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Question 1

Different criticisms used to interpret Othello (3)

Answer 1

Feminist criticism
Post-colonial (studies way Othello is perceived in his society)
Structuralist criticism (looks at language shifting and language meaning)
Marxist socialists

Question 2

How does Othello conform to typical conventions of Shakespeare’s comedy plays?

Answer 2

Though it is a tragedy of intrigue, jealousy and cuckoldry often topics of a comedy play - links between stereotypes of characters in Othello and Shakespeare’s comedies e,g Twelfth Night when Anotonio demands his purse off the wrong twin.
Comic relief enriches tragedy and provides perspectives - ‘Othello’s credulity diminishes his tragic effect?”

Question 3

is othello purely a tragedy?

Answer 3

• Othello draws close to aspects of comedy – MIDSUMMERS NIGHT A DREAM and tragedy – ROMEO AND JULIET
• both enrich the depth of Othello’s tragic fall and the characterisation of Iago

Question 4

Is othello a play just about racism? (EMMA SMITH) (5)

Answer 4

• The central thesis is that Othello is protean – audiences are continually interested in ‘race, difference and belonging’ (EMMA SMITH)
• The play may be a plea for a more tolerant society in which Othello and Desdemona’s marriage could flourish

OR IS IT A PLAY ABOUT OUTISDERS AND OTHELLO’S STRADDLING OF TWO WORLDS?

• Othello is regarded in two ways at the start of the play – he has eloped with Desdemona without her father’s permission, but he’s also a potential saviour of Venice in his military role – this duality will permeate the play
• Othello is in an ‘estranged position as both a Moor’ and ‘of Venice’, the commander of the Venetian forces and the unacceptable son-in-law, the Christian defender against a malignant Turk, and that turbaned and circumcised Turk himself’
• Othello’s tragedy is catalysed by his ‘unbearable cognitive dissonance’ – a successful black man in a white society, a man who has self-control and loses it, a professionally brilliant soldier who is clueless in a domestic sphere – so is Othello just about racism?

Question 5

EMMA SMITH QUOTES ABOUT OUTSIDERS IN OTHELLO (2)

Answer 5

• Outsiders – all three central characters are ‘different outsiders struggling with their own disempowered status’ – ‘Othello, Iago and Desdemona all struggle to be autonomous selves within the confines of what is expected and assumed about them by others’