{"collection":"Shakespeare","full_text_available":false,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/sacred_texts_v1_sks_ff_oth_htm/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/sacred_texts_v1_sks_ff_oth_htm","id":"sacred_texts_v1_sks_ff_oth_htm","license":"unknown_pending_legal_review","rights_basis":"sacred_texts_v1_preview_gate_primary_text_only; acquisition-method/ToS and compilation-copyright questions still open, not resolved by this gate","source":"sacred_texts_v1","source_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/sks/ff/oth.htm","summary":"This is the opening two scenes of Shakespeare's tragedy *Othello* (c. 1603), written in Early Modern English verse and prose. The action begins with Iago revealing to Rodrigo that he has been passed over for promotion by the Moorish general Othello, who appointed the bookish Cassio as lieutenant instead \u2014 a slight Iago frames as proof that military advancement now goes by favoritism rather than merit. Iago immediately discloses his core philosophy: he serves Othello only to exploit him, performing loyalty while pursuing self-interest, encapsulated in his declaration \"I am not what I am.\" The two men wake Brabantio, Desdemona's father, with deliberately inflammatory racial taunts \u2014 describing Othello as \"an old black ram tupping your white ewe\" \u2014 to incite him against the marriage. In Scene Two, Othello appears as a figure of calm authority, unbothered by Brabantio's accusations of witchcraft and confident his military reputation will protect him, while urgent summons from the Duke about a crisis in Cyprus pull him toward the Senate. What is most distinctive is how fully Iago's scheming and his articulate contempt for \"knee-crooking\" servility are established at the outset, making the audience complicit in his manipulations before Othello himself has spoken a dozen lines.","tags":[],"text":null,"title":"The Tragedie of Othello, the Moore of Venice","tradition":"Shakespeare","translated_text":null,"word_count":27387}