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OTHELLO, THE MOOR OF VENICE:

A TRAGEDY, BY WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE,

GIOVANNI Giraldi Cynthio's Hecatommithi, contains the original story of this drama, but no English version of that work of the time of Shakspeare has been yet discovered; though an imperfect French translation by Gabriel Chappuys, was published at Paris in 1584. Malone originally assigned 1611, Chalmers 1614, and Dr. Drake 1612, as the date of the composition of this Tragedy, upon Warburton's supposition that Othello's words in Act iii. Scene 4., "our new heraldry is hands, not hearts," referred to the order and badge of Baronets instituted in 1611. Malone afterwards altered his time to 1604, affirming that the play was acted that year. Vertue's MSS. shew, however, that it was performed at Court before James I. in 1613: but it is supposed that Shakspeare derived Othello's simile of the never-ebbing current of the Pontick Sea, Act iii. Scene 3., from Dr. Philemon Holland's translation of Pliny's Natural History, London : 1601, folio, book ii. chap. 97. Othello was entered at Stationers' Hall, October 16th, 1621, and appeared in quarto in the year following; but there are many minute differences between that edition and the folio of 1623.

For the first act of this play, the scene lies in Venice, but during the remainder at a sea-port in the Isle of Cyprus; and a few days appear to include all the action. For the historical period, Selymus II, formed his design against Cyprus in 1569, and captured it in 1571; which, being the only attempt that the Turks ever made upon the Island after it came into the Venetian power in 1473, the circumstances must be placed in some part of the interval. The play relates-Act i. Scene 3-that there was a junction of the Turkish fleet at Rhodes, for the invasion of Cyprus, to which it was first sailing; then it returned to Rhodes, and then, meeting another squadron, resumed it's way to Cyprus, The real date, therefore, is May 1570, when Mustapha, the general of Selymus, attacked the island.

This Tragedy was originally performed at the Globe and Black-Friars' Theatres, Othello and Iago being played by Burbage and Taylor, Spranger Barry is said to have made the finest Moor on the stage; and he was also admirably supported by his wife, formerly Mrs. Dancer, whom he taught to perform Desdemona. The other most eminent actors in the principal parts, have been Betterton, Booth, Garrick, Henderson, Cooke, Young, and Kean; and Mr. C. Kemble as Cassio. The modern alteration of Othello was produced by J. P. Kemble at Covent-Garden in 1804; for which house Mr. J. R. Planché published a series of accurate historical costume in 1825.

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ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA :

A TRAGEDY, BY WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

MALONE has placed the composition of this drama in 1608, in which year a volume of the same title appears entered at Stationers' Hall; but no edition of it earlier than the folio of 1623, has been hitherto discovered. Another entry in 1593 mentions a "booke entituled The Tragedie of Cleopatra," but this has been considered as most probably the production of Samuel Daniel; whose poem so called passed through several editions, one appearing in 1594. The materials used by Shakspeare were derived from North's translation of Plutarch, and he appears to have been desirous of introducing every incident and person which he found recorded; for when the historian mentions his grandfather Lamprias, as his authority for his account of the entertainments of Antony at Alexandria,—in the old copy of this play, in a stage-direction in Act i. Scene 2., Lamprias, Ramnus, and Lucilius, enter with the rest, but have no part in the dialogue.

The scene of the Tragedy is as diversified, and full of vivacity, as the incidents; being laid at Alexandria, Rome, Messina, near Misenum, on board Pompey's galley there, on a plain in Syria, at Athens, Antony's camp near Actium, aud Cæsar's camp in different parts of Egypt. Expectation is kept always engaged, and the passions always interested; whilst the continual hurry of the action, the variety of the incidents, and the quick succession of one personage to another, call the mind forward from the first act to the last. These, as Dr. Johnson observes, form it's principal powers of delighting; for, excepting the feminine arts, some of which are too low, which distinguish Cleopatra, no character is very strongly discriminated. If Ben Jonson really alluded to this drama in his Silent Woman, 1609, he has certainly not unaptly, though, perhaps, somewhat ill-naturedly, characterised it, as "a play that is nothing but fights at sea, drum, trumpet, and target." The principal events are described according to history, though without any art of connection or care of disposition; and they appear to extend the action from near the death of Fulvia, the wife of Antony, about 40 years Before Christ, until the battle of Alexandria, and the death of himself and Cleopatra, B. C. 30.

In 1758, this Tragedy was altered by Edward Capell, with the assistance of Garrick, and produced at Drury-Lane, with new scenery, dresses, and decorations, when it was received with considerable applause; but Garrick had not sufficient personal qualifications to render him a proper representative of Marcus Antonius.

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CYMBELINE :

A TRAGEDY, BY WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

ALL the historical materials and references of this drama were taken from Holinshed's Chronicles; but the plot is to be found chiefly in the 9th Novel of the second day of Boccaccio's Decameron. Shakspeare derived it, however, from an inferior and altered translation of that particular story, printed in 1518, entitled This matter tréateth of a Merchauntes Wife, that afterwardes wente like a man, and became a greate lorde, and was called Frederyke of Jennen. The events of Imogen wandering after Pisanio in the forest, and being taken as a page by the Roman general, are attributed to the second tale in a book published in 1603, named Westward for Smelts.

Malone believed this drama to have been composed in 1609, after Lear and Macbeth; because all the stories are found together in Holinshed. In the Scottish part of those chronicles, is the narrative of Hay and his two sons rallying the flying Scots against the Danes; which, perhaps, furnished the incident of Belarius and the Princes turning the retreating Britons in Act v. Scene 2. The name of Leonatus was adopted from that of the legitimate son of the blind King of Paphlagonia, in Sir Philip Sidney's Arcadia, which Shakspeare had been recently using in Lear; and the many Roman features introduced in this piece, shew it to be probable that about the same time he had been reading North's Plutarch. Cymbeline was neither entered nor printed before 1623.

The scene is laid dispersedly in Britain and Italy. According to Holinshed, Cymbeline began to reign in the 19th year of Augustus Cæsar; and the piece commences about his 24th year, the 42nd of the Emperor, A. D. 16. In 1759 an adaptation of this drama by W. Hawkins, was acted for a very few nights at Covent-Garden; in which the part of Iachimo was omitted, and Posthumus kept back until the third act. Garrick produced a less violent alteration in 1761 at Drury-Lane, yet he left out on the stage the speech of Cornelius in Act i. Scene 6., which prepares the audience for the trance of Imogen; though it was restored in the printed copy. The modern revisal is that by J. P. Kemble, performed at Drury-Lane, February 12th, 1801, when he first exhibited his most manly and noble delineation of Posthumus. He used to observe that one of the most pleasing representations he ever saw upon the stage, was the elegant rusticity of the two boys, Guiderius and Arviragus, played by C. Kemble and young Decamp, who looked really of the same family. In 1810, Mr. Kemble's alteration of Cymbeline was produced at Covent-Garden.

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