Act 1 of Othello Quotations Flashcards
(19 cards)
Iago is angry at Othello for promoting Cassio to lieutenant rather than him because Cassio has less experience.
(Cassio) ‘Never set a squadron in the field’
Iago tells Roderigo that he plans to get his revenge on Othello by pretending to be his good and faithful friend.
‘I follow him to serve my turn upon him’
Iago tells Roderigo of his duplicitous and deceitful personality right at the beginning, preparing the audience for his villainy.
‘I am not what I am’
Iago and Roderigo go to Brabantio’s house and wake him to tell him about his daughter’s secret marriage to Othello. Iago, from the shadows, uses sexual, animalistic and racial imagery to make Brabantio angry. (2 quotations)
‘An old black ram is tupping your white ewe’ and ‘Your daughter and the moor are now making the beast with two backs’
Iago warns Othello that Brabantio knows about his marriage to Desdemona. He describes Brabantio as being disrespectful towards Othello.
‘Spoke such scurvy and provoking terms against your honour’
Othello dismisses what Iago says and as he is confident that what he has done for the Duke and Senate will rule out any wrongs he has done to Brabantio.
‘My services which I have done the signiory shall out-tongue his complaints’
Cassio enters with a message from the Duke for Othello to come to the Senate to discuss the war in Cyprus. Othello is well respected and many have been trying to find him.
‘You have been hotly called for’
Brabantio, Roderigo and officers enter to arrest Othello for bewitching Desdemona. They hear that Othello is going to the Duke anyway and Brabantio is convinced he will punish Othello. If the senate don’t then they are…
‘Bondslaves and pagans shall our statesmen be’
Brabantio tells the Duke that Othello has taken Desdemona and ruined her.
‘She is abused, stolen from me and corrupted’
Othello, when questioned, says he did not use any ‘drugs’ or ‘charms’ to take Desdemona. She married him willingly and Brabantio lost.
‘I won his daughter’
Othello has immense respect for Desdemona and requests that she speaks her case to the Duke.
‘Send for the lady to the Sagittary’
Othello explains how he fell in love with Desdemona and how she fell for him.
‘She loved me for the dangers I had passed and I loved her that she did pity them’
Desdemona uses societal expectations of women being passed from their fathers to their husbands against Brabantio to explain why she does not submit to her father now.
‘I am hitherto your daughter. But here’s my husband’
The Duke is surprised at Othello’s calm, respectful and virtuous demeanour and tells Brabantio…
‘Your son-in-law is far more fair than black’
Iago says he will help Roderigo to get Desdemona if he pays him money.
‘Put money in thy purse’
Brabantio warns Othello about Desdemona.
‘Look to her, Moor, if thou hast eyes to see: she has deceived her father and may thee’
Iago, in his soliloquy, tells the audience another reason (or rumour) why he hates Othello. Iago thinks Othello may have slept with his wife.
‘Tis’ thought abroad that ‘twixt my sheets he’s done my office’
Iago plans to convince Othello that Desdemona is being unfaithful to him with Cassio. He wants to glorify himself and remove Cassio, while ruining Othello’s marriage.
‘To get his place, and to plume up my will in double knavery’
The final sentence of Act one. Iago says this to show the audience his quick and strategic thinking and how his plan is now formed.
‘It is engendered. Hell and night must bring this monstrous birth to the world’s light’
