CRITICISM

Boose, Lynda E. “‘Let it be Hid’: The Pornographic Aesthetic of Shakespeare's Othello.” In New Casebooks: Othello, edited by Lena Cowen Orlin, pp. 22-48. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004.

Argues that Othello shares elements with pornographic literature, noting the play's emphasis on voyeuristic watching and the way in which Desdemona is silenced by erotic violence.

Hays, Michael L. “Othello: Courtly Love and Chivalric Justice.” In Shakespearean Tragedy as Chivalric Romance: Rethinking Macbeth, Hamlet, Othello, and King Lear, pp. 155-90. Cambridge, U.K.: D.S. Brewer, 2003.

Maintains that Othello belongs to the genre of romance and that its protagonist's actions can best be understood by viewing him as a chivalric knight—“a fighter for state and church, for justice and faith, and a lover.”

Nordlund, Marcus. “Theorising Early Modern Jealousy: A Biocultural Perspective on Shakespeare's Othello.” Studia Neophilologica 74, no. 2 (2002): 146-60.

Discusses the representation of jealousy in Othello.

Richmond, Hugh Macrae. “The Audience's Role in Othello.” In Othello: New Critical Essays, edited by Philip C. Kolin, pp. 89-101. New York: Routledge, 2002.

Emphasizes the manner in which Othello is shaped by the playwright's expectations of audience reaction and focuses in particular on Desdemona's actions, which do not conform to audience's expectations of conventional female behavior.

Rudanko, Juhani. “Dominance, Topics and Iago.” In Pragmatic Approaches to Shakespeare, pp. 35-62. Lanham, Md.: University Press of America, 1993.

Investigates Iago's ability to dominate the other characters in Othello by linguistic means.

Sinfield, Alan. “Cultural Materialism, Othello and the Politics of Plausibility.” In New Casebooks: Othello, edited by Lena Cowen Orlin, pp. 49-77. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004.

Probes the ideology of Venetian culture, which set the parameters for the racism and sexism expressed by the characters in Othello.

Taylor, Paul. “First Night: Youth Blunts the Sharp Pain of Betrayal.” Independent (22 April 1999): 13.

Comments on a 1999 Royal Shakespeare Company staging of Othello directed by Richard Attenborough. The critic finds that actor Ray Fearon was too young to make a convincing Othello but praises the production's energy.

Vitkus, Daniel J. “Turning Turk in Othello: The Conversion and Damnation of the Moor.” Shakespeare Quarterly 48, no. 2 (summer 1987): 145-76.

Views Othello as an expression of British concerns about the power of the Islamic Ottoman Empire and discusses the fear of religious and military conquest that was common in post-Reformation England.