English Language and Literature Commons^™

Undone By Adaptation? : Tracing Desdemona And Emilia In Othello And Otello(S), Emily Buckley-Crist

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

This thesis explores the characters of Desdemona and Emilia in Shakespeare’s Othello and productions of Giuseppe Verdi and Arrigo Boito’s operatic adaptation, Otello (1887). Shakespeare structures the play’s meditation on the limitations of feminine agency in early modern England with Desdemona and Emilia’s detached acts of defiance. When both women succumb to the parasitism of their marriages, Shakespeare illuminates the unjust danger defiant women face under the unyielding power of early modern patriarchy. Surprisingly, Verdi and Boito diminish the agency of these female characters in their opera, instead favoring male characters while adapting Shakespeare’s play to the form and audience …