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Question 1

Venice

Answer 1

Elizabethan dramatists often used Italianate settings fr plays about secret love affairs/revenge
Foreign courts were stereotyped as being full of villainy and sexual perversion
Has a reputation as a city of wealth and sophistication but also perceived as a place of loose morals

Question 2

How Shakespeare uses Venetian settings

Answer 2

To establish Othello as an outsider
Iago is a typical Italianate villain scheming, selfish and amoral
Iago is able to make much of Othello’s outsider status - convincing him that he doesn’t understand the society he deserves

Question 3

Venice
A02

Answer 3

Iago uses his insider knowledge of Venice and its decadent sexual stereotypes to undermine Othello and Desdemona’s love -> how the use of setting contributes to the tragedy

Question 4

Cyprus

Answer 4

Conflict/danger of the setting are mirrored in the tragic events that unfold
Othello is sent to Cyprus to govern and restore peace -> instead he destroys desdemona and then himself
Isolated setting - psychologically appropriate
Ironic that a once great soldier should die for love in a war zone

Question 5

Cyprus
A02

Answer 5

Iago’s relentless focus on desdemonas bedroom throughout act 3/4 turns into a setting of terror and tragedy in act 5

Question 6

Sexuality and setting
A04

Answer 6

Italian setting is important to the way sex/sexual jealousy are portrayed
In Othello, the perceived immorality of the Italian women is neatly encapsulated in Emilia’s description of adultery as ‘a small vice’
Bedroom settings are often locations associated with tragedy in Jacobean drama