Othello Act 1 Scene 1 Lyrics

BRABANTIO appears above, at a window

BRABANTIO
What is the reason of this terrible summons?
What is the matter there?


RODERIGO
Signior, is all your family within?

IAGO
Are your doors lock'd?

BRABANTIO
Why, wherefore ask you this?

IAGO
'Zounds, sir, you're robb'd; for shame, put on
Your gown;

Your heart is burst, you have lost half your soul;
Even now, now, very now, an old black ram
Is tupping your white ewe
. Arise, arise;
Awake the snorting citizens with the bell

Or else the devil will make a grandsire of you:
Arise, I say.

BRABANTIO
What, have you lost your wits?

RODERIGO
Most reverend signior, do you know my voice?

BRABANTIO
Not I what are you?

RODERIGO
My name is Roderigo.

BRABANTIO
The worser welcome:
I have charged thee not to haunt about my doors:
In honest plainness thou hast heard me say
My daughter is not for thee; and now, in madness
Being full of supper and distempering draughts
Upon malicious bravery, dost thou come
To start my quiet.


RODERIGO
Sir, sir, sir,--

BRABANTIO
But thou must needs be sure
My spirit and my place have in them power
To make this bitter to thee.

RODERIGO
Patience, good sir.

BRABANTIO
What tell'st thou me of robbing? this is Venice;
My house is not a grange.

RODERIGO
Most grave Brabantio
In simple and pure soul I come to you.

IAGO
'Zounds, sir, you are one of those that will not
Serve God, if the devil bid you. Because we come to
Do you service and you think we are ruffians, you'll
Have your daughter covered with a Barbary horse;
You'll have your nephews neigh to you; you'll have
Coursers for cousins and gennets for germans.


BRABANTIO
What profane wretch art thou?

IAGO
I am one, sir, that comes to tell you your daughter
And the Moor are now making the beast with two backs.


BRABANTIO
Thou art a villain.


IAGO
You are--a senator.

BRABANTIO
This thou shalt answer; I know thee, Roderigo.

RODERIGO
Sir, I will answer any thing. But, I beseech you
If't be your pleasure and most wise consent
As partly I find it is, that your fair daughter
At this odd-even and dull watch o' the night

Transported, with no worse nor better guard
But with a knave of common hire, a gondolier
To the gross clasps of a lascivious Moor--
If this be known to you and your allowance
We then have done you bold and saucy wrongs;
But if you know not this, my manners tell me
We have your wrong rebuke. Do not believe
That, from the sense of all civility
I thus would play and trifle with your reverence:
Your daughter, if you have not given her leave
I say again, hath made a gross revolt;
Tying her duty, beauty, wit and fortunes
In an extravagant and wheeling stranger
Of here and every where.
Straight satisfy yourself:
If she be in her chamber or your house
Let loose on me the justice of the state
For thus deluding you.

BRABANTIO
Strike on the tinder, ho!
Give me a taper! call up all my people!
This accident is not unlike my dream:
Belief of it oppresses me already
Light, I say! light!

Exit above

IAGO
Farewell; for I must leave you:
It seems not meet, nor wholesome to my place
To be produced--as, if I stay, I shall--
Against the Moor:
for, I do know, the state
However this may gall him with some cheque
Cannot with safety cast him, for he's embark'd
With such loud reason to the Cyprus wars
Which even now stand in act, that, for their souls
Another of his fathom they have none
To lead their business: in which regard
Though I do hate him as I do hell-pains
Yet, for necessity of present life
I must show out a flag and sign of love
Which is indeed but sign.
That you shall surely find him
Lead to the Sagittary the raised search;
And there will I be with him. So, farewell.

Exit

Enter, below, BRABANTIO, and Servants with torches

BRABANTIO
It is too true an evil: gone she is;
And what's to come of my despised time
Is nought but bitterness. Now, Roderigo
Where didst thou see her? O unhappy girl!
With the Moor, say'st thou? Who would be a father!
How didst thou know 'twas she? O she deceives me
Past thought! What said she to you? Get more tapers:
Raise all my kindred. Are they married, think you?

RODERIGO
Truly, I think they are.

BRABANTIO
O heaven! How got she out? O treason of the blood!
Fathers, from hence trust not your daughters' minds
By what you see them act. Is there not charms
By which the property of youth and maidhood
May be abused? Have you not read, Roderigo,
Of some such thing?


RODERIGO
Yes, sir, I have indeed.

BRABANTIO
Call up my brother. O, would you had had her!
Some one way, some another. Do you know
Where we may apprehend her and the Moor?

RODERIGO
I think I can discover him, if you please
To get good guard and go along with me.

BRABANTIO
Pray you, lead on. At every house I'll call;
I may command at most. Get weapons, ho!
And raise some special officers of night.
On, good Roderigo: I'll deserve your pains.

Exeunt

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Genius Annotation

As the play begins, Roderigo is upset to learn that Desdemona has eloped with Othello, a Moorish general of Venice. Roderigo had been trying to woo her for himself.

Iago, Othello’s ancient (flag officer, third-in-command), assures Roderigo that he, too, hates Othello because the general passed him over for a promotion in favor of Cassio. He explains that he is a skilled faker (“I am not what I am”) pretending to be loyal to Othello as he plans his revenge.

Iago and Roderigo wake Desdemona’s father, Brabanto, to tell him about the marriage. Iago describes the coupling in graphic, racially charged terms. Brabanto is enraged and vows to assemble an armed posse to hunt down Othello.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=44GKZrErSFQ

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