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Othello as a story of Mercenaries
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This study is designed to show how and to what extent the historical reality of mercenary soldiers and its related epistemological accoutrements in Renaissance countries, particularly Venice, enrich the proper understanding of the complicated dramatic and ideological texture of Shakespeare’s Othello, a tragedy often regarded in recent criticisms as a disturbing dramatization of the downfall of an alienated cultural other. The practice of employing alien mercenary soldiers in early modern Europe was a great source of social and political anxiety on the part of the host countries, despite the foreign soldiers’ tremendous contributions to their national security and aggressive foreign policies, and their military modernization project. The multi-national nature of the military troops of mercenaries was vulnerable to the inner conflicts among soldiers, which was seriously detrimental to their expected cohesive power; more importantly, the mercenary soldiers often invited backhanded suspicions about their possible betrayal as their commitment was ultimately contingent upon how much they got paid for their service. Othello reflects or refracts this contemporary anxiety surrounding the ambivalent perceptions of mercenaries. What is particularly remarkable about Othello is its use of the mercenary theme not merely as a foil for highlighting Othello’s cultural otherness but as a structural device, which helps clarify the complicated relationships between main characters in the context of Venice’s ideological concern about the possible subversive potentiality of mercenaries and their mentality. In order to drive home this aspect of the dramatic function of the mercenary theme Othello attempts to evoke the image of mercenary soldiers as wandering lots, a group of social underdogs who were frequently imagined in the contemporary European minds as residing outside the reach of state power, a dangerous threat that could challenge the established social order. For all this, however, the Venetian government in the play fails to completely erase the shadow of alien mercenaries from the surface of its territory as they are still desperately in need of the service of mercenary soldiers.
Abstract
This study is designed to show how and to what extent the historical reality of mercenary soldiers and its related epistemological accoutrements in Renaissance countries, particularly Venice, enrich the proper understanding of the complicated dramatic and ideological texture of Shakespeare’s Othello, a tragedy often regarded in recent criticisms as a disturbing dramatization of the downfall of an alienated cultural other. The practice of employing alien mercenary soldiers in early modern Europe was a great source of social and political anxiety on the part of the host countries, despite the foreign soldiers’ tremendous contributions to their national security and aggressive foreign policies, and their military modernization project. The multi-national nature of the military troops of mercenaries was vulnerable to the inner conflicts among soldiers, which was seriously detrimental to their expected cohesive power; more importantly, the mercenary soldiers often invited backhanded suspicions about their possible betrayal as their commitment was ultimately contingent upon how much they got paid for their service. Othello reflects or refracts this contemporary anxiety surrounding the ambivalent perceptions of mercenaries. What is particularly remarkable about Othello is its use of the mercenary theme not merely as a foil for highlighting Othello’s cultural otherness but as a structural device, which helps clarify the complicated relationships between main characters in the context of Venice’s ideological concern about the possible subversive potentiality of mercenaries and their mentality. In order to drive home this aspect of the dramatic function of the mercenary theme Othello attempts to evoke the image of mercenary soldiers as wandering lots, a group of social underdogs who were frequently imagined in the contemporary European minds as residing outside the reach of state power, a dangerous threat that could challenge the established social order. For all this, however, the Venetian government in the play fails to completely erase the shadow of alien mercenaries from the surface of its territory as they are still desperately in need of the service of mercenary soldiers.
참고문헌 (14)
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