[XXIV]
OTHELLO—THE THEME AND ITS TREATMENT—A MONOGRAPH IN THE GREAT STYLE
A manuscript preserved in the Record Office, of doubtful date, but probably copied from an authentic document, contains the following entry:—
The plaiers 1605 The Poets wchBy the Kings Hallamas Day being the mayd the plaies
Maties plaiers First of November A play
in the Banketing house Shaxberd.
Att withal called the
Moore of Venis
Thus Othello was probably produced in the autumn of 1605. After this we have no proof of its performance till four and a half years later, when we hear of it again in the journal of Prince Ludwig Friedrich of Würtemberg, written by his secretary, Hans Wurmsser. The entry for the 30th of April 1610 runs thus:—
"Lundi, 30. S. E[minence] alla au Globe, lieu ordinaire ou l'on Joue les Commedies, y fut representé l'histoire du More de Venise."
In face of these data it matters nothing that there should appear in Othello, as we have it, a line that must have been written in or after 1611. The tragedy was printed for the first time in a quarto edition in 1622, for the second time in the Folio of 1623. The Folio text contains an additional 160 lines (proving that another manuscript has been made use of), and all oaths and mentions of the name of God are omitted. It is not only possible, but certain, that this line must have been a late interpolation. Its entire discordance with its position in the play shows this clearly enough, and seems to me to render it doubtful whether it is by Shakespeare at all.
In the scene where Othello bids Desdemona give him her hand, and loses himself in reflections upon it (iii. 4), he makes this speech:—
"A liberal hand: the hearts of old gave hands;
But our new heraldry is hands, not hearts."