Othello AO5 Flashcards
4 Different Branches of Critics
Neoclassicalism
Romanticism
20th Century
Feminism + Historicism
What did Neoclassicists think of the play Othello?
Wasn’t a proper tragedy.
Lack of poetic justice: Othello suicide + Iago vow of silence.
What did Rymer argue about Iago’s actions?
Unexplainable due to him being a soldier:
“never in Tragedy, nor in Comedy, nor in Nature was a Soldier with his Character”
What were Rymer’s opinions on the importance of the handkerchief?
Handkerchief shouldn’t have caused such jealousy and it was exaggerated.
“Why was not this call’d the Tragedy of the Handkerchief”
Relationship between Johnson and Rymer - differences in terms of Iago?
Johnson dismissed Rymer’s soldier view - argued that Iago is clearly an antagonistic villain who the audience can despise.
How did Johnson describe Iago’s manipulation?
“artfully natural” - realistic, contrasting view of Rymer.
What did Hazlitt argue about Othello?
He “excites our sympathy in an extraordinary degree”, “noble”, “tender”, “confiding” - Romantic belief of sympathising with depths of passion.
How did Coleridge describe Iago’s manipulation?
“the almost superhuman art of Iago”
Which critic can be used as an antidote to Leavis and Rymer? - reasoning?
Coleridge - argued that any man would have acted in the same way from “the almost superhuman art of Iago”.
What did Hazlitt argue that Iago was motivated by?
“the love of power”
Hazlitt believed this was “natural to man”, Iago’s was extreme case.
Who said Iago = “being next to the devil”?
Coleridge
How did Coleridge describe Iago’s soliloquies?
“the motive-hunting of motiveless malignity”
Evil without a reason, irrational. Aesthetics to Iago’s evil - “fictions” of his mind.
What does AC Bradley think about Othello?
“Othello is the greatest poet of them all”
Celebratory through Othello’s language and thought process.
Othello was a “great man” who was “concious of his worth”
What does TS Eliot think about Othello?
Fundamentally disagreed with AC Bradley - “terrible exposure of human weakness” - final speech
“thinking about himself” reminders of service are Othello “cheering himself up”
What did Loobma argue about the play in terms of patriarchy?
Othello can be used as a tool to look at the “sexism” of Shakespearean society in relation to modern day issues, rather than challenging patriarchy.
