Oftenset in domestic environments and built around protagonists of more modeststatus than traditional tragic subjects, ‘domestic tragedy' was a genre thatflourished on the Renaissance stage from 1580-1620. Shakespeare, Othello, and Domestic Tragedyis the first book to examine Shakespeare's relationship to the genre by way ofthe King's and Chamberlain's Men's ownership and production of many of thedomestic tragedies, and of the genre's extensive influence on Shakespeare's owntragedy, Othello. Drawing in part upon recent scholarship thatidentifies Shakespeare as a co-author of Ardenof Faversham, Sean Benson demonstrates the extensive―even uncanny―tiesbetween Othello and the domestictragedies. Benson argues that just as Hamlet employs and adapts theconventions of revenge tragedy, so Othello can only be fully understoodin terms of its exploitation of the tropes and conventions of domestic tragedy.This book explores not only the contexts and workings of this popular sub-genreof Renaissance drama but also Othello's secure place within it as thequintessential example of the form.