Shakespeare He was not of an age but for all time.

William Shakespeare ( )  His plays have never been equaled in their dramatic power, philosophical depth, and characterization  His poetry has enriched and amplified the English language  A writer for all time

Influences and Types  Humanism: confidence in human powers as reflected in classical texts  Reformation: doubt that human endeavors amount to very much at all  Shakespeare’s plays fit four categories: tragedies, comedies, histories, and romances

The Sonnets  Wrote 142 Sonnets  Changed and adapted the original format created by Petrarch  Ridiculed the traditional version of beauty, in favor of a more earthier version  Also used the sonnet for meditations about the passage of time

England  Under the rule of Elizabeth I, England became a world power  Defeated the Spanish Armada  Became unsurpassed in theater  Public theaters were disapproved of by the Puritans and so had to be placed outside the London city limits

Revival of Drama  Plays representing stories of the Bible become more elaborate: “mystery plays”  “Morality plays” replace them with stories of allegorical characters  Humanists bring back interest in the ancient Greek plays  Plays written in English combined the classical elements and medieval, Roman and English elements

Renaissance Drama  Companies of professional actors begin staging plays  Licensed theater companies were formed: protected by a noble patron  Grow in popularity, despite Protestant disapproval  Theaters placed outside city limits to avoid limits placed by the city leaders  All classes of people go see the plays

Renaissance Theater  The Globe built in 1599, many of Shakespeare’s plays performed there  No artificial lighting—plays had to be performed during the afternoon  Semicircular in shape with a platform stage that juts out into the courtyard  Lower-class people stand in the “pit”  Upper classes sit in the galleries above

More About the Theater  Orchestra was generally on stage  Designed not just for the elite but for all classes of society  Few props, no backgrounds  Wore clothing of the time, usually donated clothes from the royal patron  No females, all female roles acted by males  Less formal, more like a nightclub than now

Othello  First produced in 1604  Created a hero who falls without any hope of redemption: a tragic hero  Sets the play in Venice: a place of luxury and corruption, but full of people from faraway lands  Iago: the villain, is a Venetian  Othello: the hero, is black

Why Venice?  As a center of trade, Venice was full of people from faraway places  Othello was a black Moor—someone from sub-Saharan Africa

 Not uncommon in Renaissance England  Common biases were that they were uncivilized, highly sexed, without religion  Term “black”: unclean, ugly, evil — “white”: beautiful, ideal, pure Africans in England

Rialto Bridge, Venice, Italy

Black and White Symbolism  Symbolism plays on the audience’s misconceptions  Presents a black man who is inwardly pure, and a white man who is evil  Difficulty of distinguishing being from seeming is a major theme for the play  The alleged super-sexuality of Africans is also a misconception as Othello is faithful to Desdemona, but Iago is unfaithful to his wife

Tragic Hero  Othello is a typical tragic hero because he moves from a state of power and good to one of degradation where he can no longer endure his life  Like Oedipus he experiences a revelation of self-knowledge, and turns his hand on himself  Combination of fate and character is seen in the combination of Othello’s character and the plotted malice of Iago

Poetic Verse  Play is written in “blank verse” or iambic pentameter  Consists of unrhymed lines of ten syllables: a weak stress is followed by a strong stress  Shakespeare also uses prose and rhyming lines in the play  Blank verse is usually reserved for the main characters, while prose is often used for the servants and lesser characters

Music in Othello  Shakespeare used music to establish the scene and help set the mood  Instrumental music: associated with the world of action  Vocal music: used for the inner world of the character  Music could show more effectively how the character was feeling than just the lines alone could

Madrigals  Originally Italian  Compositions of part music, with words that spoke of love, war, birth, and death  Combined poetry with street songs  Accompanied by the lute  Used to entertain at court, streets, during carnivals and festivals, and at homes of middle class  Madrigalisms: musical sounds that correspond to the words sung—word “higher” would be sung higher

Music  Printing press made music available to the middle class at home and abroad  No longer need a court composer to create music just for you  Famous English madrigal composers were: John Dowland, William Byrd, and Orlando Gibbons  Favorite works of all time was Thomas Morley’s “Now is the Month of Maying”