Let’s start with some humor…
Life
Setting
Times
The
Bard
Entertainment
1564-1616
William Shakespeare
Life
Shakespeare’s Birthplace
Anne Hathaway’s Cottage
and Visitor Center
1564
Shakespeare is born in Stratford-upon-Avon, England
1582
Shakespeare marries Anne Hathaway
1582-1585
Hathaway and Shakespeare have 3 children
1588
Shakespeare travels to London to work as an actor and playwright
1593
The Earl of Southampton begins to pay Shakespeare for his work
1594
All theaters are closed for a year due to the plague;
Shakespeare becomes the founding member of Lord Chamberlain’s Men
1599
Shakespeare and Lord Chamberlain’s Men build The Globe Theatre
1603
Queen Elizabeth dies and James I becomes the King of England;
Lord Chamberlain’s Men becomes the King’s Men
1614
The Globe burns down
1616
William Shakespeare retires home, falls ill, and dies of causes unknown today
The Birthplace
The Birthplace
Shakespeare Monument
Setting and Times
Elizabethan Era: 1558-1603
The Height of the English Renaissance
Monarch: Queen Elizabeth I
Concern for the World and Man’s Natural Existence
Age of Expansion and Exploration Abroad
Brief Period of Internal Peace
Surge of Poetry and Drama
Rise of the Merchant Class: Rise of Modern Commerce with Cloth
Era of the 1st Theatres in England
Famous Figures: William Shakespeare, Christopher Marlowe, John Dee
Queen Elizabeth
What do you think she was like?
Entertainment
The Original Globe Theatre: 1599
Burned in 1613: Accidentally during a Performance
Note: James Burbage built the first theatre in 1576 called “The Theatre”
Elizabethan England and the Theatre
• London authorities viewed play going as
morally questionable
• Bubonic plague
• Playhouses built outside of city limits
Why Study Shakespeare?
• If you can read Shakespeare, you can read almost
anything
• Students gain a sense of Biblical, mythological history
• Shakespeare was a master of plot and logic
• Students gain a broader view of the world
• Students gain a broader view of human nature
– greed, faithfulness, love, power, gentleness, poor
choices, honesty, integrity, popularity, danger,
patriotism, selfishness, self-sacrifice
• Students appreciate other art forms
– music, drama, art, costume, writing
Introduction to Othello
Written Around 1600-1605
Setting:
Venice Italy
Cyprus Mediterranean Island
1489-1571?
Setting:
• Venice
– leading sea powers
– center of commercialism and materialism
– corruption and conflict arising from avarice, social status and
competition.
• Cyprus
– strategically located island which yielded substantial harvests
– Prized throughout its history
– Assyrians, Greeks, Egyptians, Romans, and Byzantines all fought
over and occupied it
– England’s King Richard I, the Lion-Hearted, conquered Cyprus in
1191 but later ceded it to the French
– Venice seized the island in 1489
– 1571 the Ottoman Turks brought Cyprus under its control.
Characters
Iago: Villain
Othello’s Ensign,
Lowest
Commissioned
Officer
Emilia: Iago’s Wife,
Desdemona’s
attendant
Cynical, worldly
Othello: Protagonist,
Christian Moor and general
of Venetian army
Eloquent, physically
powerful, respected
Roderigo: Jealous
suitor of Desdemona
Young, rich and
foolish
Trusts Iago
Brabantio Venetian Senator, Desdemona’s father
Gratiano Brabantio’s brother
Duke of Venice
Lodovico Brabantio’s relative
Venetian Senators first and second
Bianca, in love with Cassio
Montano Governor of Cyprus
Desdemona: Daughter
of Brabatino
Pure, meek
determined, selfpossessed
Cassio: Othello’s
lieutenant
Young, inexperienced
soldier
Resented by Iago
Devoted to Othello
Clown comic servant to Othello
Gentlemen of Cyprus
Sailors, Servants, Attendants,
Officers, Messenger, Herald,
Musicians, Torchbearers
Othello, a Moor
• A Muslim of mixed Arab and Berber descent.
• Berbers were North African natives who eventually accepted
Arab customs and Islam after Arabs invaded North Africa in
the Seventh Century A.D.
• The term has been used to refer in general to Muslims of
North Africa and to Muslim conquerors of Spain.
• The word Moor derives from a Latin word, Mauri, from the
word Mauritanium, used to name the residents of the ancient
Roman province of Mauritania in North Africa.
• Early 17th Century British attitudes did not come from
slavery. Slavery would become widespread at the end of the
17th century. Queen Elizabeth granted them “full diplomatic
recognition” for helping to defeat the Spanish.
• Elizabeth recognized them but they were still exotic outsiders
Universal Concepts
Jealousy has
the power to
destroy
Hatred is skin
deep
Love
requires
courage
Good people
experience
tragedy and the
response to
tragedy defines
them
Appearance and
reality contrast
greatly (Things
aren’t always as
they seem)
Conflicts
Ambition
Murder
Passion
Unrequited
Love
Betrayal
Illusion
Revenge
Envy
Race
Rank
Literary Device: Dramatic Irony
When the audience (or reader)
understands more of a situation or
of what is being said than the
character is aware of
•
The Tragic Hero: Aristotle and
th century B.C)
The
Poetics
(4
His basis for traditional analysis of
drama
• Poetic art is “the imitation of
action”
– A spiritual movement represented in
concrete artistic form (becomes
universal)
– This imitation, or mimesis, is a writer’s
attempt to represent reality or truth in
poetic form
Aristotle’s ideas about structure
and purpose of tragedy
• Unity of Action—clear beginning middle and end, and
the action should be ordered and continuous, arising
through a cause and effect process
• Catharsis—the events should inspire pity and terror in
viewers allowing them to attain an emotional purgation,
moral purification, or clarity of intellectual viewpoint
• Tragedy—characterized by “highly renowned and
prosperous” protagonists and whose reversal of fortune
and fall from greatness are brought about “not by vice or
depravity, but by some error or frailty.” (Hamartia)
• Scene of Suffering
The Tragic Hero
• The story of a noble hero whose downfall is
brought about by a specific defect in his
character, a tragic flaw.
• The hero may face opposition from an outside
force but his ruin is a result of his own error in
judgment.
• Will he understand it and accept
responsibility?
• We relate to this hero and experience tragedy
with him. We want to be better people as a
result. We feel uplifted because we see the
hero overcome his limitation.
Hamartia: Tragic Flaw
• The protagonist’s inner weakness or inherent error, taken
from the Greek word meaning to “err” or to “miss the
mark.”
• The hamartia often concerns excessive pride or hubris.
Hubris may include a belief that the protagonist is
somehow above the fates, or in control of destiny.
• The protagonist most often contributes to his or her own
downfall by a mismatch between character and
circumstances.
• Interestingly enough, the translation of hamartia as "flaw"
may in fact itself be flawed. There is some evidence that
suggests that it rather means any quality in excess--perhaps
even a virtue--that brings about the fall of the protagonist.
Anagnorisis
• The reversal in fortune is characterized by “reversal of
situation” (Peripeteia) and “recognition” (agnorisis)
• The agnorisis involves a moment of insight; the tragic hero
see his own nature and destiny more clearly.
• The protagonist's recognition of his tragic flaw occurs at
the climax and leads to his downfall.
• In Oedipus the King, Oedipus reverses his position from
that of the powerful and just king to a character who has
committed unbearable wrongs. The same event brings
about the anagnorisis.
• Aristotle believed that in the most successful tragedies, the
moment of recognition and the reversal of situation take
place in the same narrative event.
Scene of Suffering
• It must take place in tragedy
• Oedipus blinds himself
• Aristotle (and the Greeks in general) viewed
suffering as a prerequisite for wisdom
Audience Catharsis
• A purifying or figurative cleansing of the
emotions, especially pity and fear, described
by Aristotle as an effect of tragic drama on its
audience.
• A release of emotional tension, as after an
overwhelming experience, that restores or
refreshes the spirit.
Audience Empathy and Sympathy
• Empathy--"feeling-into"--is a projection of
oneself into another character; an identification
in which one seems to participate in the actions
and feelings of the other.
• Sympathy--"feeling-with"--is a little more
detached, a fellow-feeling for the other; as
when two strings are tuned to the same note,
one will vibrate in sympathy if the other is
sounded. The word has become somewhat
reduced in meaning
Thematic Questions
• Can we ever know the truth about a person? Is it
possible to know if someone is lying to us? How
can we discover what lies behind the words
someone tells us?
• What does it feel like to be alienated or
marginalized? What does this status do to our
self-worth?
• Once you are in love with someone, can you ever
truly get over that person?
• Do we have the power to choose who we are and
who we love?
During this unit you will be given the opportunity to discover your
own answers to the questions asked in, about, and of Othello…