“Othello: The Moor of Venice” Educational Posters & Prints

Othello: The Moor of Venice is a tragedy, written c. 1603 by William Shakespeare.

The title character, Othello, is an African prince living in Venice as an ambassador from the Moors. He and Desdemona, the daughter of a Venetian senator, fall in love and elope; eventually Othello is deployed to Cyprus. When Othello's servant Iago tricks him into believing that Desdemona is having an affair with one of his soldiers, Michael Cassio, Othello kills her out of jealousy, only to realize that she was faithful, at which point he commits suicide.

There are several candidates as models for the character of Othello: the diplomat Leo Africanus who wrote a description of North Africa, and Abd el-Ouahed ben Messaoud, an ambassador to Elizabeth I from Morocco. The story has roots in “Un Capitano Moro” by Giovanni Battista Giraldi (Cinthio), and The Three Apples from One Thousand One Nights.

FYI ~ Composer Edward Elgar titled his “Pomp and Circustances Marches” from Act III, Scene III, of Othello. “O farewell, / Farewell the neighing steed, and the shrill trump, / The spirit-stirring drum, th' ear-piercing fife; / The royal banner, and all quality, / Pride, pomp, and circumstance of glorious war! / And O you mortal engines, whose rude throats / Th' immortal Jove's dread clamors counterfeit, / Farewell! Othello's occupation's gone.” (During the Renaissance “pomp and circumstance” were considered the inherent, and positive, duties of the exalted classes - so as a graduate, marching down the aisle, what is expected of you now?)