THE 'ADDITIONS' TO OTHELLO IN THE FIRST FOLIO. THE PONTIC SEA.
The first printed Othello is the first Quarto (Q1), 1622; the second
is the first Folio (F1), 1623. These two texts are two distinct versions
of the play. Q1 contains many oaths and expletives where less
'objectionable' expressions occur in F1. Partly for this reason it is
believed to represent the earlier text, perhaps the text as it stood
before the Act of 1605 against profanity on the stage. Its readings are
frequently superior to those of F1, but it wants many lines that appear
in F1, which probably represents the acting version in 1623. I give a
list of the longer passages absent from Q1:
(a) I. i. 122-138. 'If't' ... 'yourself:'
(b) I. ii 72-77. 'Judge' ... 'thee'
(c) I. iii. 24-30. 'For' ... 'profitless.'
(d) III. iii. 383-390. 'Oth. By' ... 'satisfied! Iago.'
(e) III. iii. 453-460. 'Iago.' ... 'heaven,'
(f) IV. i. 38-44. 'To confess' ... 'devil!'
(g) IV. ii. 73-76, 'Committed!' ... 'committed!'
(h) IV. ii. 151-164. 'Here' ... 'make me.'
(i) IV. iii. 31-53. 'I have' ... 'not next'
and 55-57. 'Des. [Singing]' ... 'men.'
(j) IV. iii. 60-63. 'I have' ... 'question.'
(k) IV. iii. 87-104. 'But I' ... 'us so.'
(l) V. ii. 151-154. 'O mistress' ... 'Iago.'
(m) V. ii. 185-193. 'My mistress' ... 'villany!'
(n) V. ii. 266-272. 'Be not' ... 'wench!'
Were these passages after-thoughts, composed after the version represented by Q1 was written? Or were they in the version represented by Q1, and only omitted in printing, whether accidentally or because they were also omitted in the theatre? Or were some of them after-thoughts, and others in the original version?
I will take them in order. (a) can hardly be an after-thought. Up to that point Roderigo had hardly said anything, for Iago had always interposed; and it is very unlikely that Roderigo would now deliver but four lines, and speak at once of 'she' instead of 'your daughter.' Probably this 'omission' represents a 'cut' in stage performance. (b) This may also be the case here. In our texts the omission of the passage would make nonsense, but in Q1 the 'cut' (if a cut) has been mended, awkwardly enough, by the substitution of 'Such' for 'For' in line 78. In any case, the lines cannot be an addition. (c) cannot be an after-thought, for the sentence is unfinished without it; and that it was not meant to be interrupted is clear, because in Q1 line 31 begins 'And,' not 'Nay'; the Duke might say 'Nay' if he were cutting the previous speaker short, but not 'And.' (d) is surely no addition. If the lines are cut out, not only is the metre spoilt, but the obvious reason for Iago's words, 'I see, Sir, you are eaten up with passion,' disappears, and so does the reference of his word 'satisfied' in 393 to Othello's 'satisfied' in 390. (e) is the famous passage about the Pontic Sea, and I reserve it for the present. (f) As Pope observes, 'no hint of this trash in the first edition,' the 'trash' including the words 'Nature would not invest herself in such shadowing passion without some instruction. It is not words that shake me thus'! There is nothing to prove these lines to be original or an after-thought. The omission of (g) is clearly a printer's error, due to the fact that lines 72 and 76 both end with the word 'committed.' No conclusion can be formed as to (h), nor perhaps (i), which includes the whole of Desdemona's song; but if (j) is removed the reference in 'such a deed' in 64 is destroyed. (k) is Emilia's long speech about husbands. It cannot well be an after-thought, for 105-6 evidently refer to 103-4 (even the word 'uses' in 105 refers to 'use' in 103). (l) is no after-thought, for 'if he says so' in 155 must point back to 'my husband say that she was false!' in 152. (m) might be an after-thought, but, if so, in the first version the ending 'to speak' occurred twice within three lines, and the reason for Iago's sudden alarm in 193 is much less obvious. If (n) is an addition the original collocation was:
| but O vain boast! |
Who can control his fate? 'Tis not so now. Pale as thy smock!
which does not sound probable.
Thus, as it seems to me, in the great majority of cases there is more or less reason to think that the passages wanting in Q1 were nevertheless parts of the original play, and I cannot in any one case see any positive ground for supposing a subsequent addition. I think that most of the gaps in Q1 were accidents of printing (like many other smaller gaps in Q1), but that probably one or two were 'cuts'--e.g. Emilia's long speech (k). The omission of (i) might be due to the state of the MS.: the words of the song may have been left out of the dialogue, as appearing on a separate page with the musical notes, or may have been inserted in such an illegible way as to baffle the printer.
I come now to (e), the famous passage about the Pontic Sea. Pope supposed that it formed part of the original version, but approved of its omission, as he considered it 'an unnatural excursion in this place.' Mr. Swinburne thinks it an after-thought, but defends it. 'In other lips indeed than Othello's, at the crowning minute of culminant agony, the rush of imaginative reminiscence which brings back upon his eyes and ears the lightning foam and tideless thunder of the Pontic Sea might seem a thing less natural than sublime. But Othello has the passion of a poet closed in as it were and shut up behind the passion of a hero' (Study of Shakespeare, p. 184). I quote these words all the more gladly because they will remind the reader of my lectures of my debt to Mr. Swinburne here; and I will only add that the reminiscence here is of precisely the same character as the reminiscences of the Arabian trees and the base Indian in Othello's final speech. But I find it almost impossible to believe that Shakespeare ever wrote the passage without the words about the Pontic Sea. It seems to me almost an imperative demand of imagination that Iago's set speech, if I may use the phrase, should be preceded by a speech of somewhat the same dimensions, the contrast of which should heighten the horror of its hypocrisy; it seems to me that Shakespeare must have felt this; and it is difficult to me to think that he ever made the lines,
In the due reverence of a sacred vow I here engage my words,
follow directly on the one word 'Never' (however impressive that word in its isolation might be). And as I can find no other 'omission' in Q1 which appears to point to a subsequent addition, I conclude that this 'omission' was an omission, probably accidental, conceivably due to a stupid 'cut.' Indeed it is nothing but Mr. Swinburne's opinion that prevents my feeling certainty on the point.
Finally, I may draw attention to certain facts which may be mere accidents, but may possibly be significant. Passages (b) and (c) consist respectively of six and seven lines; that is, they are almost of the same length, and in a MS. might well fill exactly the same amount of space. Passage (d) is eight lines long; so is passage (e). Now, taking at random two editions of Shakespeare, the Globe and that of Delius, I find that (b) and (c) are 6-1/4 inches apart in the Globe, 8 in Delius; and that (d) and (e) are separated by 7-3/8 inches in the Globe, by 8-3/4 in Delius. In other words, there is about the same distance in each case between two passages of about equal dimensions.
The idea suggested by these facts is that the MS. from which Q1 was printed was mutilated in various places; that (b) and (c) occupied the bottom inches of two successive pages, and that these inches were torn away; and that this was also the case with (d) and (e).
This speculation has amused me and may amuse some reader. I do not know enough of Elizabethan manuscripts to judge of its plausibility.