context Flashcards
How did Shakespeare change the plot of Cinthio’s story?
- Ensign was motivated by lust for Disdemona
- added Roderigo and Brabantio
What were the connotations of the word ‘Moor’ in the Shakespearean era?
- North African
- Sub-Saharan African
what was 16th century Venice like?
- extremely multi-cultural, especially in the trading centre (Rialto)
- famous for its high class prostitutes/ courtesans
How were black people treated in th early 1600s?
- The moroccan ambassador visited Londfo in 1600 to negotaiate a military alliance with the queen
- a draft proclomation in 1601 asked for the deportation of black people
what ideas of monsters were there at the time?
-The Travels of John Mandeville was one of the most popular travel books, detailimg the wondorous races and creatures around the world
What ideas of poison was there in early modern england?
- people were keenly aware of the dangers and benefits of plants as remedies and poisons
- Herball by John Gerard
why is Cyprus significant?
- 1571 sea battle of Lepanto - victory of the Chrisitans over the Ottomans
- -> political resonance
what were cuckholds?
- men depicted with animal horns as a shameful sign
- running joke in any early modern ballads, plays and pamphlets
- -> Othello’s fear of cuckholdery links him to a society that his race makes him feel an outsider from
Who was Leo Africanus?
- used reductive racial stereotypes to describe vices of Africans in 1550
- -> ‘no nation in the world is so subject to jealousie’
who was the first man to play Othello?
-probably Richard Burbage (white actor)
Who was Thomas Rymer?
-a critic who cuttingly asked why Othello wasn’t named ‘the tragedy of the handkerchief’ as it was a tragedy of ‘trifle’
Who was Samuel Taylor Coleridge?
-commented on Iago’s ‘motiveless malignity’
who was Ira Aldridge?
American actor
first black man to play Othello (1825)
how does female speech relate to Othello’s jealousy?
-the misogynist association of uncontrolled female speech with uncontrolled female sexuality fuels Othello’s jealousy
how does the patrileanial society effect women?
- unchastity subverts patrilineal inheritance
- predating paternity tests, England had a cultural obsession with controlling women’s bodies
how did sexual promiscuity effect women?
charge of sexual promiscuity was the most readily available form of assault on a woman’s reputation
how did the church view women?
- untrustworthy, due to original sin and eve’s role in the fall of mankind
- marriage tracts focused on wifely submission (parental permission, discretion)
what similarities can be drawn between Much Ado About Nothing and Othello?
-most mischief and drama happens in an outpost of civilisation (the forest in MAAN)
Were black people common in 18th century England?
-few people outside of London would have ever seen a black person
What is interesting about the marriage between Othello and Desdemona?
- eloped, and therefore illict in the eyes of Venice
- -> But shakespeare views there love as not illict, and the play regards them as fully entitled
- -> they don’t see that they are prisoners of a time of racial prejudice and sexual inequality
- -> Iago personifies the venemous rage of society
Who was Machiavelli?
- desired to occupy political office, and worked hard for 14 years, but the Florence came over Papal control again (with help from Venice) and Machiavelli was fired, arrested and tortured.
- -> Wrote ‘the prince’, a scathing review of human nature and how duplicity and manipulation is the road to political success
- -> believed it was more important to be feared than loved
- -> ‘good’ in the christian sense brings weakness
How do verse and prose compare in Shakespeare’s comedies and tragedies?
- Twelfth night = 60% prose
- Othello = 80% verse
How does line distribution among the men compare across Shakespeare’s tragedies?
Iago = 31% Othello = 25% Hamlet = 37%
How does line distribution among the women compare across Shakespeare’s tragedies?
Desdemona = 11%
Lady Macbeth = 11%
Ophelia (Hamlet) = 4%
What was the effect of the drinking scene on the contemporary audience?
- ironic ‘foreign’ perspective on the English (who were very nationalistic)
- reputed madness and excessive drinking habits of the English were a stock joke on the London stage
How does the setting relate to Othello’s religion?
-dramatises the singular vulnerability of the Moor, a figure who is alien despite being a convert to Christianity
What does Moor REALLY mean?
- (subtitle of Play = ‘the Moor of Venice’ and emphasizes his exotic nature)
- A muslim of North Africa
- -> handkerchief is a treasured relic from his past, and from Egypt
- -> possibly pronounced Otello on early stage and so sounds like Ottoman
How does the Ottoman empire relate to the play?
- set in 1570s, during an ongoing conflict between the European christian powers and the Islamic Ottoman empire
- English writers like Knolles deamonised the Ottomans as barbaric and cruel, but Shakespeare undercuts this binary opposition by making his hero Venetian and his hero an outsider
-suicide = service as christian convert to kill the inner Turk
what is the true role of the clown?
- not directly Shakespeare or Othello’s voice –> political message
- eases tension
- truth tellers that reflect on other characters
what happens in the stage production by Lawerence Oliveirre?
- Othello rips a cross off of his neck when converting to madness
- -> Christian = good and Muslim = improper
Who is Forello?
- a jealous husband in the play ‘every man in his humour’
- -> naming Othello after him suggests that Othello’s jealousy is more important than his race
How does ‘Othello’ contrast ‘King Lear’?
In King Lear, the motives are clearly laid out (Villain = Edmund)
What are the origins of Iago’s name?
- Spanish Saint ‘Iago’ (giving name Santiago) = known conquerer of Moors
- -> suggests racial agenda
How could the play be defended as not racist?
-It interrogates racism rather than being racist, just as the taming of the shrew interrogates sexism
What is meant by ‘Syntactic vs Semantic’?
- Syntactic: structure of tragedy i.e. downfall and catharsis
- Semantic: tonal ideas of tragedy i.e. serious and sad
-largely, Othello is a syntactic but not a Semantic tragedy
In what ways does ‘Othello’ draw on the framework of comedy?
- Iago is witty
- Plotting occurs more in comedy than tragedy
- In classic tragedy events are down to fate and gods. In Othello they are down to human interventions
