Othello criticism Flashcards

Question

Caryl Phillips on the relationship between Desdemona and Othello

Answer 1

"Othello's love of Desdemona is 'the love of possession. She is a prize, a spoil of war"

Answer 2

"Othello feels constantly threatened and profoundly insecure"

Answer 3

"England was increasingly hostile to foreigners, both officially and at popular level."

Answer 4

" Desdemona becomes a stereotype of female passivity"

Answer 5

"It is not sufficient to simply drape Iago in allegorical trappings and proclaim him Mister Evil. Such a limited view of Iago is an injustice to the complexity of his character"

Answer 6

"He is not the devil. He's you or me being jealous and not being able to control our feelings"

Answer 7

"Othello is a victim of racial beliefs precisely as he becomes an agent of misogynistic ones"

Answer 8

"Evil has nowhere been portrayed with such mastery as in the character of Iago."

Answer 9

'the phonetic affinity between 'ego' and 'Iago''

Answer 10

'black and white blood cannot be intermingled'

Answer 11

'the least heroic of Shakespeare's tragic heroes'

Answer 12

Iago being 'less than a complete human being because love had been left out of his composition'

Answer 13

'[Iago] was destroyed by the power that he attacked, the power of love; and he was destroyed by it because he could not understand it; and he could not understand it because it was not in him'

Answer 14

'less quickness of intellect and less tendency to reflection than most of Shakespeare's heroines'

Answer 15

'there exists fiction in whatever is romantic. She suffers from illusion and loves to be deluded'

Answer 16

'In the 'willow scene', it 'is as if she had suddenly realised that she had made a mésalliance and that the sort of man she ought to have married was someone of her own class and colour like Ludovico'

Answer 17

'Women and blacks are the other in this play'

Answer 18

'the tragedy of Othello is that he fails to love himself and this leads to his jealousy'

Answer 19

"Suffering from repressed homosexuality" and "unknowingly views Desdemona as a rival for the love of Othello"

Answer 20

'Shakespeare's play raised questions about the correlation of our outer appearances and inner qualities'

Answer 21

She is "The mouthpiece of repressed femininity"

Answer 22

'Bianca alters the essence of Othello. bringing a measure of humanity that gives depth to the narrative'

Answer 23

'Bianca is also an allusion to the problematic status of women both in this period and today'

Answer 24

'Bianca is a sexually free woman who is nevertheless pure in spirit'

Answer 25

'He is a pathetic figure....trying to swim in a sea much too rough for him'

Answer 26

'He goes to the devil with his eyes open, yet blindly'

Answer 27

"Iago's deception of Rodrigo depends on the young man's willingness to believe that Desdemona is sexually corruptible"

Answer 28

"Desdemona is 'trapped in the predicament of being a woman'"

Answer 29

"Her willingness to risk censure of her father and society is some measure of her capacity for love "

Answer 30

"wronged patriarch" "too selfishly materialistic"

Answer 31

‘This may be a caution to all Maidens of quality who, without their parents’ consent, they run away with blackamoors’

Answer 32

“As tragic hero, merely a victim, he is blameless, honourable and romantic and thus his fall is entirely the fault of Iago, who colonises his mind.”

Answer 33

"Iago’s prompt success is not so much Iago’s diabolic intellect as Othello’s readiness to respond”

Answer 34

“Cassio in the end seems to represent the better man. The higher sophisticate in Othello’s mind than his own self”

Answer 35

Othello demonstrates to us that “nobility and valour, like depravity and cowardice, are not the monopoly of any colour”

Answer 36

Women are “weak, frail, impatient, feeble and foolish..”

Answer 37

“Desdemona’s liveliness assertiveness, and sensuality are corroborated in her marrying Othello. The crucial fact of her marriage is not that she elopes, but that she, a white women, weds a black man”

Answer 38

‘The really disturbing thing about Iago is not that he’s an unfathomable psychopath, but that he's pathologically normal and theatrically irresistible.’

Answer 39

‘Psychologically, Iago is a slighted man, powerfully possessed by hatred against a master who (as he thinks) has kept him down, and by envy for a man he despises who has been promoted over him.’

Answer 40

‘It’s quite clear that the reason Iago is able to do what he does to Othello is because Othello trusts him more completely than two men in civilian life would trust each other. It’s a given in the army; military life is based on loyalty and a code of honour amongst soldiers. ’

Answer 41

‘And yet the tragedy is that…Desdemona will never have the chance to educate her husband out of the braying masculinity that is all he has ever known or needed…This is his tragedy. Quite simply, love could have made a whole man out of him.’

Answer 42

‘Desdemona is helplessly passive. She can do nothing whatever. She cannot retaliate even in speech; no, not even in silent feeling.’

Answer 43

‘Desdemona made a very specific decision to marry this man…You want someone with the courage of her convictions and the presence of mind to make that decision…That makes her in some ways extremely strong, an active participant in the drama, rather thanan insipid feeble girl.’

Answer 44

"Desdemona is a ‘character who is misunderstood: by her father, Brabantio, who calls her a ‘maiden never bold’; by Iago, who thinks she must soon realise her folly in marrying Othello; by Roderigo, who thinks that she can be bought with presents; and by Cassio, who thinks she is indeed perfection.’"

Answer 45

'fear of Iago, though not expressed explicitly, explains Emilia’s attitude as Shakespeare’s tragedy unfolds’.

Answer 46

‘We are forced to conclude that his worthiness outweighs his weakness'

Answer 47

Cassio acts as a foil to Othello as his ‘treatment of women depicts a slovenly attitude with romance, one that thinks of women as more of a plaything or passing fancy; this is highly contrasted with Othello’s legitimate love and appreciation for women on the whole.’

Answer 48

‘Far from being the object men have made of her in their speech, her own verbal energy represents a danger to men’s sense of propriety and order in their world.’

Answer 49

“Cassio is a true gentleman, with a natural gentleness and courtesy that stand out in the Venetian world, though they also leave him ill-prepared for Iago’s treachery.”

Answer 50

“Shakespeare’s insight into human psychology is especially acute in his portrayal of Cassio, whose lamentation over his lost reputation reflects the essential role that honour plays in one’s self-concept and sense of purpose.”

Answer 51

“He (Cassio) remains curiously superficial, a man defined by his charming persona and military skill, but whose vanity and emotional volatility expose him to Iago’s manipulations.”

Answer 52

"There was no instructive moral or poetic justice because Othello isn't punished, so the ending is barbarous"

Answer 53

"'Not easily jealous' is the most appalling bit of self-deception. He's the most easily jealous man that anybody's ever written about. The minute he suspects, or thinks he has the smallest grounds for suspecting, Desdemona, he wishes to think her guilty, he wishes to"

Answer 54

'Emilia and Desdemona’s bodies haunt those that remain onstage: a testament to friendship between women and witness to the dangerous threat of false, faithless friendship among men'

Answer 55

'Death and destruction are tragedy’s inevitable end, but female friendship in Othello retains its power even in death.'

Answer 56

'Emilia’s body, like Desdemona’s, is destroyed by vindictive male violence, but her spirit is purified by Desdemona’s redemption'

Answer 57

'she loves her mistress and would face a hundred deaths sooner than see her fair fame darkened'

Answer 58

'does not agree that it is this love which gives Emilia the courage and strength to repudiate Iago'

Answer 59

'she is dramatically and symbolically the play's fulcrum'

Answer 60

'Emilia's role as the backbone of the tragedy'

Answer 61

'no one much cares about Emilia's part'

Answer 62

'Emilia's loyalty to her friend is what remains whole in the debacle of Othello'

Answer 63

'she dies in service of the truth'

Answer 64

'Emilia underscores Desdemona's lack of knowledge in the world'

Answer 65

'She nowhere shows signs of having a bad heart'

Answer 66

'At the end we are ready to worship her'

Answer 67

' she is nothing but a vessel for Iago's desires'

Answer 68

'steals the handkerchief due to the wifely virtues: silence, obedience and prudence'