Desdemona

Question 1

Caryl Phillips

Answer 1

Caryl Phillips “Othello’s love of Desdemona is the love of possession. She is a prize, a spoil of war”

Question 2

Carol Thomas Neely

Answer 2

‘inability to defend herself due to Othello’s refusal to voice his suspicions directly’

Othello’s love awakens her ‘energy, assertiveness and power’.

Question 3

Newman

Answer 3

‘Desdemona is attracted to Othello because of his sexual ‘otherness’’

“Desdemona is punished because she threatens white male hegemony”

“Possession of a women’s handkerchief was considered adultery”

Question 4

Rymer

Answer 4

• Rymer = ‘A woman without sense because she married a black moor”

Question 5

Greenblatt

Answer 5

“Desdemona’s marriage was her attempt to gain power in a society ruled by men.”

Question 6

French

Answer 6

Desdemona accepts that because of her society “she must be obedient to males”

Question 7

Lisa Jardine

Answer 7

• Desdemona is punished for being
“too-knowing” and “too-independent”

• Desdemona’s death is her being taught a lesson in what happens if you go against the patriarchy

Question 8

Leonard Tennenhouse

Answer 8

Desdemona as a character must die because she is “the embodiment of power” when she first arrives in Act 1

Question 9

Honigmann

Answer 9

has commented that Desdemona is portrayed as ‘woman as man likes to reinvent her’