Shaw, Justin P. "‘A Song of Willow’: Barbary’s Blues and Theft of Happiness in Early Modern England." Throughlines. www.throughlines.org/suite-content/othello-and-barbarys-blues. [Date accessed].
‘A Song of Willow’: Barbary’s Blues and Theft of Happiness in Early Modern England | Watch the full talk
Presented by Justin P. Shaw at Appropriations: A RaceB4Race Symposium in 2020
Justin P. Shaw is interested in how appropriation can mean theft as well as “making something new.” He discusses multiple layers of appropriation in his talk, from Shakespeare’s use of an older play (Giovanni Battista Giraldi Cinthio’s “Un Capitano Moro” written in 1565) as the basis of the plot of Othello, to Desdemona’s “consumption” of Barbary’s song for her own comfort. Using a framework of Black music and the history of appropriation of the Blues to shed light on Desdemona’s memory of Barbary’s song, Shaw asks the question: where is the line between tribute and theft?
Further learning
Recommended
Blackness and Shakespeare's sonnets
Shakespeare’s works at large, and early modern literature more broadly, all deal with constructions of race. Shakespeare’s sonnets are especially fruitful for considering how the languages of fairness and darkness are used in nuanced ways to develop particular understandings of race.
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