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  • Title: Othello (Quarto 1, 1622)
  • Editor: Donald Bailey
  • ISBN: 978-1-55058-466-0

    Copyright Internet Shakespeare Editions. This text may be freely used for educational, non-proift purposes; for all other uses contact the Coordinating Editor.
    Author: William Shakespeare
    Editor: Donald Bailey
    Peer Reviewed

    Othello (Quarto 1, 1622)

    24
    The Tragedy of Othello

    Des. Alas! shee has no speech.
    Iag. I know too much.
    I finde it, I; for when I ha list to sleepe,
    875Mary, before your Ladiship I grant,
    She puts her tongue a little in her heart,
    And chides with thinking.
    Em. You ha little cause to say so.
    Iag. Come on, Come on, you are Pictures out adores:
    880Bells in your Parlors: Wildcats in your Kitchins:
    Saints in your iniuries: Diuells being offended:
    Players in your houswifery; and houswiues in your beds.
    O fie vpon thee slanderer.
    885Iag. Nay, it is true, or else I am a Turke,
    You rise to play, and goe to bed to worke.
    Em. You shall not write my praise.
    Iag. No, let me not.
    Desd. What wouldst thou write of me,
    890If thou shouldst praise me?
    Iag. O gentle Lady, doe not put me to't,
    For I am nothing, if not Criticall.
    Desd. Come on, assay ---there's one gone to the Harbor?
    895Iag. I Madam.
    Desd. I am not merry, but I doe beguile
    The thing I am, by seeming otherwise:
    Come, how wouldst thou praise me?
    Iag. I am about it, but indeed my inuention
    Comes from my pate, as birdlime does from freeze,
    900It plucks out braine and all: but my Muse labors,
    And thus she is deliuer'd:
    If she be faire and wise, fairenesse and wit;
    The one's for vse, the other vsing it.
    905Desd. Well praisde: how if she be blacke and witty?
    Iag, If she be blacke, and thereto haue a wit,
    Shee'le finde a white, that shall her blacknesse hit.
    Desd. Worse and worse.
    910Em. How if faire and foolish?
    Iag. She neuer yet was foolish, that was faire,
    For