“The ‘Double Time’ Crux in Othello Solved”

Sohmer, Steve. “The ‘Double Time’ Crux in Othello Solved.” English Literary Renaissance: Studies in Drama and Culture, vol. 32, no. 2, Spring 2002, pp. 214-238. https://www.jstor.org/stable/43447633. Accessed 10 July 2021.

Sohmer suggests that Shakespeare intentionally linked the action in Othello to holy dates in the conflicting Julien and Gregorian calendars, and that several weeks—not several days—passed during the play. Since 1849, when John Wilson called the dramatic plot shifts in Othello “double time,” there has been as ongoing debate among scholars about the inconsistencies in the play (214-216). Sohmer provides a detailed explanation of why two different calendars were used during Shakespeare’s lifetime, and illustrates that audiences had access to both calendars through the popular Farmer’s Almanac (217-220). He shares examples of how a voyage from (Catholic/Gregorian) Venice and (Julien) Cyprus could last four or five weeks and result in routine temporal anomalies (225-226). Sohmer cites examples from the text of the play, as well as from scriptures prescribed by the church for specific dates, to support the idea that Othello and Desdemona had been married for many weeks.

--Jess Fraser