ABSTRACT
This chapter offers a close analysis of a selection of English newspapers recently made available through the British Library's online Newspaper Archive. The Manchester Courier and Lancashire General Advertiser on 8 February 1908 was one of the first newspapers to comment on the initial success that Giovanni Grasso's theatre company gained in London. Grasso was one of the most renowned actors to emerge from Sicily's first official theatre company, the Compagnia drammatica dialettale siciliana, founded by director Nino Martoglio in 1902. Grasso toured London twice in the course of his career: following the enthusiastic response he gained in 1908 for his performances of mainly Sicilian plays, Grasso returned, only two years later, with a new role included in his repertoire, Othello. Coinciding with this branding of Othello as an "Other", the decades at the turn of the new century saw the arrival en masse of Italian migrant communities in London.
