The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 12.2458 Friday, 26 October 2001
[1] From: Mike Jensen <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Thursday, 25 Oct 2001 10:51:19 -0700
Subj: Re: SHK 12.2447 Re: Othello's Name
[2] From: Monica Matei Chesnoiu<This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Friday, 26 Oct 2001 02:33:06 +0200
Subj: RE: SHK 12.2429 Re: Othello's Name
[1]-----------------------------------------------------------------
From: Mike Jensen <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Thursday, 25 Oct 2001 10:51:19 -0700
Subject: 12.2447 Re: Othello's Name
Comment: Re: SHK 12.2447 Re: Othello's Name
Christopher Paul wrote:
>Mr. Jensen seems to be confusing the Stationers' Registration date with
>that of the first recorded performance of *Othello*, which was 1
>November, 1604. The SR entry was 6 October, 1621. Q1 of course came
>out in 1622. F 1623.
Quite right, I did. My apologies to all. For what it is worth, Wells
and Taylor lay out the case from word echoes in several texts on page
126. Re: the document recording the November 1604 court performance,
the waters are muddied a bit by this, also from page 126 - *Hamilton
(1985) has recently revived early suspicions of the document's
authenticity." This tends to give more credibility to Monica's
possibility. Some of the word echoes tend to go the other way.
Thank you, Christopher, for calling this mistake to my attention. I
would not want that to stand unchallenged.
All the best,
Mike Jensen
[2]-------------------------------------------------------------
From: Monica Matei Chesnoiu<This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Friday, 26 Oct 2001 02:33:06 +0200
Subject: 12.2429 Re: Othello's Name
Comment: RE: SHK 12.2429 Re: Othello's Name
Mike,
Sorry for the delay in my response. Hardy would understand all about
elderly fathers, hospitals, and other family matters. Since you referred
to Wells and Taylor, I saw that you meant 1604 as the date of
performance at Whitehall.
I'm trying to avoid the devil of generalizations and unfounded
assumptions. As could be seen, I only quoted the marginal notes other
people made on one copy of this book, naming the story as a possible
source for Othello. My word was 'rather speculative.' However, I wished
things were as clear as you made them sound. The (slightly)later date of
publication of _Euordanus_ doesn't mean it couldn't have been available
to S. in some other form. Things were hectic and marketing went high at
St. Paul's Churchyard. See an interesting book about print culture and
the history of book-making: Douglas A. Brooks. *From Playhouse to
Printing House: Drama and Authorship in Early Modern England* (Cambridge
Studies in Renaissance Literature and Culture, 36.) Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2000.
I could raise a similar argument regarding Giraldi's _Gli Hecatommithi_:
it did not exist in English at that time, only in Italian or French, so
S. MUST have read it in one of these languages (probably the Girolamo
Scotto 1566 Italian version). It's just an assumption. I cannot pursue
my research regarding the Euordanus story now, because I have no access
here to microfilm, Short Title Catalogue, etc. All I know is that it is
a rare book, it cannot be accessed so easily, and (try it!) it yields NO
results on the search engines. I have detailed notes of Part I of this
anonymous romance.
Skeptically and unassumingly yours,
Monica
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