Iago’s World, Our World (Louis Petrich)

Recording of a lecture delivered on April 17, 2026, by Annapolis tutor Louis Petrich, as part of the Formal Lecture Series.Mr. Petrich offers the following description of his lecture: "To think that Shakespeare felt Iago deeply, as he felt Othello and Desdemona. To authenticate what it’s like to corner human dispositions and fantastically turn all heads. To hear the vulgar tongue of the street on the most intimate and volatile matters. Discretion says, 'be advised.' You may prefer to hear the musical tongues of men and women well-tuned for constant love and aromatic kisses.  Honesty says, 'leave them to time.' That is, to honest Iago, the timekeeper who makes hours seem short or seconds stretch forever. He makes only one mistake.  That is enough, but we shall see. Shakespeare, when he engendered the double-timed action of Othello (and perhaps in no play did he stage a more satisfying action), probably conspired in these terms: 'Iago, accomplice, let’s put people to extreme compulsion of good and evil. At stake is the determination of truth in history and the possession of unmasked souls by heaven or hell.' This lecture will notice things that matter to those outcomes—repetitive stuff, mainly, tracks in the dirt of Iago’s world.  And unless my omissions and exaggerations fail to do their rhetorical job, that dirt and those tracks you may recognize as our world’s."