Act One: Venice · Othello

It was night in a street in Venice. Iago, a soldier, was complaining bitterly to Roderigo, a rich, foolish young gentleman who paid him well for help in winning the senator Brabantio's daughter, Desdemona.

Iago served as ensign — standard-bearer — to Othello, the Moor, the great general of the Venetian forces. And he hated him. Othello had just chosen as his lieutenant, his second in command, not Iago, a soldier tried in battle, but Michael Cassio, a Florentine, "a great arithmetician," who knew war from books, "that never set a squadron in the field." Iago stayed on as ensign — but only to serve his own turn upon the Moor. "In following him, I follow but myself . . . I am not what I am."

And now he had news for Roderigo: Desdemona had left her father's house that very night, and secretly married Othello. They went together beneath Brabantio's windows and roused him with shouts — Iago, keeping in the dark, crying out to the old man in the coarsest terms, vile animal images of a Black man and a white woman, that his daughter was at that moment with the Moor. Brabantio, waking, found her gone, and raised the household in a fury. Iago slipped away to be at Othello's side: "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."

Othello received Iago's warning calmly. "Let him do his spite. My services which I have done the signiory shall out-tongue his complaints." He was of royal blood himself; he had married Desdemona because he loved her. "But that I love the gentle Desdemona, I would not my unhoused free condition put into circumscription and confine for the sea's worth." Cassio came with officers: the Duke and senators had sent for the general urgently, at this late hour; there was news from Cyprus. Then Brabantio arrived with armed men, and swords were drawn on both sides. "Keep up your bright swords, for the dew will rust them," said Othello. "Good signior, you shall more command with years than with your weapons."

Brabantio accused him of witchcraft: his daughter, so tender, fair and happy, so opposed to marriage that she had refused the wealthy, curled darlings of the nation, would never have run, to the general mock, into the arms of such a man as Othello — he said it in the ugliest terms — unless he had bewitched her with drugs or charms. He would bring the Moor before the Duke.

The Duke and senators were sitting in council at midnight: a Turkish fleet was making for Cyprus, the Venetian island. They needed Othello. And into the council came Brabantio, accusing him.

The reports were confused: one said a hundred and seven galleys, another a hundred and forty, another two hundred; a messenger came to say the fleet had turned towards Rhodes — a feint, the senators decided, to draw them off, for Cyprus mattered more to the Turk than Rhodes, and was less well defended. Then word came that the fleet had joined a second one, and turned back towards Cyprus. The Duke greeted Othello as soon as he entered: "Valiant Othello, we must straight employ you against the general enemy Ottoman."

Othello defended himself before them all, with dignity:

"Most potent, grave, and reverend signiors, my very noble and approved good masters: that I have ta'en away this old man's daughter, it is most true; true, I have married her: the very head and front of my offending hath this extent, no more. Rude am I in my speech, and little blessed with the soft phrase of peace . . . yet, by your gracious patience, I will a round unvarnished tale deliver of my whole course of love."

Her father had loved him, he said, and often invited him to the house, and questioned him about the story of his life — the battles, the sieges, the fortunes he had passed; "of moving accidents by flood and field, of hair-breadth 'scapes i' th' imminent deadly breach, of being taken by the insolent foe and sold to slavery, of my redemption thence"; of deserts and mountains, and of strange peoples. Desdemona would come again and again to hear, and devour up his discourse with a greedy ear; and one day she begged him to tell her the whole story; and when he had done, she gave him for his pains a world of sighs. "She loved me for the dangers I had passed, and I loved her that she did pity them. This only is the witchcraft I have used."

The Duke was moved: "I think this tale would win my daughter too." And Desdemona was sent for, and spoke for herself, clearly and bravely: she owed duty to her father for her life and education; but here was her husband; and as her mother had shown that duty to Brabantio, preferring him before her father, so she challenged that she might profess the same to the Moor her lord. She had married him for his mind: "I saw Othello's visage in his mind."

Brabantio gave her up in bitterness, and with a warning: "Look to her, Moor, if thou hast eyes to see: she has deceived her father, and may thee." "My life upon her faith!" said Othello.

He was to sail for Cyprus that night. Desdemona asked to go with him. It was granted; she would follow in another ship, in the care of his ensign, honest Iago, and Iago's wife Emilia.

Roderigo, in despair, talked of drowning himself. Iago laughed at him: "Put money in thy purse." It could not be that Desdemona would long continue her love to the Moor; she would tire of him; she would want youth, and fine manners, and change. Let Roderigo sell his lands, and follow them to the wars, and wait. "Put money in thy purse."

Alone, Iago laid out his plan:

"Thus do I ever make my fool my purse." He hated the Moor; it was thought abroad that Othello had been with his wife — "I know not if't be true; but I, for mere suspicion in that kind, will do as if for surety." Cassio was a proper man; he would get his place. "Let me see now: to get his place, and to plume up my will in double knavery — how, how? Let's see: after some time, to abuse Othello's ear that he is too familiar with his wife." Cassio had a smooth manner, framed to make women false. "The Moor is of a free and open nature, that thinks men honest that but seem to be so, and will as tenderly be led by th' nose as asses are. I have't. It is engendered. Hell and night must bring this monstrous birth to the world's light."