” • Phrase comes from a famous essay by G. Wilson Knight. • I, 3, 81-82: “Rude am I in speech/ And little blessed with the soft phrase of peace . . .” • He’s a military man, not a poet or scholar. • But is his speech really “rude” (meaning unpolished, ineloquent), is he really “little blessed with the soft phrase”? • He seems to relish words, perhaps giving the impression of someone who has learned the language and loves its nuances. • “the cannibals that each other eat,/ The anthropophogi.” • His speech to the signiory: I,3,128ff. • Duke: “I think this tale would win my daughter too.” • See his love aria to Desdemona when they meet on Cyprus: II, 1, 182ff. • And Iago’s reply: “But I’ll set down the pegs that make this music.” • Othello’s farewell to his profession: III, 3, 347ff. The poetry of his soldiering. • Or 453, where the beauty of the lines gives a kind of horror to his vow of constancy in his “bloody thoughts.” • Why give Othello such eloquence? • And what happens to the “Othello music” at IV, 1, 35ff?

11. Othello and Des • What to make of their love/marriage? • “She loved me for the dangers I had passed.” • “And I loved her that she did pity them.” • And what she says at I, 3, 248-254. • “I saw Othello’s visage in his mind.” • Doesn’t cancel out the sexual attraction, but does it make it more complex, more brainy? • Do we ever doubt the potent character of their love? • Her boldness in eloping with him is clearly a factor in our judgment of their love. • She’s taking an immense chance; clearly no meek little Venetian girl. • Each of these elements is challenged by Iago’s formulations. • So how do we judge the matter?