Chapter XVII: Part 17

Possibly, as Mr. Daniel observes, the play has been tampered with. We have no text earlier than 1622, six years after Shakespeare's death. It may be suggested, then, that in the play, as Shakespeare wrote it, there was a gap of some weeks between the arrival in Cyprus and Cassio's brawl, or (less probably) between the brawl and the temptation. Perhaps there was a scene indicating the lapse of time. Perhaps it was dull, or the play was a little too long, or devotees of the unity of time made sport of a second breach of that unity coming just after the breach caused by the voyage. Perhaps accordingly the owners of the play altered, or hired a dramatist to alter, the arrangement at this point, and this was unwittingly done in such a way as to produce the contradictions we are engaged on. There is nothing intrinsically unlikely in this idea; and certainly, I think, the amount of such corruption of Shakespeare's texts by the players is usually rather underrated than otherwise. But I cannot say I see any signs of foreign alteration in the text, though it is somewhat odd that Roderigo, who makes no complaint on the day of the arrival in Cyprus when he is being persuaded to draw Cassio into a quarrel that night, should, directly after the quarrel (II. iii. 370), complain that he is making no advance in his pursuit of Desdemona, and should speak as though he had been in Cyprus long enough to have spent nearly all the money he brought from Venice.

Or, possibly, Shakespeare's original plan was to allow some time to elapse after the arrival at Cyprus, but when he reached the point he found it troublesome to indicate this lapse in an interesting way, and convenient to produce Cassio's fall by means of the rejoicings on the night of the arrival, and then almost necessary to let the request for intercession, and the temptation, follow on the next day. And perhaps he said to himself, No one in the theatre will notice that all this makes an impossible position: and I can make all safe by using language that implies that Othello has after all been married for some time. If so, probably he was right. I do not think anyone does notice the impossibilities either in the theatre or in a casual reading of the play.

Either of these suppositions is possible: neither is, to me, probable. The first seems the less unlikely. If the second is true, Shakespeare did in _Othello_ what he seems to do in no other play. I can believe that he may have done so; but I find it very hard to believe that he produced this impossible situation without knowing it. It is one thing to read a drama or see it, quite another to construct and compose it, and he appears to have imagined the action in _Othello_ with even more than his usual intensity.

NOTE J.

THE 'ADDITIONS' TO _OTHELLO_ IN THE FIRST FOLIO. THE PONTIC SEA.

The first printed _Othello_ is the first Quarto (Q1), 1622; the second is the first Folio (F1), 1623. These two texts are two distinct versions of the play. Q1 contains many oaths and expletives where less 'objectionable' expressions occur in F1. Partly for this reason it is believed to represent the _earlier_ text, perhaps the text as it stood before the Act of 1605 against profanity on the stage. Its readings are frequently superior to those of F1, but it wants many lines that appear in F1, which probably represents the acting version in 1623. I give a list of the longer passages absent from Q1:

(_a_) I. i. 122-138. 'If't' ... 'yourself:'

(_b_) I. ii 72-77. 'Judge' ... 'thee'

(_c_) I. iii. 24-30. 'For' ... 'profitless.'

(_d_) III. iii. 383-390. '_Oth._ By' ... 'satisfied! _Iago._'

(_e_) III. iii. 453-460. 'Iago.' ... 'heaven,'

(_f_) IV. i. 38-44. 'To confess' ... 'devil!'

(_g_) IV. ii. 73-76, 'Committed!' ... 'committed!'

(_h_) IV. ii. 151-164. 'Here' ... 'make me.'

(_i_) IV. iii. 31-53. 'I have' ... 'not next'
and 55-57. '_Des._ [_Singing_]' ... 'men.'

(_j_) IV. iii. 60-63. 'I have' ... 'question.'

(_k_) IV. iii. 87-104. 'But I' ... 'us so.'

(_l_) V. ii. 151-154. 'O mistress' ... 'Iago.'

(_m_) V. ii. 185-193. 'My mistress' ... 'villany!'

(_n_) V. ii. 266-272. 'Be not' ... 'wench!'

Were these passages after-thoughts, composed after the version represented by Q1 was written? Or were they in the version represented by Q1, and only omitted in printing, whether accidentally or because they were also omitted in the theatre? Or were some of them after-thoughts, and others in the original version?

I will take them in order. (_a_) can hardly be an after-thought. Up to that point Roderigo had hardly said anything, for Iago had always interposed; and it is very unlikely that Roderigo would now deliver but four lines, and speak at once of 'she' instead of 'your daughter.' Probably this 'omission' represents a 'cut' in stage performance. (_b_) This may also be the case here. In our texts the omission of the passage would make nonsense, but in Q1 the 'cut' (if a cut) has been mended, awkwardly enough, by the substitution of 'Such' for 'For' in line 78. In any case, the lines cannot be an addition. (_c_) cannot be an after-thought, for the sentence is unfinished without it; and that it was not meant to be interrupted is clear, because in Q1 line 31 begins 'And,' not 'Nay'; the Duke might say 'Nay' if he were cutting the previous speaker short, but not 'And.' (_d_) is surely no addition. If the lines are cut out, not only is the metre spoilt, but the obvious reason for Iago's words, 'I see, Sir, you are eaten up with passion,' disappears, and so does the reference of his word 'satisfied' in 393 to Othello's 'satisfied' in 390. (_e_) is the famous passage about the Pontic Sea, and I reserve it for the present. (_f_) As Pope observes, 'no hint of this trash in the first edition,' the 'trash' including the words 'Nature would not invest herself in such shadowing passion without some instruction. It is not words that shake me thus'! There is nothing to prove these lines to be original or an after-thought. The omission of (_g_) is clearly a printer's error, due to the fact that lines 72 and 76 both end with the word 'committed.' No conclusion can be formed as to (_h_), nor perhaps (_i_), which includes the whole of Desdemona's song; but if (_j_) is removed the reference in 'such a deed' in 64 is destroyed. (_k_) is Emilia's long speech about husbands. It cannot well be an after-thought, for 105-6 evidently refer to 103-4 (even the word 'uses' in 105 refers to 'use' in 103). (_l_) is no after-thought, for 'if he says so' in 155 must point back to 'my husband say that she was false!' in 152. (_m_) might be an after-thought, but, if so, in the first version the ending 'to speak' occurred twice within three lines, and the reason for Iago's sudden alarm in 193 is much less obvious. If (_n_) is an addition the original collocation was:

but O vain boast!
Who can control his fate? 'Tis not so now.
Pale as thy smock!

which does not sound probable.

Thus, as it seems to me, in the great majority of cases there is more or less reason to think that the passages wanting in Q1 were nevertheless parts of the original play, and I cannot in any one case see any positive ground for supposing a subsequent addition. I think that most of the gaps in Q1 were accidents of printing (like many other smaller gaps in Q1), but that probably one or two were 'cuts'--_e.g._ Emilia's long speech (_k_). The omission of (_i_) might be due to the state of the MS.: the words of the song may have been left out of the dialogue, as appearing on a separate page with the musical notes, or may have been inserted in such an illegible way as to baffle the printer.

I come now to (_e_), the famous passage about the Pontic Sea. Pope supposed that it formed part of the original version, but approved of its omission, as he considered it 'an unnatural excursion in this place.' Mr. Swinburne thinks it an after-thought, but defends it. 'In other lips indeed than Othello's, at the crowning minute of culminant agony, the rush of imaginative reminiscence which brings back upon his eyes and ears the lightning foam and tideless thunder of the Pontic Sea might seem a thing less natural than sublime. But Othello has the passion of a poet closed in as it were and shut up behind the passion of a hero' (_Study of Shakespeare_, p. 184). I quote these words all the more gladly because they will remind the reader of my lectures of my debt to Mr. Swinburne here; and I will only add that the reminiscence here is of _precisely the same character_ as the reminiscences of the Arabian trees and the base Indian in Othello's final speech. But I find it almost impossible to believe that Shakespeare _ever_ wrote the passage without the words about the Pontic Sea. It seems to me almost an imperative demand of imagination that Iago's set speech, if I may use the phrase, should be preceded by a speech of somewhat the same dimensions, the contrast of which should heighten the horror of its hypocrisy; it seems to me that Shakespeare must have felt this; and it is difficult to me to think that he ever made the lines,

In the due reverence of a sacred vow
I here engage my words,

follow directly on the one word 'Never' (however impressive that word in its isolation might be). And as I can find no _other_ 'omission' in Q1 which appears to point to a subsequent addition, I conclude that this 'omission' _was_ an omission, probably accidental, conceivably due to a stupid 'cut.' Indeed it is nothing but Mr. Swinburne's opinion that prevents my feeling certainty on the point.

Finally, I may draw attention to certain facts which may be mere accidents, but may possibly be significant. Passages (_b_) and (_c_) consist respectively of six and seven lines; that is, they are almost of the same length, and in a MS. might well fill exactly the same amount of space. Passage (_d_) is eight lines long; so is passage (_e_). Now, taking at random two editions of Shakespeare, the Globe and that of Delius, I find that (_b_) and (_c_) are 6-1/4 inches apart in the Globe, 8 in Delius; and that (_d_) and (_e_) are separated by 7-3/8 inches in the Globe, by 8-3/4 in Delius. In other words, there is about the same distance in each case between two passages of about equal dimensions.

The idea suggested by these facts is that the MS. from which Q1 was printed was mutilated in various places; that (_b_) and (_c_) occupied the bottom inches of two successive pages, and that these inches were torn away; and that this was also the case with (_d_) and (_e_).

This speculation has amused me and may amuse some reader. I do not know enough of Elizabethan manuscripts to judge of its plausibility.

NOTE K.

OTHELLO'S COURTSHIP.

It is curious that in the First Act two impressions are produced which have afterwards to be corrected.

1. We must not suppose that Othello's account of his courtship in his famous speech before the Senate is intended to be exhaustive. He is accused of having used drugs or charms in order to win Desdemona; and therefore his purpose in his defence is merely to show that his witchcraft was the story of his life. It is no part of his business to trouble the Senators with the details of his courtship, and he so condenses his narrative of it that it almost appears as though there was no courtship at all, and as though Desdemona never imagined that he was in love with her until she had practically confessed her love for him. Hence she has been praised by some for her courage, and blamed by others for her forwardness.

But at III. iii. 70 f. matters are presented in quite a new light. There we find the following words of hers:

What! Michael Cassio,
That came a-wooing with you, and so many a time,
When I have spoke of you dispraisingly,
Hath ta'en your part.

It seems, then, she understood why Othello came so often to her father's house, and was perfectly secure of his love before she gave him that very broad 'hint to speak.' I may add that those who find fault with her forget that it was necessary for her to take the first open step. She was the daughter of a Venetian grandee, and Othello was a black soldier of fortune.

2. We learn from the lines just quoted that Cassio used to accompany Othello in his visits to the house; and from III. iii. 93 f. we learn that he knew of Othello's love from first to last and 'went between' the lovers 'very oft.' Yet in Act I. it appears that, while Iago on the night of the marriage knows about it and knows where to find Othello (I. i. 158 f.), Cassio, even if he knows where to find Othello (which is doubtful: see I. ii. 44), seems to know nothing about the marriage. See I. ii. 49:

_Cas._ Ancient, what makes he here?

_Iago._ 'Faith, he to-night hath boarded a land carack:
If it prove lawful prize, he's made for ever.

_Cas._ I do not understand.

_Iago._ He's married.

_Cas._ To who?

It is possible that Cassio does know, and only pretends ignorance because he has not been informed by Othello that Iago also knows. And this idea is consistent with Iago's apparent ignorance of Cassio's part in the courtship (III. iii. 93). And of course, if this were so, a word from Shakespeare to the actor who played Cassio would enable him to make all clear to the audience. The alternative, and perhaps more probable, explanation would be that, in writing Act I., Shakespeare had not yet thought of making Cassio Othello's confidant, and that, after writing Act III., he neglected to alter the passage in Act I. In that case the further information which Act III. gives regarding Othello's courtship would probably also be an after-thought.

NOTE L.

OTHELLO IN THE TEMPTATION SCENE.

One reason why some readers think Othello 'easily jealous' is that they completely misinterpret him in the early part of this scene. They fancy that he is alarmed and suspicious the moment he hears Iago mutter 'Ha! I like not that,' as he sees Cassio leaving Desdemona (III. iii. 35). But, in fact, it takes a long time for Iago to excite surprise, curiosity, and then grave concern--by no means yet jealousy--even about Cassio; and it is still longer before Othello understands that Iago is suggesting doubts about Desdemona too. ('Wronged' in 143 certainly does not refer to her, as 154 and 162 show.) Nor, even at 171, is the exclamation 'O misery' meant for an expression of Othello's own present feelings; as his next speech clearly shows, it expresses an _imagined_ feeling, as also the speech which elicits it professes to do (for Iago would not have dared here to apply the term 'cuckold' to Othello). In fact it is not until Iago hints that Othello, as a foreigner, might easily be deceived, that he is seriously disturbed about Desdemona.

Salvini played this passage, as might be expected, with entire understanding. Nor have I ever seen it seriously misinterpreted on the stage. I gather from the Furness Variorum that Fechter and Edwin Booth took the same view as Salvini. Actors have to ask themselves what was the precise state of mind expressed by the words they have to repeat. But many readers never think of asking such a question.

The lines which probably do most to lead hasty or unimaginative readers astray are those at 90, where, on Desdemona's departure, Othello exclaims to himself:

Excellent wretch! Perdition catch my soul
But I do love thee! and when I love thee not,
Chaos is come again.

He is supposed to mean by the last words that his love is _now_ suspended by suspicion, whereas in fact, in his bliss, he has so totally forgotten Iago's 'Ha! I like not that,' that the tempter has to begin all over again. The meaning is, 'If ever I love thee not, Chaos will have come again.' The feeling of insecurity is due to the excess of _joy_, as in the wonderful words after he rejoins Desdemona at Cyprus (II. i. 191):

If it were now to die,
'Twere now to be most happy: for, I fear
My soul hath her content so absolute
That not another comfort like to this
Succeeds in unknown fate.

If any reader boggles at the use of the present in 'Chaos _is_ come again,' let him observe 'succeeds' in the lines just quoted, or let him look at the parallel passage in _Venus and Adonis_, 1019:

For, he being dead, with him is beauty slain;
And, beauty dead, black Chaos comes again.

Venus does not know that Adonis is dead when she speaks thus.

NOTE M.

QUESTIONS AS TO _OTHELLO_, ACT IV. SCENE I.

(1) The first part of the scene is hard to understand, and the commentators give little help. I take the idea to be as follows. Iago sees that he must renew his attack on Othello; for, on the one hand, Othello, in spite of the resolution he had arrived at to put Desdemona to death, has taken the step, without consulting Iago, of testing her in the matter of Iago's report about the handkerchief; and, on the other hand, he now seems to have fallen into a dazed lethargic state, and must be stimulated to action. Iago's plan seems to be to remind Othello of everything that would madden him again, but to do so by professing to make light of the whole affair, and by urging Othello to put the best construction on the facts, or at any rate to acquiesce. So he says, in effect: 'After all, if she did kiss Cassio, that might mean little. Nay, she might even go much further without meaning any harm.[266] Of course there is the handkerchief (10); but then why should she _not_ give it away?' Then, affecting to renounce this hopeless attempt to disguise his true opinion, he goes on: 'However, _I_ cannot, as your friend, pretend that I really regard her as innocent: the fact is, Cassio boasted to me in so many words of his conquest. [Here he is interrupted by Othello's swoon.] But, after all, why make such a fuss? You share the fate of most married men, and you have the advantage of not being deceived in the matter.' It must have been a great pleasure to Iago to express his real cynicism thus, with the certainty that he would not be taken seriously and would advance his plot by it. At 208-210 he recurs to the same plan of maddening Othello by suggesting that, if he is so fond of Desdemona, he had better let the matter be, for it concerns no one but him. This speech follows Othello's exclamation 'O Iago, the pity of it,' and this is perhaps the moment when we most of all long to destroy Iago.

(2) At 216 Othello tells Iago to get him some poison, that he may kill Desdemona that night. Iago objects: 'Do it not with poison: strangle her in her bed, even the bed she hath contaminated?' Why does he object to poison? Because through the sale of the poison he himself would be involved? Possibly. Perhaps his idea was that, Desdemona being killed by Othello, and Cassio killed by Roderigo, he would then admit that he had informed Othello of the adultery, and perhaps even that he had undertaken Cassio's death; but he would declare that he never meant to fulfil his promise as to Cassio, and that he had nothing to do with Desdemona's death (he seems to be preparing for this at 285). His buying poison might wreck this plan. But it may be that his objection to poison springs merely from contempt for Othello's intellect. He can trust him to use violence, but thinks he may bungle anything that requires adroitness.

(3) When the conversation breaks off here (225) Iago has brought Othello back to the position reached at the end of the Temptation scene (III. iii.). Cassio and Desdemona are to be killed; and, in addition, the time is hastened; it is to be 'to-night,' not 'within three days.'

The constructional idea clearly is that, after the Temptation scene, Othello tends to relapse and wait, which is terribly dangerous to Iago, who therefore in this scene quickens his purpose. Yet Othello relapses again. He has declared that he will not expostulate with her (IV. i. 217). But he cannot keep his word, and there follows the scene of accusation. Its _dramatic_ purposes are obvious, but Othello seems to have no purpose in it. He asks no questions, or, rather, none that shows the least glimpse of doubt or hope. He is merely torturing himself.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 266: The reader who is puzzled by this passage should refer to the conversation at the end of the thirtieth tale in the _Heptameron_.]

NOTE N.

TWO PASSAGES IN THE LAST SCENE OF _OTHELLO_.

(1) V. ii. 71 f. Desdemona demands that Cassio be sent for to 'confess' the truth that she never gave him the handkerchief. Othello answers that Cassio _has_ confessed the truth--has confessed the adultery. The dialogue goes on:

_Des._ He will not say so.

_Oth._ No, his mouth is stopp'd:
Honest Iago hath ta'en order for 't.

_Des._ O! my fear interprets: what, is he dead?

_Oth._ Had all his hairs been lives, my great revenge
Had stomach for them all.

_Des._ Alas! he is _betray'd_ and _I_ undone.

It is a ghastly idea, but I believe Shakespeare means that, at the mention of Iago's name, Desdemona suddenly sees that _he_ is the villain whose existence he had declared to be impossible when, an hour before, Emilia had suggested that someone had poisoned Othello's mind. But her words rouse Othello to such furious indignation ('Out, strumpet! Weep'st thou for him to my face?') that 'it is too late.'

(2) V. ii. 286 f.

_Oth._ I look down towards his feet; but that's a fable.
If that thou be'st a devil, I cannot kill thee.
[_Wounds Iago._

_Lod._ Wrench his sword from him.

_Iago._ I bleed, sir, but not killed.

Are Iago's strange words meant to show his absorption of interest in himself amidst so much anguish? I think rather he is meant to be alluding to Othello's words, and saying, with a cold contemptuous smile, 'You see he is right; I _am_ a devil.'

NOTE O.

OTHELLO ON DESDEMONA'S LAST WORDS.

I have said that the last scene of _Othello_, though terribly painful, contains almost nothing to diminish the admiration and love which heighten our pity for the hero (p. 198). I said 'almost' in view of the following passage (V. ii. 123 ff.):

_Emil._ O, who hath done this deed?

_Des._ Nobody; I myself. Farewell:
Commend me to my kind lord: O, farewell! [_Dies._

_Oth._ Why, how should she be murdered?[267]

_Emil._ Alas, who knows?

_Oth._ You heard her say herself, it was not I.

_Emil._ She said so: I must needs report the truth.

_Oth._ She's, like a liar, gone to burning hell:
'Twas I that kill'd her.

_Emil._ O, the more angel she,
And you the blacker devil!

_Oth._ She turn'd to folly, and she was a whore.

This is a strange passage. What did Shakespeare mean us to feel? One is astonished that Othello should not be startled, nay thunder-struck, when he hears such dying words coming from the lips of an obdurate adulteress. One is shocked by the moral blindness or obliquity which takes them only as a further sign of her worthlessness. Here alone, I think, in the scene sympathy with Othello quite disappears. Did Shakespeare mean us to feel thus, and to realise how completely confused and perverted Othello's mind has become? I suppose so: and yet Othello's words continue to strike me as very strange, and also as not _like_ Othello,--especially as at this point he was not in anger, much less enraged. It has sometimes occurred to me that there is a touch of personal animus in the passage. One remembers the place in _Hamlet_ (written but a little while before) where Hamlet thinks he is unwilling to kill the King at his prayers, for fear they may take him to heaven; and one remembers Shakespeare's irony, how he shows that those prayers do _not_ go to heaven, and that the soul of this praying murderer is at that moment as murderous as ever (see p. 171), just as here the soul of the lying Desdemona is angelic _in_ its lie. Is it conceivable that in both passages he was intentionally striking at conventional 'religious' ideas; and, in particular, that the belief that a man's everlasting fate is decided by the occupation of his last moment excited in him indignation as well as contempt? I admit that this fancy seems un-Shakespearean, and yet it comes back on me whenever I read this passage. [The words 'I suppose so' (l. 3 above) gave my conclusion; but I wish to withdraw the whole Note]

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 267: He alludes to her cry, 'O falsely, falsely murder'd!']

NOTE P.

DID EMILIA SUSPECT IAGO?

I have answered No (p. 216), and have no doubt about the matter; but at one time I was puzzled, as perhaps others have been, by a single phrase of Emilia's. It occurs in the conversation between her and Iago and Desdemona (IV. ii. 130 f.):

I will be hang'd if some eternal villain,
Some busy and insinuating rogue,
Some cogging, cozening slave, _to get some office_,
Have not devised this slander; I'll be hang'd else.

Emilia, it may be said, knew that Cassio was the suspected man, so that she must be thinking of _his_ office, and must mean that Iago has poisoned Othello's mind in order to prevent his reinstatement and to get the lieutenancy for himself. And, it may be said, she speaks indefinitely so that Iago alone may understand her (for Desdemona does not know that Cassio is the suspected man). Hence too, it may be said, when, at V. ii. 190, she exclaims,

Villany, villany, villany!
I think upon't, I think: I smell't: O villany!
_I thought so then:_--I'll kill myself for grief;

she refers in the words italicised to the occasion of the passage in IV. ii., and is reproaching herself for not having taken steps on her suspicion of Iago.

I have explained in the text why I think it impossible to suppose that Emilia suspected her husband; and I do not think anyone who follows her speeches in V. ii., and who realises that, if she did suspect him, she must have been simply _pretending_ surprise when Othello told her that Iago was his informant, will feel any doubt. Her idea in the lines at IV. ii. 130 is, I believe, merely that someone is trying to establish a ground for asking a favour from Othello in return for information which nearly concerns him. It does not follow that, because she knew Cassio was suspected, she must have been referring to Cassio's office. She was a stupid woman, and, even if she had not been, she would not put two and two together so easily as the reader of the play.

In the line,

I thought so then: I'll kill myself for grief,

I think she certainly refers to IV. ii. 130 f. and also IV. ii. 15 (Steevens's idea that she is thinking of the time when she let Iago take the handkerchief is absurd). If 'I'll kill myself for grief' is to be taken in close connection with the preceding words (which is not certain), she may mean that she reproaches herself for not having acted on her general suspicion, or (less probably) that she reproaches herself for not having suspected that Iago was the rogue.

With regard to my view that she failed to think of the handkerchief when she saw how angry Othello was, those who believe that she did think of it will of course also believe that she suspected Iago. But in addition to other difficulties, they will have to suppose that her astonishment, when Othello at last mentioned the handkerchief, was mere acting. And anyone who can believe this seems to me beyond argument. [I regret that I cannot now discuss some suggestions made to me in regard to the subjects of Notes O and P.]

NOTE Q.

IAGO'S SUSPICION REGARDING CASSIO AND EMILIA.

The one expression of this suspicion appears in a very curious manner. Iago, soliloquising, says (II. i. 311):

Which thing to do,
If this poor trash of Venice, whom I trash
For his quick hunting, stand the putting on,
I'll have our Michael Cassio on the hip,
Abuse him to the Moor in the rank [F. right] garb--
For I fear Cassio with my night-cap too--
Make the Moor thank me, etc.

Why '_For_ I fear Cassio,' etc.? He can hardly be giving himself an additional reason for involving Cassio; the parenthesis must be explanatory of the preceding line or some part of it. I think it explains 'rank garb' or 'right garb,' and the meaning is, 'For Cassio _is_ what I shall accuse him of being, a seducer of wives.' He is returning to the thought with which the soliloquy begins, 'That Cassio loves her, I do well believe it.' In saying this he is unconsciously trying to believe that Cassio would at any rate _like_ to be an adulterer, so that it is not so very abominable to say that he _is_ one. And the idea 'I suspect him with Emilia' is a second and stronger attempt of the same kind. The idea probably was born and died in one moment. It is a curious example of Iago's secret subjection to morality.

NOTE R.

REMINISCENCES OF _OTHELLO_ IN _KING LEAR_.

The following is a list, made without any special search, and doubtless incomplete, of words and phrases in _King Lear_ which recall words and phrases in _Othello_, and many of which occur only in these two plays:

'waterish,' I. i. 261, appears only here and in _O._
III. iii. 15.

'fortune's alms,' I. i. 281, appears only here and in
_O._ III. iv. 122.

'decline' seems to be used of the advance of age only in
I. ii. 78 and _O._ III. iii. 265.

'slack' in 'if when they chanced to slack you,' II.
iv. 248, has no exact parallel in Shakespeare, but recalls
'they slack their duties,' _O._ IV. iii. 88.

'allowance' (=authorisation), I. iv. 228, is used
thus only in _K.L._, _O._ I. i. 128, and two places
in _Hamlet_ and _Hen. VIII._

'besort,' vb., I. iv. 272, does not occur elsewhere,
but 'besort,' sb., occurs in _O._ I. iii. 239 and
nowhere else.

Edmund's 'Look, sir, I bleed,' II. i. 43, sounds like
an echo of Iago's 'I bleed, sir, but not killed,' _O._
V. ii. 288.

'potential,' II. i. 78, appears only here, in _O._
I. ii. 13, and in the _Lover's Complaint_ (which, I
think, is certainly not an early poem).

'poise' in 'occasions of some poise,' II. i. 122, is
exactly like 'poise' in 'full of poise and difficult weight,'
_O._ III. iii. 82, and not exactly like 'poise' in
the three other places where it occurs.

'conjunct,' used only in II. ii. 125 (Q), V.
i. 12, recalls 'conjunctive,' used only in _H_. IV.
vii. 14, _O._ I. iii. 374 (F).

'grime,' vb., used only in II. iii. 9, recalls
'begrime,' used only in _O._ III. iii. 387 and
_Lucrece_.

'unbonneted,' III. i. 14, appears only here and in
_O._ I. ii. 23.

'delicate,' III. iv. 12, IV. iii. 15,
IV. vi. 188, is not a rare word with Shakespeare; he
uses it about thirty times in his plays. But it is worth
notice that it occurs six times in _O._

'commit,' used intr. for 'commit adultery,' appears only in
III. iv. 83, but cf. the famous iteration in _O._
IV. ii. 72 f.

'stand in hard cure,' III. vi. 107, seems to have no
parallel except _O._ II. i. 51, 'stand in bold cure.'

'secure'=make careless, IV. i. 22, appears only here
and in _O._ I. iii. 10 and (not quite the same sense)
_Tim._ II. ii. 185.

Albany's 'perforce must wither,' IV. ii. 35, recalls
Othello's 'It must needs wither,' V. ii. 15.

'deficient,' IV. vi. 23, occurs only here and in _O._
I. iii. 63.

'the safer sense,' IV. vi. 81, recalls 'my blood
begins my safer guides to rules,' _O._ II. iii. 205.

'fitchew,' IV. vi. 124, is used only here, in _O._
IV. i. 150, and in _T.C._ V. i. 67 (where it
has not the same significance).

Lear's 'I have seen the day, with my good biting falchion I
would have made them skip,' V. iii. 276, recalls
Othello's 'I have seen the day, That with this little arm and
this good sword,' etc., V. ii. 261.

The fact that more than half of the above occur in the first two Acts of _King Lear_ may possibly be significant: for the farther removed Shakespeare was from the time of the composition of _Othello_, the less likely would be the recurrence of ideas or words used in that play.

NOTE S.

_KING LEAR_ AND _TIMON OF ATHENS_.

That these two plays are near akin in character, and probably in date, is recognised by many critics now; and I will merely add here a few references to the points of resemblance mentioned in the text (p. 246), and a few notes on other points.

(1) The likeness between Timon's curses and some of the speeches of Lear in his madness is, in one respect, curious. It is natural that Timon, speaking to Alcibiades and two courtezans, should inveigh in particular against sexual vices and corruption, as he does in the terrific passage IV. iii. 82-166; but why should Lear refer at length, and with the same loathing, to this particular subject (IV. vi. 112-132)? It almost looks as if Shakespeare were expressing feelings which oppressed him at this period of his life.

The idea may be a mere fancy, but it has seemed to me that this pre-occupation, and sometimes this oppression, are traceable in other plays of the period from about 1602 to 1605 (_Hamlet_, _Measure for Measure_, _Troilus and Cressida_, _All's Well_, _Othello_); while in earlier plays the subject is handled less, and without disgust, and in later plays (e.g. _Antony and Cleopatra_, _The Winter's Tale_, _Cymbeline_) it is also handled, however freely, without this air of repulsion (I omit _Pericles_ because the authorship of the brothel-scenes is doubtful).

(2) For references to the lower animals, similar to those in _King Lear_, see especially _Timon_, I. i. 259; II. ii. 180; III. vi. 103 f.; IV. i. 2, 36; IV. iii. 49 f., 177 ff., 325 ff. (surely a passage written or, at the least, rewritten by Shakespeare), 392, 426 f. I ignore the constant abuse of the dog in the conversations where Apemantus appears.

(3) Further points of resemblance are noted in the text at pp. 246, 247, 310, 326, 327, and many likenesses in word, phrase and idea might be added, of the type of the parallel 'Thine Do comfort and not burn,' _Lear_, II. iv. 176, and 'Thou sun, that comfort'st, burn!' _Timon_, V. i. 134.

(4) The likeness in style and versification (so far as the purely Shakespearean parts of _Timon_ are concerned) is surely unmistakable, but some readers may like to see an example. Lear speaks here (IV. vi. 164 ff.):

Thou rascal beadle, hold thy bloody hand!
Why dost thou lash that whore? Strip thine own back;
Thou hotly lust'st to use her in that kind
For which thou whipp'st her. The usurer hangs the cozener.
Through tatter'd clothes small vices do appear;
Robes and furr'd gowns hide all. Plate sin with gold,
And the strong lance of justice hurtless breaks;
Arm it in rags, a pigmy's straw does pierce it.
None does offend, none, I say, none; I'll able 'em:
Take that of me, my friend, who have the power
To seal the accuser's lips. Get thee glass eyes;
And, like a scurvy politician, seem
To see the things thou dost not.

And Timon speaks here (IV. iii. 1 ff.):

O blessed breeding sun, draw from the earth
Rotten humidity; below thy sister's orb
Infect the air! Twinn'd brothers of one womb,
Whose procreation, residence, and birth,
Scarce is dividant, touch them with several fortunes,
The greater scorns the lesser: not nature,
To whom all sores lay siege, can bear great fortune,
But by contempt of nature.
Raise me this beggar, and deny't that lord:
The senator shall bear contempt hereditary,
The beggar native honour.
It is the pasture lards the rother's sides,
The want that makes him lean. Who dares, who dares.
In purity of manhood stand upright
And say 'This man's a flatterer'? if one be,
So are they all: for every grise of fortune
Is smooth'd by that below: the learned pate
Ducks to the golden fool: all is oblique;
There's nothing level in our cursed natures,
But direct villany.

The reader may wish to know whether metrical tests throw any light on the chronological position of _Timon_; and he will find such information as I can give in Note BB. But he will bear in mind that results arrived at by applying these tests to the whole play can have little value, since it is practically certain that Shakespeare did not write the whole play. It seems to consist (1) of parts that are purely Shakespearean (the text, however, being here, as elsewhere, very corrupt); (2) of parts untouched or very slightly touched by him; (3) of parts where a good deal is Shakespeare's but not all (_e.g._, in my opinion, III. v., which I cannot believe, with Mr. Fleay, to be wholly, or almost wholly, by another writer). The tests ought to be applied not only to the whole play but separately to (1), about which there is little difference of opinion. This has not been done: but Dr. Ingram has applied one test, and I have applied another, to the parts assigned by Mr. Fleay to Shakespeare (see Note BB.).[268] The result is to place _Timon_ between _King Lear_ and _Macbeth_ (a result which happens to coincide with that of the application of the main tests to the whole play): and this result corresponds, I believe, with the general impression which we derive from the three dramas in regard to versification.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 268: These are I. i.; II. i.; II. ii., except 194-204; in III. vi. Timon's verse speech; IV. i.; IV. ii. 1-28; IV. iii., except 292-362, 399-413, 454-543; V. i., except 1-50; V. ii.; V. iv. I am not to be taken as accepting this division throughout.]

NOTE T.

DID SHAKESPEARE SHORTEN _KING LEAR_?

I have remarked in the text (pp. 256 ff.) on the unusual number of improbabilities, inconsistencies, etc., in _King Lear_. The list of examples given might easily be lengthened. Thus (_a_) in IV. iii. Kent refers to a letter which he confided to the Gentleman for Cordelia; but in III. i. he had given to the Gentleman not a letter but a message. (_b_) In III. i. again he says Cordelia will inform the Gentleman who the sender of the message was; but from IV. iii. it is evident that she has done no such thing, nor does the Gentleman show any curiosity on the subject. (_c_) In the same scene (III. i.) Kent and the Gentleman arrange that whichever finds the King first shall halloo to the other; but when Kent finds the King he does not halloo. These are all examples of mere carelessness as to matters which would escape attention in the theatre,--matters introduced not because they are essential to the plot, but in order to give an air of verisimilitude to the conversation. And here is perhaps another instance. When Lear determines to leave Goneril and go to Regan he says, 'call my train together' (I. iv. 275). When he arrives at Gloster's house Kent asks why he comes with so small a train, and the Fool gives a reply which intimates that the rest have deserted him (II. iv. 63 ff.). He and his daughters, however, seem unaware of any diminution; and, when Lear 'calls to horse' and leaves Gloster's house, the doors are shut against him partly on the excuse that he is 'attended with a desperate train' (308). Nevertheless in the storm he has no knights with him, and in III. vii. 15 ff. we hear that 'some five or six and thirty of his knights'[269] are 'hot questrists after him,' as though the real reason of his leaving Goneril with so small a train was that he had hurried away so quickly that many of his knights were unaware of his departure.

This prevalence of vagueness or inconsistency is probably due to carelessness; but it may possibly be due to another cause. There are, it has sometimes struck me, slight indications that the details of the plot were originally more full and more clearly imagined than one would suppose from the play as we have it; and some of the defects to which I have drawn attention might have arisen if Shakespeare, finding his matter too bulky, had (_a_) omitted to write some things originally intended, and (_b_), after finishing his play, had reduced it by excision, and had not, in these omissions and excisions, taken sufficient pains to remove the obscurities and inconsistencies occasioned by them.

Thus, to take examples of (_b_), Lear's 'What, fifty of my followers at a clap!' (I. iv. 315) is very easily explained if we suppose that in the preceding conversation, as originally written, Goneril had mentioned the number. Again the curious absence of any indication why Burgundy should have the first choice of Cordelia's hand might easily be due to the same cause. So might the ignorance in which we are left as to the fate of the Fool, and several more of the defects noticed in the text.

To illustrate the other point (_a_), that Shakespeare may have omitted to write some things which he had originally intended, the play would obviously gain something if it appeared that, at a time shortly before that of the action, Gloster had encouraged the King in his idea of dividing the kingdom, while Kent had tried to dissuade him. And there are one or two passages which suggest that this is what Shakespeare imagined. If it were so, there would be additional point in the Fool's reference to the lord who counselled Lear to give away his land (I. iv. 154), and in Gloster's reflection (III. iv. 168),

His daughters seek his death: ah, that good Kent!
He said it would be thus:

('said,' of course, not to the King but to Gloster and perhaps others of the council). Thus too the plots would be still more closely joined. Then also we should at once understand the opening of the play. To Kent's words, 'I thought the King had more affected the Duke of Albany than Cornwall,' Gloster answers, 'It did always seem so to us.' Who are the 'us' from whom Kent is excluded? I do not know, for there is no sign that Kent has been absent. But if Kent, in consequence of his opposition, had fallen out of favour and absented himself from the council, it would be clear. So, besides, would be the strange suddenness with which, after Gloster's answer, Kent changes the subject; he would be avoiding, in presence of Gloster's son, any further reference to a subject on which he and Gloster had differed. That Kent, I may add, had already the strongest opinion about Goneril and Regan is clear from his extremely bold words (I. i. 165),

Kill thy physician, and the fee bestow
Upon thy foul disease.

Did Lear remember this phrase when he called Goneril 'a disease that's in my flesh' (II. iv. 225)?

Again, the observant reader may have noticed that Goneril is not only represented as the fiercer and more determined of the two sisters but also strikes one as the more sensual. And with this may be connected one or two somewhat curious points: Kent's comparison of Goneril to the figure of Vanity in the Morality plays (II. ii. 38); the Fool's apparently quite irrelevant remark (though his remarks are scarcely ever so), 'For there was never yet fair woman but she made mouths in a glass' (III. ii. 35); Kent's reference to Oswald (long before there is any sign of Goneril's intrigue with Edmund) as 'one that would be a bawd in way of good service' (II. ii. 20); and Edgar's words to the corpse of Oswald (IV. vi. 257), also spoken before he knew anything of the intrigue with Edmund,

I know thee well: a serviceable villain;
As duteous to the vices of thy mistress
As badness would desire.

Perhaps Shakespeare had conceived Goneril as a woman who before her marriage had shown signs of sensual vice; but the distinct indications of this idea were crowded out of his exposition when he came to write it, or, being inserted, were afterwards excised. I will not go on to hint that Edgar had Oswald in his mind when (III. iv. 87) he described the serving-man who 'served the lust of his mistress' heart, and did the act of darkness with her'; and still less that Lear can have had Goneril in his mind in the declamation against lechery referred to in Note S.

I do not mean to imply, by writing this note, that I believe in the hypotheses suggested in it. On the contrary I think it more probable that the defects referred to arose from carelessness and other causes. But this is not, to me, certain; and the reader who rejects the hypotheses may be glad to have his attention called to the points which suggested them.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 269: It has been suggested that 'his' means 'Gloster's'; but 'him' all through the speech evidently means Lear.]

NOTE U.

MOVEMENTS OF THE DRAMATIS PERSONÆ IN ACT II. OF _KING LEAR_.

I have referred in the text to the obscurity of the play on this subject, and I will set out the movements here.

When Lear is ill-treated by Goneril his first thought is to seek refuge with Regan (I. iv. 274 f., 327 f.). Goneril, accordingly, who had foreseen this, and, even before the quarrel, had determined to write to Regan (I. iii. 25), now sends Oswald off to her, telling her not to receive Lear and his hundred knights (I. iv. 354 f.). In consequence of this letter Regan and Cornwall immediately leave their home and ride by night to Gloster's house, sending word on that they are coming (II. i. 1 ff., 81, 120 ff.). Lear, on his part, just before leaving Goneril's house, sends Kent with a letter to Regan, and tells him to be quick, or Lear will be there before him. And we find that Kent reaches Regan and delivers his letter before Oswald, Goneril's messenger. Both the messengers are taken on by Cornwall and Regan to Gloster's house.

In II. iv. Lear arrives at Gloster's house, having, it would seem, failed to find Regan at her own home. And, later, Goneril arrives at Gloster's house, in accordance with an intimation which she had sent in her letter to Regan (II. iv. 186 f.).

Thus all the principal persons except Cordelia and Albany are brought together; and the crises of the double action--the expulsion of Lear and the blinding and expulsion of Gloster--are reached in Act III. And this is what was required.

But it needs the closest attention to follow these movements. And, apart from this, difficulties remain.

1. Goneril, in despatching Oswald with the letter to Regan, tells him to hasten his return (I. iv. 363). Lear again is surprised to find that _his_ messenger has not been sent back (II. iv. 1 f., 36 f.). Yet apparently both Goneril and Lear themselves start at once, so that their messengers _could_ not return in time. It may be said that they expected to meet them coming back, but there is no indication of this in the text.

2. Lear, in despatching Kent, says (I. v. 1):

Go you before to Gloster with these letters. Acquaint my
daughter no further with anything you know than comes from her
demand out of the letter.

This would seem to imply that Lear knew that Regan and Cornwall were at Gloster's house, and meant either to go there (so Koppel) or to summon her back to her own home to receive him. Yet this is clearly not so, for Kent goes straight to Regan's house (II. i. 124, II. iv. 1, 27 ff., 114 ff.).

Hence it is generally supposed that by 'Gloster,' in the passage just quoted, Lear means not the Earl but the _place_; that Regan's home was there; and that Gloster's castle was somewhere not very far off. This is to some extent confirmed by the fact that Cornwall is the 'arch' or patron of Gloster (II. i. 60 f., 112 ff.). But Gloster's home or house must not be imagined quite close to Cornwall's, for it takes a night to ride from the one to the other, and Gloster's house is in the middle of a solitary heath with scarce a bush for many miles about (II. iv. 304).

The plural 'these letters' in the passage quoted need give no trouble, for the plural is often used by Shakespeare for a single letter; and the natural conjecture that Lear sent one letter to Regan and another to Gloster is not confirmed by anything in the text.

The only difficulty is that, as Koppel points out, 'Gloster' is nowhere else used in the play for the place (except in the phrase 'Earl of Gloster' or 'my lord of Gloster'); and--what is more important--that it would unquestionably be taken by the audience to stand in this passage for the Earl, especially as there has been no previous indication that Cornwall lived at Gloster. One can only suppose that Shakespeare forgot that he had given no such indication, and so wrote what was sure to be misunderstood,--unless we suppose that 'Gloster' is a mere slip of the pen, or even a misprint, for 'Regan.' But, apart from other considerations, Lear would hardly have spoken to a servant of 'Regan,' and, if he had, the next words would have run 'Acquaint her,' not 'Acquaint my daughter.'

NOTE V.

SUSPECTED INTERPOLATIONS IN _KING LEAR_.

There are three passages in _King Lear_ which have been held to be additions made by 'the players.'

The first consists of the two lines of indecent doggerel spoken by the Fool at the end of Act I.; the second, of the Fool's prophecy in rhyme at the end of III. ii.; the third, of Edgar's soliloquy at the end of III. vi.

It is suspicious (1) that all three passages occur at the ends of scenes, the place where an addition is most easily made; and (2) that in each case the speaker remains behind alone to utter the words after the other persons have gone off.

I postpone discussion of the several passages until I have called attention to the fact that, if these passages are genuine, the number of scenes which end with a soliloquy is larger in _King Lear_ than in any other undoubted tragedy. Thus, taking the tragedies in their probable chronological order (and ignoring the very short scenes into which a battle is sometimes divided),[270] I find that there are in _Romeo and Juliet_ four such scenes, in _Julius Cæsar_ two, in _Hamlet_ six, in _Othello_ four,[271] in _King Lear_ seven,[272] in _Macbeth_ two,[273] in _Antony and Cleopatra_ three, in _Coriolanus_ one. The difference between _King Lear_ and the plays that come nearest to it is really much greater than it appears from this list, for in _Hamlet_ four of the six soliloquies, and in _Othello_ three of the four, are long speeches, while most of those in _King Lear_ are quite short.

Of course I do not attach any great importance to the fact just noticed, but it should not be left entirely out of account in forming an opinion as to the genuineness of the three doubted passages.

(_a_) The first of these, I. v. 54-5, I decidedly believe to be spurious. (1) The scene ends quite in Shakespeare's manner without it. (2) It does not seem likely that at the _end_ of the scene Shakespeare would have introduced anything _violently_ incongruous with the immediately preceding words,

Oh let me not be mad, not mad, sweet heaven!
Keep me in temper: I would not be mad!