Othello Critics Flashcards
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Matt Simpson on Emilia
Emilia underscores Desdemona’s lack of knowledge in the world
A.C Bradley on Emilia
She nowhere shows any sign of having a bad heart
A.C Bradley on Emilia’s stupidity
Her stupidity in this matter is gross, but it is stupidity and nothing else
Matt Simpson on Emilia’s obedience
We have to acknowledge that wives were required to be obedient to understand Emilia’s handing over of the handkerchief
Lisa Jardine on female sexuality
All three [women] are accused of sexual misdemeanour in the course of the play
Marilyn French
Desdemona accepts her culture’s dictum that she must be obedient to males and is self-denying in the extreme
Marian Cox on Desdemona
Desdemona is accused of the double dishonesty of lying and lying with other men
Marian Cox on dichotomies
Characters divide into virgins and saints or whores and devils
G. Wilson Knight on Desdemona’s language
Domesticity and gentleness
Marian Cox on reputation
Men wish to marry virgins. This made reputation an essential commodity for social society
Jarvis on Desdemona’s death
A whore’s death for all her innocence
Adams on Desdemona
She falls in love…for no better reason than that he has told her a braggart story
Harold Goddard on Desdemona
Desdemona’s audacity in doing the right thing in the face of her father’s opposition is enough to answer those incredible readers who persist in thinking her weak
A.C. Bradley on Othello
He is by far the most romantic figure among Shakespeare’s heroes. He does not belong to our world
Lisa Jardine on Desdemona
Desdemona becomes a stereotype of female passivity
A.C Bradley on Cassio
There is something very loveable about Cassio. We trust him absolutely to never pervert the truth for the sake of some doctrine of purpose of his own
S. Johnson on Cassio
Brave, benevolent and honest, ruined only by his want of stubbornness to resist an insidious invitation
William R. Mueller on Cassio
This first [flaw] is Cassio’s overcavalerish manner
Tucker Brooke
Cassio’s qualities would be almost condemnable in a fair lady
W.H. Auden
Iago is motivated by the desire to know and show what Othello is really like
Dostoevsky on Iago
Iago was not jealous, he was trustful
Matt Simpson on Iago and Othello
Othello allows Iago to replace Desdemona in his esteem and affection, and as his confidant and soulmate
Matt Simpson on Othello
In a sense, what Othello is doing is executing the Iago under his own skin
Marian Cox on Iago
He is a black sheep and resists this state of affairs by turning everyone else black rather than allowing them to feel superior in their whiteness
William Blake on Iago
He publishes doubt and calls it knowledge
Alexandra Melville on Iago
Iago’s reputation for straightforward honesty is the foundation of his deceptions
Matt Simpson on Iago
Iago is exposed as a shallow fool
G. Wilson Knight on Othello’s language
Othello’s speech ‘holds a rich music of its own…its thought does not mesh with the reader’s:rather it is always outside us, aloof’
A.C. Bradley on Othello’s feelings
Othello has no feeling that we should not have ourselves in his situation
S. Johnson on Iago
The character of Iago is so conducted that he is from the first scene to the last hated and despised
Charles Lamb on Iago
We think not so much of the crimes they commit, as of the ambition, the aspiring spirit
