He added: “There is a lot more in common between Shakespeare’s tragic romance and Jonson’s imperial Rome than first meets the eye – similar plot devices, characterisation, opportunities for audience interaction and, most persuasively for me, shared phrasing that doesn’t appear anywhere else in Shakespeare’s work.” The entire company is experimenting with new ideas.” Shakespeare is involved in that process and he’s learning from that. Noting that both Sejanus and Othello were written in 1603 and performed by the same theatre company, the King’s Men – with Richard Burbage, the foremost celebrity actor of the day, in the leading roles – Philo argues that success and failure were part of the creative process: “Sometimes it works, sometimes it goes horribly awry. “I do wonder whether we’ve been reluctant to join the dots because we’re so used to thinking about Shakespeare in relation to success.” We don’t tend to think of Shakespeare in terms of failure or things going wrong. Philo said: “Despite the fact that the cast lists have been known and that we know Sejanus was a flop, we’ve yet to acknowledge the fact that that means Shakespeare himself was heckled and hissed, and that Shakespeare himself was a victim of the early modern audience. One contemporary wrote of being among those who “hissed Sejanus off the stage”. Reality is not what one sees.Portrait of William Shakespeare, dated 1609, which was engraved by Droeshout for the 1623 First Folio edition. His intention to use Othello's honesty as a tool to deceive him serves as a warning for the audience to be cautious about appearance. He attempts restlessly to mislead other characters, particularly Roderigo and Othello, by encouraging them to misinterpret what they see. Iago maliciously uses all his wits to manipulate others and make them believe what he wants. He is, thus, considered an outsider to the white Venetian culture, deserving less respect.Īnother theme explored in Othello is reality versus appearance. The racist characters use these words to portray Othello as an animal or beast, not as a human. Othello is referred to as a "Barbary horse", a " thick lips", or a "lascivious Moor". The play also describes some characters as racist. By maliciously goading his master's jealousy, Iago makes Othello suffer and experience the torments of jealousy towards Desdemona and her supposed lover. His intense jealousy pushes him to take revenge on Othello although these suspicions are only rumors. His strong aversion has also its origin in suspecting Othello having an affair with Emilia his wife. In the first scene, he expresses dissatisfaction when Othello promotes Cassio instead of him. Iago is depicted as a jealous character from the beginning. Jealousy motivates the main characters of the play. In Othello, Shakespeare explores themes such as jealousy, racism, and reality versus appearance. Iago maliciously provokes his master's jealousy until the normally stoic North African murders his beloved wife in a fit of temper and kills himself. Othello has secretly married Desdemona, a pretty and rich white Venetian, much younger than he is, against the wishes of her father. Iago, however, is angry because Othello has promoted Cassio to be his lieutenant instead of him. Othello is a Moorish general in the Venetian army leading his army into a war with the Ottoman Turks over the island of Cyprus. The story revolves around two characters, Othello and Iago. A short summary of Othello by William Shakespeare Othello ( The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice) is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, probably written in 1603. Read the following text about Othello and do the comprehension questions
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |