An introductory guide to Othello in performance offering a scene-by-scene theatrically aware commentary, contextual documents, a brief history of the text and first performances, case studies of key productions, a survey of screen adaptations, a sampling of critical opinion and further reading.
General Editor's Preface
Introduction
The Text and Early Performances
Commentary
The Play's Intellectual and Cultural Contexts
Key Productions and Performances
The Play on Screen
Critical Assessment
Further Reading
Index.
STUART HAMPTON-REEVES is Professor of Research-Informed Teaching at the University of Central Lancashire, UK, and a Trustee of the British Shakespeare Association. His previous publications include the volume on Measure for Measure, also in the Shakespeare Handbooks series.
Othello is one of Shakespeare's most theatrically striking plays. This Handbook focuses on Othello as a dramatic work which exploits the resources of the early modern stage and yet still challenges contemporary theatres. Exploring race and gender as performance issues throughout the study, Stuart Hampton-Reeves: • examines the play's earliest performances and the problem of staging darkness on Shakespeare's stage • analyses the play from a performance point of view scene by scene, line by line • surveys key productions and films, tracing the play's move away from mainstream theatres • draws together the latest criticism on Othello's treatment of identity and sexuality.