The Sources and Representations of the Moor in the Works of Shakespeare
One theme consistently reemployed throughout Shakespeare's plays is that of the Other. The Other is usually characterized as a character that is somehow separated, stigmatized, or noted as being different from the mainstream ideal. For the Elizabethan England of Shakespeare's time, it may have been a self-defensive maneuver against the encroachment of something which threatened too close to home (Bartels 450). Bryant lists several methods used to employ this convention of the Other: race such as that of Shylock and Aaron, nationality as in Iachimo, bastardy such as the characters Don John and Edmund, social status such as that belonging to Iago, and deformity, for example, Richard III (35). Not every Other is characterized as evil, but nonetheless depicted as being somehow different or separated from society. Characters such as Malvolio, Faulconbridge, Macbeth, and Othello are of this subdivision.
One sect of Otherness is that of race. During this time, England seems at first glance to be separated culturally from any area of the Ottoman Empire. However, this assumption proves to be false. There are four characters in Shakespeare's plays, Caliban, Othello, the Prince of Morocco, and Aaron, who are of distinctly African, or Moorish heritage. Whether these persons were of Negro, Berber, Spanish, or Arab descent is definitely in question. The use of the term Moor also is of importance. This word is used to describe Aaron and Othello, but not to describe Caliban or the Prince of Morocco, both who come from areas classically referred to as being Moorish. The origin of the word Moor comes from the word mauri. Mauri refers to the Berbers w...
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...ntic Review. 55.4 (1990): 1-17.
Bryant, J.A. Jr. "Aaron and the Pattern of Shakespeare's Villains." Renaissance Papers. (1984): 29-36.
Burshatin, Israel. "The Moor in Text: Metaphor, Emblem, and Silence." Critical Inquiry. 12.1 (1985): 98-118.
D'Amico, Jack. The Moor in English Renaissance Drama. Tampa: University of South Florida Press, 1991.
Everett, Barbara. " 'Spanish' Othello: The Making of Shakespeare's Moor." Shakespeare Survey. 35 (1982): 101-112.
Jones, Eldred. The Elizabethan Image of Africa. Charlottesville: UP of Virginia, 1971.
Shakespeare, William. The Merchant of Venice. Ed. Kenneth Myrick. New York: Signet, 1965.
---. Othello. Ed. David Bevington. New York: Bantam Books, 1988.
---. The Tempest. Ed. Charles W. Eliot. New York: P.F. Collier & Sons, 1969.
---. Titus Andronicus. Ed. Sylvan Barnet. New York: Signet, 1964.
Shakespeare, William. (1564-1616 C.E.). The Tragedy of Othello the Moor of Venice. Folger Shakespeare Library Edition. New York: Washington Square Press, 2004. Print.
Jones, Eldred. "Othello- An Interpretation" Critical Essays on Shakespeare's Othello. Ed. Anthony G. Barthelemy Pub. Macmillan New York, NY 1994. (page 39-55)
Throughout Shakespeare's "Othello", one of the most poignant themes is that of race and racial prejudice. Various critics are of the view that "Othello" was written as a social commentary, depicting the discrimination present in formal Venetian society. These ideas of racial prejudice are portrayed through Othello, the protagonist, who is referred to as "the Moor", an African or a black man.
Aim: The aim of this assignment will be to research the basic structure and function of Human Lungs and the respiratory condition known as asthma, and how its effects on the human lungs, looking at the causes and treatments used to prevent and treat the illness.
Shakespeare, William. The Tragedy of Othello: The Moor of Venice. Ed. Barbara A. Mowat and Paul Werstine. New York; Washington Square Press, 1993.
Shakespeare, William, and Kim F. Hall. Othello, the Moor of Venice: Texts and Contexts. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2007. Print.
Asthma is a chronic disease that makes it difficult to breathe. The airways to the lungs swell up and become inflamed, which narrows the air passageway to the lungs and the lungs cannot receive the amount of oxygen that it needs. “Mucus builds up inside the airways so you have trouble getting air in and out of your lungs.” (Pope, 2002, p.44). If the lungs do not receive the essential amount of air, it will cause a lot of distress and wheezing to the patient.
Asthma is a disorder of the respiratory system in which the passages that enable air to pass into and out of the lungs periodically narrow, causing coughing, wheezing, and shortness of breath. This narrowing is typically temporary and reversible, but in severe attacks, asthma may result in death. Asthma most commonly refers to bronchial asthma, an inflammation of the airways, but the term is also used to refer to cardiac asthma, which develops when fluid builds up in the lungs as a complication of heart failure. This article focuses on bronchial asthma.
Texts and their appropriations reflect the context and values of their times. Within Shakespeare’s Othello and Geoffrey Sax’s appropriation of Othello, the evolution of the attitudes held by Elizabethan audiences and those held by contemporary audiences can be seen through the context of the female coupled with the context of racism. The role of the female has developed from being submissive and “obedient” in the Elizabethan era to being independent and liberated within the contemporary setting. The racism of the first text is overtly xenophobic and natural, whilst the “moor” is unnatural whereas the updated context portrays Othello’s race as natural and racism as unnatural. Therefore these examples show how Shakespeare’s Othello, and it’s appropriation, Geoffrey sax’s Othello, reflect the context and values of their times.
Shakespeare, William, and James K. Lowers. Othello: Commentary, Complete Text, Glossary. Lincoln, Neb.: Cliff's Notes, 1968. Print.
I suggest there is no concrete perspective of either prejudice or sympathy towards these character types. Rather, plurality in the representations of qualities such as race, ethnicity, religion, morality and gender demonstrate how fluid the condition of being an outsider can be. In her book, Shakespeare and Outsiders, Marianne Novy has described it as being “a relative identity and not a fixed position.” Mockery or expression of hatred on the part of a group of characters for another who is different from them ...
Shakespeare, William. “Othello.” Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, Drama, and Writing. Ed. X. J. Kennedy and Dana Gioia. Boston, MA: Pearson, 2012. 1002-102. Print.
- - -. Othello. 1968. Ed. Kenneth Muir. The New Penguin Shakespeare. London: Penguin Books, 1996.
The discussion of race in Shakespeare's Othello has received a great deal of critical attention. Virginia Mason Vaughn, in her book Othello: A Contextual History, surveys this critical history, beginning with Marvin Rosenberg's 1961 book The Masks of Othello (a book documenting the nineteenth-century tendency toward representing Othello as light-skinned), and continuing through to Jack D'Amico's 1991 book The Moor in English Renaissance Drama. According to Vaughan herself, "The effect of Othello depends . . . on the essential fact of the hero's darkness, the visual signifier of his Otherness" (51). Arthur L. Little, Jr., in his article "'An essence that's not seen': The Primal Scene of Racism in Othello," claims that "The three crucial structural elements of Shakespeare's play are Othello's blackness, his marriage to the white Desdemona, and his killing of her" (306, emphasis added) as if there were no other "crucial structural elements." It is not my intention to undercut or undervalue the attention that has been given to the discourse of race, the opposition of black and white, in Othello; however, I contend that an exclusive focus on this discourse radically reduces and simplifies the play, and I wish to focus on a different discourse, a different opposition in the play-the discourse of honesty and whoredom, the opposition of falseness and loyalty.
The character Othello is written to play the part of the outsider in the play Othello, the Moor of Venice. As the title suggest the main character, Othello, was a moor living in Venice. In the 1600s, when this play was written, being a moor carried a certain stigma of being barbaric (CITE). Othello is a warrior and his barbaric characteristics help him in the battlefield. His brutality helped him go up to the rank of general in the Venetian army. Many people find his stories of war, slavery, and exotic locations extremely interesting and a lot like entertainment. Shakespeare used many different underlying themes when writing Othello but one of the biggest ones is otherness. Otherness is defined as the quality or condition of being other or