ACT THREE NOTES
Act Three Scene 3
Desdemona
 “O that’s an honest fellow” – (About Iago) dramatic irony.
 “Assure thee, if I do vow a friendship, I’ll perform it to the last article.” She is a true, caring
friend.
 “I have no judgement in an honest face.” Prophetic, dramatic irony.
 “Whate’er you be, I am obedient.”
Othello
 This is where he starts to lose the plot!! “As if there were some monster in thy thought
too hideous to be shown.” – Beast imagery and metaphor of something monstrous
brewing in his head.
 About Iago – “And for I know thou’rt full of love and honesty, and weigh’st thy words before
thou giv’st them breath.” Dramatic irony.
 “Think’st thou I’d make a life of jealousy…No, to be once in doubt is once to be resolved.” He
does not do this…
 “Exchange me for a goat, when I shall turn the business of my soul to such exsuffliate and
blown surmises.” Animal reference. This is what he will be reduced to (lower positioning)
if he is to have these overblown and rotten imaginings.
 “For she had eyes and chose me. No Iago, I’ll see before I doubt; when I doubt, prove.”
 “O curse of marriage! That we can call our delicate creatures ours, and not their appetites.
I had rather be a toad and live upon the vapour of a dungeon, than keep a corner in the
thing I love for others’ uses.” Men can own women, but cannot control her lust and her
mind. But own their bodies but not their thoughts. Witches imagery; grubby and
negative.
 “If she be false, o then heaven mocks itself. I’ll not believe’t.” Heaven itself is a mockery if
this is true.
 “I have a pain upon my forehead here.” Mental unease, stress. Metaphorical and literal.
 “Thou hast set me on the rack. I swear ‘tis better to be much abused, than but to know’t a
little.” Metaphor. He is psychologically tortured by Iago’s information, for he only told
him a little. It would be better not to know at all.
 “He that is robbed, not wanting what is stol’n, let him know’t, and he’s not robbed at all.”
Ignorance is bliss
 “I had been happy, if they general camp, pioners and all, had tasted her sweet bodm so I
had nothing known.” Very derogatory. He wouldn’t care if every member of the army
base was to gang rape her as long as he didn’t know.
 “Farewell the tranquil mind; farewell content; farewell the plumed troops, and the big wars
that make ambition virtue.” Woe is me! Hyperbole, emotive language  very inflated.
 “Villain, be sure thou prove my love a whore, be sure of it. Give me the ocular proof, or by
the worth of mine eternal soul, thou hadst been better have been born a dog than answer
my naked wrath.” Prove that she is a whore to me.
 “I think thou wife be honest, and think she is not. I think that thou art just and think thou
art not.” Character unravelling: very irrational. Parallel construction to show his
uncertainty.
 “Her name that was as fresh as Dian’s visage, is now begrimed and black as mine own face.”
Associating racism with evil, internalised. Honour – Dian was the virgin goddess, now
she is not.
 “O monstrous! Monstrous!” Their act – animalising it/imagery.
 “I’ll tear her all to pieces.”
 “Arise, black vengeance, from the hollow hell. Yield up, o love, thy crown and hearted
throne to tyrannous hate.”
 “O, blood, blood, blood!” Triple construction.
 “Damn her, lewd minx! O, damn her, damn her!” Triple construction
Iago
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“That he would sneak away so guilty like, seeing you coming.” About Cassio, planting ideas
into Othello’s head. And again: “But for satisfaction of my thought; no further harm.”
Clever manipulation when Othello asks why he asked such a question about Cassio.
ACT THREE NOTES
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“Men should be what they seem.” Equivocation and deception. And Othello replies,
“Certain, men should be what they seem.”
“As I confess it is my nature’s plague to spy into abuses, and oft my jealousy shapes faults
that are not.” Truthful insight into Iago’s nature.
“’Twas mine, ‘tis his and has been slave to thousands; but he that filches from me my good
name robs me of that which not enriches him, and makes me poor indeed.” Money imagery
used to show reputation.
“It is the green-eyed monster which doth mock the meat it feeds on.” Metaphor. Jealousy –
idea of feeding on meat – parasitic. Also very self destructive.
“Good god, the souls of all my tribe defend from jealousy!”
“She did deceive her father, marrying you; and when she seemed to shake, and fear your
looks, she loved them most.”
In reply to Othello’s “I do not think but Desdemona’s honest.”  “Long live she so. And
long live you to think so.”
“Trifles light as air are to the jealous confirmations strong as proofs of holy writ.” Really
small things are huge to jealous people.
“O wretched fool, that livst to make thine honesty a vice.” Why was I honest? Very two
faced.
“But how? How satisfied my lord?” Would you, the supervisor, grossly gape on, behold her
topped? Grubby language. Do I have to show them sleeping together? Plants the image in
O’s head, playing him. Reiterated a few lines later by “Were they as prime as goats, as hot
as monkeys” Vulgar and crude similies used to develop sexually rapant animal imagery.
“’Tis done at her request. But let her live.” – Reminds him of Desdemona – fuels rage.
Emilia
 “I nothing but to please his fantasy.” Lives to please her hubby Iago. Good wife by
Elizabethan standards – contradicting to Iago’s portrayal of her earlier in the play.
Act Three Scene Four
Clown
 “I know not here he lodges, and for me to devise a lodging, and say he lies here, or he lies
there, were to lie in mine own throat.” Verbal equivocation, pun and innuendo. Where
does he live, who he sleeps with, is he a liar?
Iago
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About Othello. “Can he be angry? I have seen the cannon when it hath blown his ranks into
the air, and, like the devil, from his very arm puffed his own brother.” What is death to
him? I have seen him in battle – reminds Dezzy he is an army man – he is calm in the
middle of war, and kills a man beside him still maintaining calmness. If he is angry now it
must be serious – feeds her unease and makes her more paranoid.
Emilia
 “Tis not a year or two shows us a man. They are all but stomachs, and we all but food; they
eat us hungerly, and when they are full, they belch us.” Takes awhile to find out what
someone is truly like. Interesting imagery of men discarding of women. Vulgar language;
shows Emilia does recognise a power imbalance between man and woman. Objectifies
both men and women: women as food, disposable and edible. Men as nothing but
appetites, shows their true intent.
 “But jealous souls will not be answered so; they are not ever jealous for the cause, but
jealous for they’re jealous. It is a monster begot upon itself, born on itself.” Jealous people
need not a reason to be jealous, they will find things to be jealous about. Imagery of
parasitic monster: not only does it birth itself, it feeds upon jealousy and grows bigger
and bigger.
Desdemona
 “Heaven, keep that monster from Othello’s mind.”