Given that up until this moment, Othello has acted in a noble manner, his rash behaviour with Desdemona contradicts his whole verse-speaking mannerism. I know, Iago. The party arrives in Cyprus to find that a storm has destroyed the Turkish fleet. man of peace and had little admiration for the Caesars and 'other great warriors, is here taking his opportunity to show how little of the higher virtues dwells in great military ability. Angry at having been passed over by Othello for promotion to the rank of lieutenant, and also because he seems to enjoy creating mayhem for its own sake, Iago develops an intricate conspiracy to ruin Othello. 175198, at p.186. This wholly unwarranted [104] Leigh Hunt saw Kean's Othello in 1819, describing his performance in The Examiner as "the masterpiece of the living stage". Othello blames Cassio for the disturbance and strips him of his rank. In 2009, stand-up comedian Lenny Henry played Othello, produced by Northern Broadsides in collaboration with West Yorkshire Playhouse. [180] The film was described as a "fair stab at turning the Bard into a decent night at the multiplex"[181] but failed to achieve success at the box office. The soldier fired his gun, breaking the arm of the actor playing Othello. She goes on to make it clear that she believes that she is doing Othello a good turn by getting him back together with his loving friend, Cassio. "The temptation scene" is a term often used in the critical literature to mean. Would Othello Be Jealous Without Iago.pdf - Usman Khan 10Lc Iago is very popular among the characters in the play. Iago's attitudes to love Flashcards RODERIGO I would not follow him, then. 230258, at p.232. More books than SparkNotes. I could never betterstead thee than now. the Moor in his new home in Venice. Power and Control in Othello, Notes on a Scandal and The Collector. Othello - Act 3, scene 3 | Folger Shakespeare Library Iago Iago's character is particularly significant because it is his 'performance' of false love that replaces and subverts Desdemona's true love. Stanton, Kay ""Made to write 'whore' upon? When Desdemona drops a handkerchief (the first gift given to her by Othello), Emilia finds it and gives it to Iago at his request, unaware of what he plans to do with it. The UK's National Film and Television Archive holds over 25 20th-Century films containing performances, adaptations or extracts from Othello including Anson Dyer's 1920 animated Othello, 1921's Carnival and its 1932 remake, the 1922 German film The Moor, the 1936 Men Are Not Gods, 1941's East of Piccadilly, George Cukor's 1947 A Double Life, Orson Welles in Return to Glennascaul and Welles' own Othello, Sergei Yutkevich's Russian language Othello discussed below, two productions for BBC Television (including Jonathan Miller's for the BBC Television Shakespeare series, discussed below), Basil Dearden's All Night Long, Janet Suzman's 1988 South African TV Othello, a film of Trevor Nunn's RSC production with Willard White and Ian McKellen in the central roles, and True Identity - a crime caper in which Lenny Henry's character Miles lands the role of understudy to James Earl Jones (playing himself) in a production of Othello. What event delays Othello's arrival on Cyprus? [88][89] Moorish characters were conventionally played in turbans, with long white gowns and red trousers, with the actor's face darkened with lampblack or coal. As one of "the usual lunacies," so-called, in the interpretation of the play, however, Professor Bradley says, "It has been held, for example, that this lago now declares his hatred of the pair, and intimates his willingness to join Roderigo in an attempt to harass Othello, and if not too late, to prevent his marriage. During the scuffle, Iago comes from behind Cassio and badly cuts his leg. IAGO Why, there's no remedy. [166], Laurence Olivier said that the role of Othello demanded "enormously big"[167] acting, and he incorporated what The Spectator described as his "outsize, elaborate, overwhelming"[168] performance into the film of his National Theatre production. Iago uses Cassio's youth, good looks, and friendship with Desdemona to play on Othello . Characters [Scene Summary], After Othello has berated her about the handkerchief, Cassio appears and again asks Desdemona for her help in getting his job back, so that "I may again / Exist, and be a member of his love / Whom I with all the office of my heart / Entirely honour" (3.4.111-114). From Hamlet, an ideal prince, and other essays in Shakesperean interpretation: Hamlet; Merchant of Venice; Othello; King Lear by Alexander W. Crawford. For some [1] Desdemona is the only named character in Cinthio's tale, with his few other characters identified only as the "Moor", the "Squadron Leader", the "Ensign", and the "Ensign's Wife" (corresponding to the play's Othello, Cassio, Iago, and Emilia). "Nude Shakespeare in Film and Nineties Popular Feminism" in Alexander, Catherine M. S. and Wells, Stanley "Shakespeare and Sexuality" Cambridge University Press, 2001, pp.183-200 at pp.190-192. / I hope you will consider what is spoke / Comes from my love" (3.3.215-217). stealthy enemy. He tells Roderigo of how Othello passed him over for promotion in favor Cassio, and then says. But the "lunacy" on this occasion is to be charged to Othello in utterly disregarding and [187] And the first decade of the 21st-Century saw two non-English language film adaptations: Alexander Abela's French Souli set the story in a modern-day Madagascan fishing village, and Vishal Bhardwaj's Hindi Omkara amidst political violence in modern Uttar Pradesh. Iago begins to plot to himself how he may use Othello's marriage to get back at Othello and . Is Iago Gay In Othello? Homosexuality & Love In Othello Play - Arogundade Othello: Iago Quotes | SparkNotes When Iago tells Othello that Brabantio will try to annul his marriage to Desdemona, Othello replies that he is worthy of her, and that for her he has given up some precious freedom. Othello is a Moorish military commander who was serving as a general of the Venetian army in defence of Cyprus against invasion by Ottoman Turks. Neill, 2006, pp.122-123 citing Virginia Mason Vaughan's "Othello: A Contextual History". Shakespeare, William "Othello", The Oxford Shakespeare, Oxford University Press, 2006, p.35. [156] And Richard Eyre's Stage Beauty depicts a restoration performance of the play. this premium content, Members Only section of the site! Badger, 1916. "The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare and Popular Culture", Cambridge University Press, 2007, pp. His other adviceto become a soldier, and to get a man's beard even if he has to get a phony onemerely marks time between the repetitions of "put money in thy purse." How does Cassio feel about Desdemona? 'Tis the curse of service. [112] Konstantin Stanislavski admired, and was greatly influenced by, Salvini's Othello, which he saw in 1882. The love between Desdemona and Othello begins as ideally as it can. Character analysis: Iago in Othello | The British Library He was dissatisfied with his own performance, later recalling "I was able to reach nothing more than insane strain, spiritual and physical impotence, and the squeezing of tragic emotion out of myself. [160] And the text is heavily cut: Othello's first words are his speech to the Senators from Act 1 Scene 3. Upon their reunion in Cyprus, Othello says to Desdemona, "Honey, you shall be well desired in Cyprus; / I have found great love amongst them" (2.1.204-205). After his usual manner Shakespeare has made the opening conflict, that between Othello and lago, the chief conflict of the play. At this point in the lives of Othello and lago a great change comes over their relations. She's Come Undone: Did Desdemona's Determination Dictate Her Death? "[199] Charles Marowitz's An Othello reworked the play in the context of the Black Power movement. Bani played Othello as a Torres Straits Islander and member of the Torres Straits Light Infantry Battalion during World War II. [97], Among seventeenth- and eighteenth-century actors praised for expressing the nobility of the Moor - and fully exploring the degrading passions which lead to the brutal murder he commits - were Thomas Betterton and Spranger Barry. Professor Bradley may be taken as voicing the best that can be said by those who would lay all the blame of the tragedy upon lago, but who feel they must account in some manner for this sudden malignity. Othello Character Development Use quote support in your Chillington Rutter, Carol "Looking at Shakespeare's Women on Film" in Jackson, Russell (ed.) Brown, John Russell "The Oxford Illustrated History of the Theatre", Oxford University Press, 1995, pp. The consent submitted will only be used for data processing originating from this website. In place of this, however, he has an alternative that becomes his ruling motive, to put Othello into a jealousy of Cassio. Badger, 1916. More than any other character's, his comments are charged with homeoerotic suggestiveness. Ever since Coleridge it has been the common thing, though by no means universal, to attribute the whole trouble to the sudden and unmotived malignity of lago, or to forget the fact that it has been sudden and unlike anything heard of before on the part of lago, and to assume only the malignity. Iago begins to plot to himself how he may use Othello's marriage to get back at Othello and . When Iago stabs her, she has nothing to say about him, or about anything except Desdemona. For examples see Wikipedia's articles on. rightly grieved lago, who took it as a great slight, for he believed he was entitled to promotion. a storm. She makes her way to Desdemona's bed, sings Desdemona's "willow" song and dies saying, "Moor, she was chaste; she loved thee, cruel Moor; / So come my soul to bliss, as I speak true; / So speaking as I think, alas, I die" (5.2.249-251) Iago has been "defeated by the power of love" because he couldn't understand love. Moody, Jane "Romantic Shakespeare" in Welles, Stanley and Stanton, Sarah (eds.) [190], Voltaire's 1732 French play Zare was a "neoclassical refurbishment" of Shakespeare's "barbarous" work. "[33] And it is one of only two plays (alongside Timon of Athens) in which the word "whore" is used with specific reference to every named female character. "The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare on Film" Cambridge University Press, 2000 pp.183-198 at pp.189-193. In front of the Duke and others, she openly proclaims her love for Othello. Iago handles this turn of events by threatening Othello with emotional isolation. This rewarding of Cassio with a military position because of personal service to himself and Desdemona was a most dangerous thing for a general to do, and opened up all kinds of possibilities of trouble, not only with lago, but with the discipline of all his forces. Come, be a man" (1.3.325-326). this premium content, Members Only section of the site! "The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare on Film", Cambridge University Press, 2000, pp.295-313 at pp.303-306. [87], The title role was originally played by Richard Burbage, whose eulogies reveal that he was admired in the role. [152][153] This plot is also shared by the very first Othello-influenced film: the 18-minute Danish 1911 Desdemona. Barbara Hodgdon, quoted in Tatspaugh, 2000, p.151. [163], Sergei Yutkevich's Russian film, with a screenplay by Boris Pasternak, was an attempt to make Shakespeare accessible to "the working man". Of course Iago is glad to accept the assignment. Theme Of Love In Othello By Shakespeare English Summary 645657, at p.649. Roderigo, a wealthy and dissolute gentleman, complains to his friend Iago, an ensign, that Iago has not told him about the recent secret marriage between Desdemona, the daughter of Brabantio, a senator, and Othello, a Moorish general in the Venetian army. They are needy, dependent and nagging. [194], In the 19th-Century United States, Othello was often used in parody, sometimes allied with minstrel shows: with the contrast between Shakespearean verse and African-American dialect a source of racist humour. and shortly thereafter Emilia facilitates a meeting between Desdemona and Cassio . [143], In 2017, Ben Naylor directed the play for the Pop-up Globe in Auckland, New Zealand, with Mori actor Te Kohe Tuhaka in the title role, Jasmine Blackborow as Desdemona and Haakon Smestad as Iago. [9][10], Another possible source was the Description of Africa by Leo Africanus. He realizes that he must at no time be found in a position "Against the Moor" (I. i. Othello orders a general celebration and leaves to consummate his marriage with Desdemona. [92] These patents stated that "all the women's parts to be acted in either of the said two companies for the time to come my be performed by women". With no reason that he dare give, he appoints a wholly inexperienced man in preference to a tried and proven soldier who had fought under his own eyes, "At Rhodes, at Cyprus, and on other grounds Christen'd and heathen." [137], In September 2013, a Tamil adaptation titled Othello, the Fall of a Warrior was directed and produced in Singapore by Subramanian Ganesh. This page was last edited on 9 July 2023, at 08:29. to continue. [Scene Summary]. [19], There is no consensus over Othello's ethnic origin. The story revolves around two characters, Othello and Iago. [37][38], The over-reliance of the plot of Othello upon a trivial prop, the handkerchief, was noted in the play's earliest criticism. The former governor Montano arrives with Gratiano and Iago. The task of the critic at present, then, is to discover the cause of this [13], Cinthio's "Moor" is the model for Shakespeare's Othello, but some researchers believe the poet also took inspiration from the several Moorish delegations from Morocco to Elizabethan England circa 1600. For knowledge of this, Shakespeare may have used Gasparo Contarini's The Commonwealth and Government of Venice, in Lewes Lewkenor's 1599 translation. [8], While supplying the source of the plot, the book offered nothing of the sense of place of Venice or Cyprus. But how little this was his intention is seen by the fact that he never He certainly seems to take great pleasure in preventing Othello from enjoying marital happiness, and he expresses his love for Othello frequently and effusively. One is that Iago had expected to be promoted to the rank of Othello's first lieutenant and tells Roderigo that three influential Venetians ("Three great ones of the city"), in fact, had recommended him to Othello. [212] But the most notable version, considered a masterpiece with a power equivalent to that of the play, is Verdi's 1887 Otello,[213] for which Arrigo Boito's libretto marked a return to faithfulness to the original plot, including the reappearance of the pillow as the murder weapon, rather than Ducis' dagger. Responsibility for Tragedy in Othello and Macbeth, Gender Roles and Sexual Politics in Othello, Desdemona and the Handkerchief in Othello, The Significance of Stories in Othello and The Tempest, To Assert Eternal Providence: The Religion of Iago, Explore how Shakespeare portrays Othello in Act V Scene II, focusing on this scene and relating it to the play as a whole, Attacking Apartheid and Trivializing the Fear of Black Male Sexuality: Janet Suzman's "Othello", The Significance of Act 5, Scene 1 in Othello, Intrinsic Factors and Extenuating Forces in the Determination of Romantic Relationships in Twelfth Night and Othello, Women's Confirmity in A Midsummer Night's Dream and Othello, Othello: Racial Stereotyping through Images of Light and Dark, Psychological Development in Housekeeping and The Other, Form, Structure, and Love in Duffy's and Rossetti's Poetry, Continuation of Values Throughout "Othello" and "O", Its All a Matter of Perception: Reality and Iagos Megalomania, Shakespeare's Construction of Desdemona as an Acceptable Feminine Woman. . [185] Tim Blake Nelson's basketball-themed teen drama O reset the story at an elite boarding school. [221] In it, the characters of Tortzov, the director, and Kostya, the young actor - both partly autobiographical - rehearse the role of Othello in the opening act. Without even asking why he needs it, she gives away the handkerchief of Desdemona given to her by Othello as their first token of love and it becomes the solid weapon in the hands of Iago. [47], The character's own motives are never made clear, because Iago himself expresses too many motives:[48], These led Samuel Taylor Coleridge to refer to Iago's "motive-hunting of motive-less Malignity". [157], The filming of Orson Welles' Othello was plagued by chaos. [120] Margaret Webster's 1943 Broadway production was considered a theatrical landmark, with Robeson (in the words of Howard Barnes) "making the Moor the great and terrible figure of tragedy which he has so rarely been on the stage. [191] And across continental Europe through most of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries the play was better known than Shakespeare's in Jean-Franois Ducis' adaptation and its subsequent translations, in which a heroine renamed Hdelmone is stabbed to death by Othello. DESDEMONA flouting the principle of preferment that holds in military circles more rigorously than perhaps anywhere else. Put money in thy purse; follow thou thewars; defeat thy favor with an usurp'd beard. "The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare on Stage" Cambridge University Press, 2002, pp. [43][44] The whiteness of the handkerchief is often taken to represent Desdemona's purity; and the red strawberries blood from her hymen symbolising her virgin marriage. [100], Paul Robeson's iconic performance (see 20th Century, below) was not the first professional performance of the title role by a black actor: the first known is James Hewlett at the African Grove Theatre, New York, in 1822. (3.3.375-376). / For making him egregiously an ass" (2.1.308-309). When Othello mentions the handkerchief as proof, Emilia realizes what Iago has done, and she exposes him. In Sudanese novelist Tayeb Salih's retelling of the Othello story, Season of Migration to the North, the central character Mustafa Sa'eed, on trial for the murder of his white mistress, refuses to be judged by the standards of the play, declaring: Language links are at the top of the page across from the title. Desdemona's Love In Othello - 1073 Words | Cram Othello, but only to disturb his relations with Desdemona, and to put him into an agony of jealousy. Later in the scene, Iago drops a few hints that start to arouse Othello's jealousy, but craftily pretends that he doesn't want to say much, thus giving the impression that he knows a lot more than he is telling. When Roderigo, who is madly in love with Desdemona, hears that she has eloped with Othello, he complains to Iago. Iago: At the beginning of the play, Iago is established as a highly manipulative and deceptive character. on thy love, I charge thee" (2.3.177-178), "Thy honesty and love doth mince this matter, / Making it light to Cassio" (2.3.247-248), "Cassio, I love thee / But never more be officer of mine" (2.3.248-249), "good lieutenant, I think you think I love you" (2.3.311), "I protest, in the sincerity of love and honest kindness" (2.3.327), "But he protests he loves you / And needs no other suitor but his likings / To take the safest occasion by the front / To bring you in again" (3.1.47-50), "You do love my lord: / You have known him long; and be you well assured / He shall in strangeness stand no further off / Than in a politic distance" (3.3.10-13), "That, I being absent and my place supplied, , / My general will forget my love and service" (3.3.17-18), "If thou dost love me / Show me thy thought" (3.3.116), "I think thou dost; / And, for I know thou'rt full of love and honesty, / And weigh'st thy words before thou givest them breath, / Therefore these stops of thine fright me the more" (3.3.117-120), "I am glad of it; for now I shall have reason / To show the love and duty that I bear you / With franker spirit" (3.3.193-195), "but I am much to blame; / I humbly do beseech you of your pardon / For too much loving you" (3.3.211-213), "I' faith, I fear it has. [135], In summer 2013, the Royal National Theatre produced the play with Adrian Lester in the title role and Rory Kinnear as Iago. He infatuates from his own side only. [42], Symbolically the handkerchief represents the bond between Othello and Desdemona, and its loss the breaking of that bond: Othello blames Desdemona for its loss when in fact he casts it aside while she is trying to use it to help him. [67] Yet this short timeframe does not allow any time for the supposed affair between Desdemona and Cassio to have happened.
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