"'Late' has no meaning here"

Imagining a Second Chance in Toni Morrison's Desdemona

Authors

  • Peter Erickson Northwestern University

Keywords:

Othello, Toni Morrison, Desdemona, Performance Studies

Abstract

Toni Morrison's Desdemona dramatically displaces Othello as the title character in Shakespeare's play. Morrison's renaming signals her re-vision of Othello by giving Desdemona an afterlife that restores her voice and activates her pursuit of further development beyond Shakespearean limits and without Othello. What enables this change is Desdemona's exploration of newly established and newly emphasized bonds with female characters, notably Emilia and Barbary.

Author Biography

Peter Erickson, Northwestern University

Peter Erickson is a member of the graduate faculty in theater and a faculty affiliate in African American studies at Northwestern University. He is the author of Citing Shakespeare: The Reinterpretation of Race in Contemporary Literature and Art (2007), Rewriting Shakespeare, Rewriting Ourselves (1991), and Patriarchal Structures in Shakespeare's Drama (1985), and co-editor of Approaches to Teaching Shakespeare's Othello (2005), Early Modern Visual Culture: Representation, Race, and Empire in Renaissance England (2000), and Shakespeare's "Rough Magic"(1985).

Issue Cover text: B&L, Vol. 8, No. 1, 2013. Image: 19th century actress Sarah Bernhardt dressed as Hamlet poses holding Yorick's skull.

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Published

2013-05-01

Issue

Vol. 8 No. 1 (2013): Spring/Summer

Section

Articles