The Connell Guide to Shakespeare's Othello - Couverture souple

Bradshaw, Graham

Couverture souple

ISBN 10 : 1907776001 ISBN 13 : 9781907776007

Editeur : CONNELL PUBLISHING LTD, 2012

Synopsis

With the exception of Hamlet, Othello is Shakespeare’s most controversial play. It is also his most shocking. Dr Johnson famously described the ending as “not to be endured”, and H.H. Furness, after editing the Variorum edition of the play, confessed to wishing that “this tragedy had never been written”. No play in performance has prompted more outbursts from onlookers: there are many recorded instances of members of the audience actually trying to intervene to prevent Othello murdering Desdemona.                       

It is a more domestic tragedy than Hamlet, King Lear or Macbeth, and it is the intimacy of its subject matter which gives it its dramatic power. Othello is a faithful portrait of life, wrote one anonymous Romantic critic. “Love and jealousy are passions which all men, with few exceptions, have at some time felt.”  Othello has also prompted more critical disputes than any other play except Hamlet. How could the hero possibly believe his wife had been unfaithful within a few days of their marriage? Is the marriage consummated (as it is usually assumed to be)? Is Othello a noble hero or is he really just a self-deluded egotist? And in this play about a disastrous inter-racial marriage, how important is the whole issue of race? Is the play itself racist?                 

This book looks at what Othello is really about and why it has such power to move us. It aims to offer a clear, authoritative and fresh view of Othello, while taking account of the many fascinating insights other critics have had into the play in the four centuries since it was written.

A propos du livre

À propos de l'auteur

Professor Graham Bradshaw is the author of Shakespeare's Scepticism, described by Harold Bloom as "one of the half-dozen or so best modern books about Shakespeare" and numerous other books and essays. But he is also a leading authority on Conrad, who he has studied for almost 50 years. A former Professor of English at Chuo University in Tokyo and before that a Reader at the University of St Andrews, he began his career at Cambridge. He is now an Honorary Professor of English and Fine Arts at the University of Queensland.

Détails de l'édition

• Éditeur: CONNELL PUBLISHING LTD
• Date d'édition: 2012
• Langue: anglais
• ISBN 10: 1907776001
• ISBN 13: 9781907776007
• Reliure: Broché
• Numéro d'édition: 1
• Nombre de pages: 128
• Éditeur: Connell Jolyon
• Coordonnées du fabricant: non disponible
• Personne responsable: non disponible