Act 3 Scene 4; and focus on skills of analysis

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Theme of Nobility or Virtue
Theme of Faulty Knowledge, connected to the theme of Appearance and Reality
“men should be what they seem”
[Could be argued] the point of the entire play is to show that things are never really what they seem;
Othello’s downfall is caused by believing what he sees to be true.

Text as drama
 Make an effort to visualize how we SEE characters on stage [from page to stage]
 And how we would HEAR characters?
 Think about the movement and grouping of characters, entrances and exits?
 And other theatrical elements
 And what dramatic EFFECTS all this would have on a theatre audience?

 What words and phrases STAND OUT???
 Next, ask yourself whether they have any qualities in common…
 They may fall into groups you can classify
 Try to group them as similar kinds of words
 Or, as having a meaning or an emotion in common with each other…

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Origin: “metaphora”
Meaning to ‘transfer’ ‘transit’ ‘carry across’
 Hence transfer of meaning
 Metaphors transfer, connect and compare unlike things
 To make more clear, graphically vivid and concretize the meaning of something

 Note striking use of imagery
 And proceed as with words and phrases
 Look for what images have in common
 Notice the choice of imagery?
 Notice the form of the imagery? (visual?)
 Notice the degree of novelty that attempts to establish new / original / striking connections
 Degree of concretization; effects

O beware, my Lord, of jealousy !
It is the green-eyed monster … [transfer of meaning!!]
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Ironically intended as a warning
Very striking, powerful, impacting, vivid…
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Makes more concretely evident the kind and nature of the jealousy Iago speaks of
How potent, dangerous, and destructive it can be
Once possessed by it, has the power to transform a man into a most horrible, wicked, evil person,

Note use of prose, which can be poetic
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Adorned with rhetorical inflation, or artifice
Also prose as low, popular speech
And use of blank verse
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We note Iago’s linguistic duality
Iago’s styles of speech vary from situation to situation to suit his own hidden agenda
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Iago even assumes the sententious style of nobility
Sententious – full of meaning; aphoristic

Othello speaking verse?
 Creates the effect of largeness and grandeur and nobility of character
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Verse is a polished form of dramatic writing
Possessing enormous expressive & rhetorical power
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Can effectively summarize and encapsulate an issue
As such, it can dramatically heighten and intensify the key issue in a given speech

 Note the punctuation that divides language into units of meaning (sense units)
 Note where phrases are short, and broken
 Other places where phrases are longer, and the speaker’s speed increases
 Explain how these variations in rhythmic movement relate to 1) the character,
 or 2) the subject matter of the speech

Characters may speak in
 Short, simple, and direct sentence structures
 Continuous, articulate, reasoned structures
 Fragmented, loose, emotional structures

This fellow’s of exceeding honesty,
And knows all qualities with a learned spirit,
Of human dealing. if I do prove her haggard ,
Though that her jesses were my dear heartstrings,
I’d whistle her off, and let her down the wind,
To prey at fortune. Haply for I am black,
And have not those soft parts of conversation
That chamberers have, or for I am declin’d
Into the vale of years, —yet that’s not much—
She’s gone, I am abus’d, and my relief
Must be to loathe her:

O curse of marriage,
That we can call these delicate creatures ours,
And not their appetites! I had rather be a toad,
And live upon the vapour in a dungeon,
Than keep a corner in a thing I love,
For others’ uses: yet ’tis the plague of great ones ,

 Allows the audience to see into the inner workings and troubled state of Othello’s mind
 Why only now?
 Thus far audience has had no reason to doubt that his outward appearance corresponded to the inner workings of his mind
 That is now changing

 Othello is thinking about the possibility that his wife is unfaithful
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His thoughts consist of reasons for and against being suspicious of her…
Iago’s ‘honesty’; Iago’s ‘learned spirit’
Desdemona’s appearance makes his love and trust return — how we know?
 If she is untrue, then heaven mocks itself

 In between these arguments, Othello reflects on reasons which make her adultery plausible
 His colour
 Believes he lacks refined manners
 His age; believes he is too old for her
 All of which makes it seem Iago must be right

Looking at, and closely examining choice and form of language —
 Diction
 Imagery
 Rhythmic movement, and sentence structure
 Patterned sound repetition (Rhyme)

Examine the speech in sections
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Note a regular rhythm up to the period stop after ‘dealing’
‘If I do prove her haggard’ interrupts this, and the pace increases suddenly
Othello’s first two sentences fall into two distinct categories;
 First is measured; second, disturbed

 Third sentence begins how?
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Begins with irregular phrasing
Ranging from the word ‘haply’ to eleven words between pauses
 Pace here is very broken, then suddenly races forward
 Then it breaks again

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Note the two dashes around the short ‘—yet that’s not much—’ and the sentence breaks off unfinished
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The rhythm shows how disturbed, and ill at ease Othello is in this speech
At the start of line 271, ‘she’s gone’
 marks an outcry of new emotion

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First thinks of Iago’s knowledge & honesty
 Of Desdemona as a hawk
 Of his own weakness
 Of jealous beliefs and the pain he feels
 Of betrayal in general
 Upon Desdemona appearing his love returns

 Diction? What words stand out (in context)?
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Othello uses what kind of language?
Phrases, words to describe Iago?
‘exceeding honesty’; ‘qualities’; ‘learned spirit’; and ‘human dealing’
 Suggestive of what??? Effect?
 Bring to mind noble qualities in human nature

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Turning his mind to Desdemona, we note a transformation. How do we know?
‘haggard’; ‘jesses’; ‘whistle her off’
‘let her down the wind’; ‘prey’; EFFECT?
 Paints a picture of her as a hawk, bird of prey
 Words associated with the animal kingdom
 Ironically, for Othello, Iago is associated with the human, civilized world; Desdemona now, with primitive wildness

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Othello admires beauty of women
‘these delicate creatures’
But undermined…how?
By the word ‘appetites’
 This (linked to appearance and reality)
 points to the primitive element that lies beneath a seemingly fine outward appearance

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The unfaithfulness of wives
‘Forked’ carries several implications
The idea of an arrow – piercing
 The sense of two-legged
 The suggestion of horns (Elizabethan symbol of the cuckold)
 The idea of a very difficult dilemma

‘I had rather be a toad
And live upon the vapour of a dungeon
Than keep a corner in the thing I love
For other’s uses ’
 Toad a contemptible creature
 Expressing such a preference?
 Intended to? Suggestive of what?

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The striking, forceful impact of this imagery shows us how much it would horrify and hurt
Othello should it be firmly established his wife has indeed been sleeping around
To be a ‘toad’, an unsightly, ugly creature
But at least this way he’d be devoid of human consciousness and therefore the torments of the emotional pain of jealousy

 The environment of his imagined toad is no ordinary pond, but that of a dungeon with its stenching surrounds of waste water
 Further dramatically emphasizing what he would be prepared to sacrifice (his humanity, marriage, and military career) and to bear instead such a ‘toady’ existence rather than having to live in the knowledge, pain and humiliation of his wife’s carnalities

 To unfold the strange history of the handkerchief
 To establish that Othello is undergoing a change
 To relieve atmosphere of doom in Scene 3
 To present a close up picture of the three women characters of the play
 To focus a stronger light on the character of
CASSIO

 The strange origins of the handkerchief?
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Important for a proper understanding of the play
Not an ordinary handkerchief…Why?
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It is of magical origin, and for Othello
“There’s magic in the web of it”

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It was sewn by a sibyl (a female prophet);
From whom did he get it?
Given to Othello’s mother by an Egyptian charmer who said
It had the power to preserve love, but if lost or given away
Love would be lost
‘To lose it, or give’t away were such perdition
As nothing else could match.’

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More then than an ordinary handkerchief
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Symbolical?
Symbolic of Othello’s mysterious and romantic past which won the heart of Desdemona
Recall however Othello’s words in Scene 3 of Act 3
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‘She loved me for the dangers I had passed,
And I loved her, that she did pity them.
This only is the witchcraft I have used ’ p33
He in turn gave it to Desdemona as a symbol of his love and constancy

By Desdemona losing this precious handkerchief
 Symbolically foreshadows the grave possibility that she would also lose her love
 Therefore the handkerchief is of great symbolical significance;
 It becomes and functions as an organic element in the whole texture of the play

I am glad I have found this napkin .
This was her first remembrance from the Moor.
My wayward husband hath a hundred times
Wooed me to steal it. But she loves the token ,
For he conjured her she should ever keep it,
That she reserves it evermore about her
To kiss and talk to. I’ll have the work ta’en out,
And give’t Iago. What he will do with it,
Heaven knows, nor I;
I nothing but to please his fantasy.

Hast stol’n it from her?
No faith; she let it drop by negligence ,
And to th’advantage, I being here, took’t up.
Look, here it is.
A good wench; give it to me.

 It flutters in and out through several scenes of the play —
 ominously, like a storm signal
It is vital to Othello’s love
 Causes distress to Desdemona upon losing it
 Emilia involved in finding it
 Passes it on to Iago, because he desired it so much

Where should I loose that handkerchief, Emilia?
I know not, madam . [Recall Emilia & Iago in 3.3]
Believe me, I had rather have lost my purse
Full of crusadoes. And, but my noble Moor
Is true of mind, and made of no such baseness
As jealous creatures are, it were enough
To put him to ill-thinking.

Is’t lost? Is’t gone? Speak
It is not lost .
But what and if it were?
How?
I say it is not lost.

Something sure of state,
Either from Venice , or some unhatched practice
Made demonstrable here in Cyprus to him,
Hath puddled his clear spirit; and in such cases
Men’s natures wrangle with inferior things ,
Though great ones are their object.
Nay, we must think men are not gods …

 Iago has insisted on Emilia’s silence whenever its topic is being discussed
 Next Cassio becomes involved, as he in turn comes to possess it, after it being lost for a time;
 Then we come to see its physical presence in the hands of Bianca; thus involving Bianca as well;
 We are thus reminded of imminent tragedy

 Re Cassio, [ Gives her Desdemona’s handkerchief ] as indicated by Stage Directions, to Bianca;
Bianca: ‘O Cassio, whence came this?’
Cassio : ‘I found it in my chamber.’
Recall Scene 3 of Act 3 p141, 143: Iago to Othello -
Have you not sometimes seen a handkerchief..
Such a handkerchief / I am sure it was your wife’s – did I today /
See Cassio wipe his beard with.

O Cassio, whence came this?
Go to, woman
Throw your vile guesses in the devil’s teeth,
From whence you have them. You are jealous now
That this is from some mistress, some remembrance.
No, in good troth, Bianca

 As we watch the play progress, this seeming trifle of a handkerchief
As light as air,
Changes significantly through Iago,
And thereby becomes a powerful weapon
Dramatic Effect?
 The poignancy of the tragedy becomes more pronounced as a result of the status accorded to this piece of cloth;