Othello by William Shakespeare (Illustrated)

By William Shakespeare

This eBook features the unabridged text of ‘Othello’ from the bestselling edition of ‘The Complete Works of William Shakespeare’.

Having established their name as the leading publisher of classic literature and art, Delphi Classics produce publications that are individually crafted with superior formatting, while introducing many rare texts for the first time in digital print. The Delphi Classics edition of Shakespeare includes original annotations and illustrations relating to the life and works of the author, as well as individual tables of contents, allowing you to navigate eBooks quickly and easily.

eBook features:
* The complete unabridged text of ‘Othello’
* Beautifully illustrated with images related to Shakespeare’s works
* Individual contents table, allowing easy navigation around the eBook
* Excellent formatting of the textPlease visit www.delphiclassics.com to learn more about our wide range of titles

• Language: English
• Publisher: Publishdrive
• Release date: Jul 17, 2017
• ISBN: 9781786562951

William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare (1564–1616) is arguably the most famous playwright to ever live. Born in England, he attended grammar school but did not study at a university. In the 1590s, Shakespeare worked as partner and performer at the London-based acting company, the King’s Men. His earliest plays were Henry VI and Richard III, both based on the historical figures. During his career, Shakespeare produced nearly 40 plays that reached multiple countries and cultures. Some of his most notable titles include Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet and Julius Caesar. His acclaimed catalog earned him the title of the world’s greatest dramatist.

Book preview

The Complete Works of

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

VOLUME 27 OF 74

Othello

Parts Edition

By Delphi Classics, 2012

Version 6

COPYRIGHT

‘Othello’

William Shakespeare: Parts Edition (in 74 parts)

First published in the United Kingdom in 2017 by Delphi Classics.

© Delphi Classics, 2017.

All rights reserved.  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form other than that in which it is published.

ISBN: 978 1 78656 295 1

Delphi Classics

is an imprint of

Delphi Publishing Ltd

Hastings, East Sussex

United Kingdom

Contact: [e-mail]

www.delphiclassics.com

William Shakespeare: Parts Edition

This eBook is Part 27 of the Delphi Classics edition of William Shakespeare in 74 Parts. It features the unabridged text of Othello from the bestselling edition of the author’s Complete Works. Having established their name as the leading publisher of classic literature and art, Delphi Classics produce publications that are individually crafted with superior formatting, while introducing many rare texts for the first time in digital print. Our Parts Editions feature original annotations and illustrations relating to the life and works of William Shakespeare, as well as individual tables of contents, allowing you to navigate eBooks quickly and easily.

Visit here to buy the entire Parts Edition of William Shakespeare or the Complete Works of William Shakespeare in a single eBook.

Learn more about our Parts Edition, with free downloads, via this link or browse our most popular Parts here.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

IN 74 VOLUMES

Parts Edition Contents

The Plays

1, Henry  VI, Part 2

2, Henry  VI, Part 3

3, Henry  VI, Part 1

4, Richard  III

5, The Comedy of Errors

6, Titus Andronicus

7, Taming of the Shrew

8, The Two Gentlemen of Verona

9, Love’s Labour’s Lost

10, Romeo and Juliet

11, Richard II

12, A Midsummer Night’s Dream

13, King John

14, The Merchant of Venice

15, Henry IV, Part I

16, Henry IV, Part II

17, Much Ado About Nothing

18, Henry V

19, Julius Caesar

20, As You Like It

21, Twelfth Night

22, Hamlet

23, The Merry Wives of Windsor

24, Troilus and Cressida

25, All’s Well that Ends Well

26, Measure for Measure

27, Othello

28, King Lear

29, Macbeth

30, Antony and Cleopatra

31, Coriolanus

32, Timon of Athens

33, Pericles

34, Cymbeline

35, The Winter’s Tale

36, The Tempest

37, Henry  VIII

38, The Two Noble Kinsmen

The Lost Plays

39, The Lost Plays

The Sources

40, The Plays’ Sources

The Apocryphal Plays

41, Arden of Faversham

42, The Birth of Merlin

43, King Edward  III

44, Locrine

45, The London Prodigal

46, The Puritan

47, The Second Maiden’s Tragedy

48, Sir John Oldcastle

49, Thomas Lord Cromwell

50, A Yorkshire Tragedy

51, Sir Thomas More

52, Fair Em

53, Mucedorus

54, The Merry Devil of Edmonton

55, Edmund Ironside

56, Thomas of Woodstock

57, Vortigern and Rowena

The Adaptations

58, Tales from Shakespeare by Charles and Mary Lamb

The Poetry

59, The Sonnets

60, Venus and Adonis

61, The Rape of Lucrece

62, The Passionate Pilgrim

63, The Phoenix and the Turtle

64, A Lover’s Complaint

The Apocryphal Poetry

65, To the Queen

66, A Funeral Elegy for Master William Peter

67, Sonnets to Sundry Notes of Music

The Criticism

68, The Criticism

The Biographies

69, Some Account of the Life of Mr. William Shakespear by Nicholas Rowe

70, Shakespeare: His Life, Art, and Characters by Henry Norman Hudson

71, Life of William Shakespeare by Sir Sidney Lee

72, Shakespeare’s Lost Years in London by Arthur Acheson

73, The People for Whom Shakespeare Wrote by Charles Dudley Warner

Resources

74, Resources

www.delphiclassics.com

Othello

This famous tragedy is believed to have been written in 1603, and is based on the Italian short story Un Capitano Moro by Cinthio, a follower of Boccaccio, first published in 1565. The work revolves around four central characters: Othello, a Moorish general in the Venetian army; his wife Desdemona; his lieutenant, Cassio; and his trusted ensign Iago, whose secret machinations to bring about the downfall of Othello serve as the play’s central action.

The play opens with Roderigo, a rich and dissolute gentleman, complaining to Iago, a high-ranking soldier, that he has not told him about the secret marriage between Desdemona, the daughter of a Senator named Brabantio, and Othello, a Moorish general in the Venetian army. He is upset because he loves Desdemona and had previously asked her father for her hand in marriage. Iago is upset with Othello for promoting a younger man named Cassio above him, and tells Roderigo that he plans to use Othello for his own advantage.

Shakespeare’s main source text for this play is available via this link.

The title page of the first quarto, 1622

Abd el-Ouahed ben Messaoud ben Mohammed Anoun, a Moorish ambassador that attended Queen Elizabeth I in 1600, who was suggested as being the inspiration for Othello.

CONTENTS

Dramatis Personæ

Act I. Scene I.

Act I. Scene II.

Act I. Scene III.

Act II. Scene I.

Act II. Scene II.

Act II. Scene III.

Act III. Scene I.

Act III. Scene II.

Act III. Scene III.

Act III. Scene IV.

Act IV. Scene I.

Act IV. Scene II.

Act IV. Scene III.

Act V. Scene I.

Act V. Scene II.

Orson Wells’ film noir style 1952 film adaptation

The 1995 movie version, with Kenneth Brannagh as the conspiring Iago

Dramatis Personæ

DUKE OF VENICE.

BRABANTIO, a Senator. Other Senators.

GRATIANO, Brother to Brabantio.

LODOVICO, Kinsman to Brabantio.

OTHELLO, a noble Moor; in the service of the Venetian State.

CASSIO, his Lieutenant.

IAGO, his Ancient.

RODERIGO, a Venetian Gentleman.

MONTANO, Othello’s predecessor in the Government of Cyprus.

Clown, Servant to Othello.

DESDEMONA, Daughter to Brabantio, and Wife to Othello.

EMILIA, Wife to Iago.

BIANCA, Mistress to Cassio.

Sailor, Officers, Gentlemen, Messengers, Musicians, Heralds, Attendants.

SCENE. — For the first Act, in Venice; during the rest of the Play, at a Sea-Port in Cyprus.

Act I. Scene I.

Venice.  A Street.

Enter RODERIGO and IAGO.

Rod.  Tush! Never tell me; I take it much unkindly

That thou, Iago, who hast had my purse

As if the strings were thine, shouldst know of this.   5

Iago.  ‘Sblood, but you will not hear me:

If ever I did dream of such a matter,

Abhor me.

Rod.  Thou told’st me thou didst hold him in thy hate.

Iago.  Despise me if I do not. Three great ones of the city,   10

In personal suit to make me his lieutenant,

Off-capp’d to him; and, by the faith of man,

I know my price, I am worth no worse a place;

But he, as loving his own pride and purposes,

Evades them, with a bombast circumstance   15

Horribly stuff’d with epithets of war;

And, in conclusion,

Nonsuits my mediators; for, ‘Certes,’ says he,

‘I have already chose my officer.’

And what was he?   20

Forsooth, a great arithmetician,

One Michael Cassio, a Florentine,

A fellow almost damn’d in a fair wife;

That never set a squadron in the field,

Nor the division of a battle knows   25

More than a spinster; unless the bookish theoric,

Wherein the toged consuls can propose

As masterly as he: mere prattle, without practice,

Is all his soldiership. But he, sir, had the election;

And I — of whom his eyes had seen the proof   30

At Rhodes, at Cyprus, and on other grounds

Christian and heathen — must be be-lee’d and calm’d

By debitor and creditor; this counter-caster,

He, in good time, must his lieutenant be,

And I — God bless the mark! — his Moorship’s ancient.   35

Rod.  By heaven, I rather would have been his hangman.

Iago.  Why, there’s no remedy: ’tis the curse of the service,

Preferment goes by letter and affection,

Not by the old gradation, where each second

Stood heir to the first. Now, sir, be judge yourself,   40

Whe’r I in any just term am affin’d

To love the Moor.

Rod.        I would not follow him then.

Iago.  O! sir, content you;

I follow him to serve my turn upon him;   45

We cannot all be masters, nor all masters

Cannot be truly follow’d. You shall mark

Many a duteous and knee-crooking knave,

That, doting on his own obsequious bondage,

Wears out his time, much like his master’s ass,   50

For nought but provender, and when he’s old, cashier’d;

Whip me such honest knaves. Others there are

Who, trimm’d in forms and visages of duty,

Keep yet their hearts attending on themselves,

And, throwing but shows of service on their lords,   55

Do well thrive by them, and when they have lin’d their coats

Do themselves homage: these fellows have some soul;