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William Shakespeare
34
Othello, the Moor of Venice
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Shakespeare’s England
•
At the time of Shakespeare, England
was a small nation by modern
standards, with a population of about
five million.
•
The English Renaissance was in full
bloom. The arts and sciences
flourished, and increased contact with
other nations led to new styles of
living, new fashions, new art forms
(the sonnet), and a broader
vocabulary (which Shakespeare
eagerly appropriated).
•
England was mostly rural.
Agriculture was the chief means of
livelihood. Mining and timber were
expanding industries.
A Marriage Feast at Bermondsey by Joris Hoefnagel (ca. 1569)
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Shakespeare’s England continued …
• New domestic comforts included chimneys, metal dishes, carpets, windows,
beds, and pillows.
• Travel within England was slow because of poor roads and dangerous because
of highway robbers.
• The heart of London stretched for a couple of miles at most.
• The city had trees, gardens, and meadows. London Bridge was a fashionable
thoroughfare with shops festively decorated for certain occasions. But London
Bridge also displayed the heads of executed traitors.
• City houses were small and crowded, and the streets narrow and filthy.
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Shakespeare’s England continued …
• Epidemics and plagues resulted from the unsanitary conditions.
• England was a proud nation that had begun to forge a strong national identity.
• The English took pride in their nation’s overseas exploration and empire
expansion. Sir Francis Drake circumnavigated the world from 1577-1581, and
the English founded its first permanent colony in America with Jamestown in
1607.
• Ireland was declared a kingdom under English rule in 1541, but was more a
source of trouble than of economic strength.
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Queen Elizabeth
• Elizabethan England takes its name from Queen
Elizabeth, who lived from 1533-1603, reigning from
1558-1603. She was the daughter of King Henry VIII
and Anne Boleyn, who was executed three years after
Elizabeth’s birth.
• Elizabeth’s reign was generally marked by peace,
economic prosperity, and social advancement.
• Despite her success, the age was openly skeptical
about a woman’s ability and right to rule.
• The Babington Conspiracy of 1586 refers to a plot to
assassinate Elizabeth. Mary, Queen of Scots, was
involved and executed when the plot was uncovered.
The “Darnley Portrait” of Queen Elizabeth 1 (ca. 1575)
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Queen Elizabeth continued…
• Elizabeth was a skilled diplomat who dealt effectively with foreign governments,
factions at home, and Parliament.
• Elizabeth never married. Marriage would have upset the delicate political
relationships she maintained with one foreign or domestic group or another.
• She was a patron of the arts and several poems have been credited to her.
• Elizabeth was succeeded by James I (reigned until 1625). A far less successful
monarch, he was not a good diplomat as he resisted compromise. He was out of
touch with the English people, and his reign helped widen the gap between crown
and Parliament that led to the Civil War.
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
The Globe Theatre
•
The theatre was so important and influential to the
Elizabethans that Queen Elizabeth found it necessary to
censor plays. Shakespeare avoided the controversial
political issues of the day.
• The Globe Theatre opened on the south bank of the Thames River in 1599. Shakespeare
was a minor shareholder in the theatre and many of his greatest plays premiered at the
Globe.
• The Globe could accommodate an audience of perhaps 3,000, including 800 groundlings,
who paid a penny to stand on the ground surrounding the stage.
• More prosperous spectators sat in one of the three stories nearly encircling the stage.
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Globe Theatre continued …
•
The stage projected out into the audience, creating more intimacy between actors and
audience than on Greek stages. Like the Greek amphitheaters, the stage was open to the
sky.
•
The Globe had a fairly versatile stage, containing a balcony, several doors for convenient
entrances and exits, a curtained alcove, and a stage floor trapdoor. Costumes were often
elaborate.
• All parts were played by men or young boys. Women were not allowed to appear on
stage until after the English Restoration in 1660.
•
In 1613, during a performance of Henry VIII, sparks from a stage cannon set the
thatched roof on fire. The theatre burned to the ground in less than two hours. There
were no deaths. The theatre was quickly rebuilt with a tiled roof. The theatre functioned
successfully until 1642 when the Puritans rose to power and closed all theatres. The
Globe was demolished to make room for tenements in 1644.
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
William Shakespeare
•
William Shakespeare was born in April 1564 in Stratford-upon-Avon. His father was a
successful merchant and fairly prominent member of the community who later fell on
hard times.
•
The young Shakespeare attended local schools, where he learned some Latin and a little
Greek.
•
In late 1582, Shakespeare married Anne Hathaway, who was eight years older than he.
They had three children together.
•
Shakespeare spent most of his working life, some twenty-five years, in London, as one of
a troupe of players called Lord Chamberlain’s Men. He was an actor and the company’s
principal playwright.
• Apparently a political conservative, he seemed to enjoy London, but never surrendered
his roots in the countryside. In 1597, Shakespeare purchased New Place, a fine house in
Stratford-upon-Avon – a sign that he had prospered in his career.
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Shakespeare’s Life continued …
•
By most counts, Shakespeare wrote some 37 plays between 1591 and
1611.
•
His poetry includes long narrative poems, such as “Venus and Adonis”
and “The Rape of Lucrece,” and 154 sonnets.
•
Shakespeare retired to New Place in 1611 and died on April 23, 1616.
• Contemporaries, like Ben Jonson wrote about him with extravagant
praise and contemporary critic Harold Bloom calls Shakespeare “the
supreme genius” (Genius: A Mosaic of One Hundred Exemplary
Creative Minds 11).
“He’s the rain forest of our language … in fact … the first user of
thousands of words … and he is one of the great creators of beauty. …
You can’t solve … the pain of life. But you can set beauty against it and
maybe endure it.”
— Ralph Williams, University of Michigan
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Ben Jonson on Shakespeare
“… Soul of the age!
The applause! delight! the wonder of our stage!
My SHAKESPEARE rise! I will not lodge thee by
Chaucer, or Spenser, or bid Beaumont lie
A little further, to make thee a room:
Thou art a monument without a tomb,
And art alive still while thy book doth live
And we have wits to read, and praise to give.
…
But stay, I see thee in the hemisphere
Advanced, and made a constellation there!
Shine forth, thou Star of Poets, and with rage
Or influence, chide or cheer the drooping stage,
Which, since thy flight from hence, hath mourned
like night,
And despairs day, but for thy volume's light.”
— from “To the Memory of My Beloved Master William Shakespeare”
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Harold Bloom on Shakespeare
Shakespeare is “the supreme genius … who at the least changed our
ways of presenting human nature, if not human nature itself. …
Shakespeare’s language is primary to his art … he employed more
than twenty-one thousand separate words. … He invented … about
eighteen hundred coinages, many of them now in common use. [The
great French dramatist] Racine used two thousand words, not many
more than Shakespeare coined. … The true Shakespearean difference,
the uniqueness of his genius, is elsewhere, in his universality, in the
persuasive illusion (is it illusion?) that he has peopled a world,
remarkably like what we take to be our own, with men, women, and
children preternaturally natural. … Is there another dramatist who
excelled equally at comedy and tragedy? We have no comedies by
Sophocles, or tragedies by Aristophanes.”
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Shakespeare’s Endurance
• In short, Shakespeare endures because of his masterful use
of words, his insight into the human mind and human action,
and his ability to explore and reveal the complexities and
paradoxes inherent in the human condition.
• Shakespeare’s greatest tragedies are generally considered to
be King Lear, Macbeth, Othello, and Hamlet (written c. 1600
and for which Shakespeare used several sources).
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Othello
• Shakespeare drew the plot from Othello
from Giraldi Cinthio’s “Tale of the
Moor,” a sixteenth-century Italian tale.
Just a glimpse at the original elevates
our appreciation for Shakespeare’s
genius and vision, as he transforms a
mediocre tale into one of the world’s
great works of art.
• Consider the changes:
– In Cinthio only Disdemona is given a name, which Shakespeare changes to Desdemona.
Shakespeare’s Iago is identified as the Ensign and his Cassio as the Captain. More
importantly, Shakespeare deepens his characters with psychological complexity.
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Othello continued…
• Consider the changes:
– The Moor and Disdemona have lived harmoniously as husband and wife for a long
time before the Ensign’s destructive scheme.
– In Cinthio, the Ensign’s wife knows of her husband’s plot, but chooses to remain
silent.
– In Cinthio, the Moor conceals the Ensign and coaxes Disdemona to rise from her bed
and approach her closet, out of which the Ensign rushes to beat her to death with a
sandbag. The Moor and Ensign place her body on her bed and collapse a portion of
the ceiling to make the death look accidental.
– The Ensign betrays the Moor and arranges for his conviction for murder. The Moor
is banished and then slain by Disdemona’s relatives. Only after a subsequent act of
villainy is the Ensign arrested, tortured into a confession, and dies a miserable
death.
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
The Fall of Othello
• The central question of Othello might be phrased this way: How does a decisive,
resourceful, and intelligent soldier, a successful general, allow himself to be so
manipulated by another?
• In Act 1, Othello is self-confident, open, clear-headed, and calm; see his
reaction when Brabantio tries to arrest him (1.2). Consider too how calmly he
expresses his love for Desdemona to the Duke (1.3). Othello brings adventure
to her sheltered life while she offers him love and stability.
• By Act 3.3, Othello’s jealousy is aroused and it begins to drive him. At the end
of the scene he declares his unwavering commitment to murder his wife. Note
too how his language begins to mimic the sexual coarseness of Iago – see
4.2.63-67; 5.1.32-38; 5.2.217-223.
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
The Fall of Othello continued…
• So impassioned has he become that, in Act 5, he cannot grant a hearing to his
wife’s deathbed denial. For Othello, killing Desdemona is an honorable and
necessary act, even a sacrifice. Desdemona must be punished for her adultery,
which corrupted their spiritual love, and she is sacrificed to save her from
further dishonor. Othello is more sorrowful, than angry here. Ironically, he
wants the act of murder to be dispassionate and rational yet he acts in the
throes of emotion. (See especially 5.2.1-22.)
• After he recognizes the truth, Othello articulates his epitaph proudly, rationally,
somewhat calmly, and without self-pity (5.2.302-304; 5.2.348-366).
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Othello as Tragic Hero
1. The traditional tragic hero must be
extraordinary in rank and deed – “of high
estate,” “great reputation and prosperity.”
Othello is a highly successful general in the
Venetian army with many heroic adventures
in his past.
2. A Tragic Flaw – “Hamartia”
A tragic flaw is the personality trait or fated
mistake that leads to a tragic hero’s
downfall. Iago identifies Othello’s tragic
flaw at the end of Act 1.3.400-03. Othello
is gullible, a trait Iago exploits as Othello
“thinks men honest that but seem to be so.”
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
The Tragic Hero continued …
3. Outside elements cooperate in the hero’s fall.
First and foremost, consider the role of Iago in Othello’s downfall. But consider other
forces that conspire against him: bad luck with the loss of the handkerchief and
Bianca’s arrival with the handkerchief, Desdemona’s naiveté, and more.
How do Othello’s foreignness and race, the importance of which is signaled by the title
of the play, affect his relationships with the other characters? How does being a Moor
in Venice affect his own confidence and sense of security? How does Iago use Othello’s
foreignness in his plotting?
4. Recognition – “Anagnorisis”
Othello experiences recognition or “anagnorisis,” as he not only learns the specific
truth about his wife’s good nature and Iago’s evil plotting, but he also learns about the
complexity of human nature, human emotion, and the world itself.
5.
Willingness to Suffer
Othello serves as his own judge, jury, and executioner. Is he fair to himself at the end
of play? Does he depict himself accurately in his self-delivered eulogy (5.2.350-66)?
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Othello as Traditional Tragedy
• Restoration – Traditional tragedy follows a pattern of upheaval and
restoration. Because the tragic hero is such an important figure, the state itself
is affected by his fate. Here, the island of Cyprus and the Venetian army are
thrown off balance – although Othello has less of an impact than Oedipus and
Hamlet on their respective states. Still, order is restored at the end when a
wiser and more experienced Cassio assumes Othello’s position.
• Poetry – The traditional language of tragedy is poetry, which establishes an
exalted atmosphere and expresses the heights and depths of human emotion
and action more completely. See, for instance, 3.3.469-77, to see how
Shakespeare uses poetry to express Othello’s resolve.
• Catharsis – The emotional renewal created by an audience’s feelings of pity and
terror for a tragic hero, resulting in the recognition that the hero’s tragic fate
was just and that his acceptance of that fate makes the tragedy complete.
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Iago
• The most fascinating character in the play. Iago is intelligent, resourceful,
fearless, devious, creative, and conscienceless.
• He is an excellent judge of character and a master manipulator who identifies
and exploits the weaknesses of others. Consider how he manipulates
Roderigo’s foolish love for Desdemona, and Cassio’s trust in him and his “poor
and unhappy brains for drinking” (2.3.30-31).
• Iago recognizes that Othello is gullible and insecure as a foreigner and a Moor
in a white, Christian culture. Consider, for example, what he tells Othello about
Venetian women and their propensity for adultery (3.3.216-19).
• Othello becomes so isolated that Iago becomes his sole interpreter of reality. In
a sense, Iago recreates the world for Othello.
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Iago’s Technique
• Iago manipulates Othello to reach certain conclusions through a carefully
contrived and patient procedure:
– Iago plants an idea in Othello’s mind with a leading but indirect statement or
question.
– Iago might act surprised at Othello’s response.
– He pretends to withhold information so as to arouse Othello’s suspicion.
– He waits patiently for Othello to state the intended conclusion.
– He reaffirms the conclusion and pledges to help Othello correct the wrong.
• Consider this technique in action in 3.3.101-295.
• Through this technique, Iago appears a faithful and caring friend, honest,
trustworthy, and unselfish.
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Iago’s Motive
• Consider the following possibilities:
─ Iago is bitter at not being promoted and desires Cassio’s position.
─ Othello has cuckolded him.
─ Iago turns a neat profit for himself from swindling Roderigo.
─ Cassio has cuckolded him.
─ He is jealous of Cassio’s good looks and the favor that Othello shows him.
─ He is jealous of Desdemona and her closeness with his friend.
─ He enjoys deceiving and destroying everyone, and manipulating their perspectives on the
world. For Iago, his deceptions are entertaining and makes him feel superior.
• Which possible motives seem most probable? Be sure to consider Iago’s
monologues.
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Iago’s Motive continued …
•
Under examination, each of these possible motivations will prove deficient or limited.
•
The final one seems most complete. Iago enjoys what he is doing. Actors usually deliver
his last words before breaking into a vicious laugh:
Othello: … demand that demi-devil
Why he hath thus ensnared my soul and body?
Iago:
•
Demand me nothing. What you know, you know.
From this time forth I never will speak word.
(5.2.311-12)
Othello’s question, Iago’s response, and silence from other characters on the issue of
motive emphasize that no one in the play can rationalize Iago’s destructive actions.
Perhaps even Iago had no answer for Othello’s question.
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Iago’s Motive continued …
• The great Romantic poet and
Shakespearean scholar, Samuel T. Coleridge
might serve as our guide on the question of
Iago’s motive. Coleridge states that Iago’s
soliloquy at the end of Act 1 reveals the
“motive-hunting of motiveless malignancy.”
• Certainly, Iago suggests and knowingly
creates motives for inspiration, which
indicates that he has to inspire himself to
evil, since he has no justified cause.
Portrait of Samuel Taylor Coleridge (ca. 18th century)
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Iago’s Mistake
• Iago might have been completely successful, except for one mistake. He
underestimates the integrity and intelligence of his wife Emilia.
• Iago probably thought Emilia lacked the skillfulness to detect his scheming, but
he compounded this misjudgment by underestimating her loyalty to
Desdemona, her loyalty to truth and justice, and her independence. He
expected her to respond to the culture’s code of obedience to husband and
“charm [her] tongue” (5.2.190) and go home at his command.
• Note too how Emilia’s experience, awareness, and practical morality contrast
with Desdemona’s inexperience, innocence, and uncompromising morality – see
Act 4.3.
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Dramatic Irony
• Dramatic irony is a discrepancy between what the characters know and what
the audience or readers know.
• Shakespeare uses dramatic irony throughout the play. The audience is well
aware of Iago’s plot and true nature (he is hardly “honest, honest Iago”) and
about all kinds of details unknown to the characters onstage, especially
Othello. We know, for instance, the real topic of the conversation between Iago
and Cassio on which Othello eavesdrops (4.1).
• The dramatic irony arouses the audience’s emotions while also increasing our
fascination with and appreciation for the evil Iago, whose resourcefulness,
improvisational skills, and daring enthrall us.
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
The Handkerchief
• Shakespeare employs dramatic irony with the handkerchief, one
of the most famous props in theatrical history.
• The audience is well aware of what happens to the handkerchief,
the symbol of Othello’s love for and trust in Desdemona.
• Consider the trail of the handkerchief:
─ Desdemona loses the handkerchief and Emilia finds it (3.3.300-344).
─ Othello demands Desdemona produce the handkerchief (3.4.51-104).
─ Cassio gives the handkerchief to Bianca (3.4.178-192).
─ Iago keeps the handkerchief, “ocular proof,” in the forefront of
Othello’s mind (4.1.1-42).
─ Bianca enters with the handkerchief (4.1.147-185).
─ Othello learns the truth about the handkerchief from Emilia
(5.2.216-241).
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Contrasting Loves
• At the beginning of the play, Othello and Desdemona
demonstrate a pure love, untouched by base impulses.
• In contrast, the speeches of Roderigo, Iago, Emilia, and
Bianca consider love in sexual terms, not as a spiritual
union. Iago has numerous references to bestial sexuality –
see Act 1.1, when he informs Brabantio of Desdemona’s
elopement.
• What are the implications of the corruption of Othello and
Desdemona’s love? Why was it so difficult for their love to
survive?
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Jealousy
•
Othello is not jealous by nature. He needs to be worked into a state of jealous
confusion.
•
Consider the following pivotal passages in your discussion of the theme of jealousy.
– When Iago further reveals his plot, he seems jealous himself (sincerely so?), and
says that he must “put the Moor/ At least into a jealousy so strong/ That judgment
cannot cure” (2.1.287-313).
– Iago later tells Othello to beware of the “green-eyed monster.” Othello responds
that he would not “make a life of jealousy.” Note how brilliantly Iago maneuvers
the conversation (3.3, 178-206).
• Othello implies that even the most rational of individuals has the capaci ty for “being
wrought/ perplexed in the extreme” when it comes to jealousy.
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
Dual Settings
•
The dual settings of Venice and Cyprus emphasize the play’s very
prominent polarities of reason and passion.
•
In Venice, reason, as embodied by the Duke, is firmly in control, but,
in Cyprus, Othello’s passions take over and the barbaric Iago moves
unchecked.
Alvin Kernan
• Alvin Kernan wrote that Shakespeare “makes Venice over into a form of The City, the ageless
image of government, of reason, of law, and of social concord,” while Cyprus is an outpost
where “passions are more explosive and closer to the surface than in Venice.”
• Kernan also states that the dual settings show “a movement expressed in geographical and
social symbols from Venice to a Cyprus exposed to attack, from The City to barbarism, from
Christendom to the domain of the Turks, from order to riot, from justice to wild revenge and
murder, from truth to falsehood” (“Othello: An Introduction,” in Alfred Harbage, ed.,
Shakespeare, The Tragedies: A Collection of Critical Essays).
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34
For Further Consideration
• Examine the scene in which Othello secretly watches Cassio talking to Bianca
(4.1). Think about how Iago controls Othello’s perception, leading him to
misinterpret what he sees.
Literature: Craft & Voice | Delbanco and Cheuse | Chapter 34