critics

Question 1

‘Othello is a man of mystery, exoticism and intense feeling, trustful, open, passionate but self controlled: so noble’

Answer 1

A.C. Bradley

Question 1

‘For Shakespeare… the uncertainty is the point’

Answer 1

David Kastan

Question 2

Iago ‘has neither felt nor understood the spiritual impulses that bind ordinary human beings together, loyalty, friendship, respect, compassion - in a word, love’

Answer 2

Honigmann

Question 3

‘The tragedy doesn’t involve the idea of the hero’s learning through suffering’

Answer 3

Leavis

Question 4

‘Othello is a victim of racial beliefs precisely because he is an agent of misogynist ones’

Answer 4

Ania Loomba

Question 5

‘The play should be used to examine and dismantle the racism and sexism of the leadership in of the state’

Answer 5

Ania Loomba

Question 6

‘Iago… knowing every twist which can be given to the Moor because of his alien and inferior race does not reckon with the full primitive power of the passion with which he unleashes’

Answer 6

Margaret Webster

Question 7

‘This is not a text about race (or even racism) but this is the tale of a man that fell victim to and committed terrible acts’

Answer 7

Nicole Smith

Question 8

‘Race is the otherness that separates Othello’

Fear of the unknown.

Answer 8

Nicole Smith

Question 9

‘As the play progresses, it is clear that Othello is a man like any other in the text, the only difference is his race’

Answer 9

Nicole Smith

Question 10

Iago is a character of temptation - he tempts Cassio to drink, and Othello to kill his wife and give into jealousy.

Answer 10

Mark Goth

Question 11

‘In spite of her masculine assertiveness in choosing her own husband, Desdemona accepts her culture’s dictum, that she must be obedient to males and is self denying in the extreme when she dies’

Answer 11

Marilyn French

Question 12

‘The soft simplicity of Desdemona, confident of merit, unconscious of innocence, her artless perseverance in her suit, and her slowness to suspect that she can be suspected’

Answer 12

Samuel Johnson

Question 13

‘Iago is a being next to the devil, only not quite devil - and this Shakespeare has attempted - and executed - without disgust, without scandal’

Answer 13

Coleridge

Question 14

Iago is an ‘amoral artist who seeks to fashion the world in his own interest’

Answer 14

William Hazlitt

Question 15

‘Dramatic perspective can even make us the villain’s accomplices’

Answer 15

Honigmann

Question 16

‘Iago excels in short term tactics, not in long term strategy’ - an opportunity to talk about Emelia

Answer 16

Honigmann

Question 17

‘Emelia’s love (of Desdemona) is Iago’s undoing’ - about Iago’s flaws/loyalty/love/women

Answer 17

Honigmann

Question 18

othello as noble and diabolically misled… or criminal egotist

Answer 18

jane adamson


Question 19

Iago is more a catalyst that precipitates destruction rather than a devil who causes it

Answer 19

jane adamson


Question 20

Iago is the ‘Machiavellian villain’
‘there is no Othello without Iago

Answer 20

O’Toole

Question 21

“Iago’s brilliance lies not in what he puts into Othello’s mind, but what he draws out of it”

Answer 21

O’Toole

Question 22

Iago’s blueprint to destroy a war god

Answer 22

Harold Bloom


Question 23

Death was preferred to dishonour

Answer 23

Cox


Question 24

Motiveless malignancy


Answer 24

S.L COLERIDGE

Question 25

"it is only "Othello's jealousy, not Iago's hatred, that is the real tragedy"

Answer 25

Bonnie Greer

Question 26

"Desdemona becomes a stereotype of female passivity."


Answer 26

Lisa Jardine

Question 27

"Iago simply exploits a weakness that already existed in Othello's character."


Answer 27

TS elliot

Question 28

the tragedy of othello is not just about jealousy but the destructive power of fear and mistrust

Answer 28

harold bloom

Question 29

‘Shakespeare put a good deal of himself into Iago.’

Answer 29

A. C. Bradley

Question 30

‘Iago is Shakespeare’s most extraordinary example of a “surrogate dramatist”"

Answer 30

Graham Bradshaw

Question 31

‘Iago is successful in manipulating Othello because he takes advantage of real, male, social concerns.'

Answer 31

Traub

Question 32

It is possible to identify Iago as a projected image of forces present in Othello

Answer 32

Maud Bodkin

Question 33

That Othello in such circumstances refers to his services to Venice has been regarded as a sign of egotism. An Elizabethan audience would have seen it rather as the natural expression of proper pride

Answer 33

Kenneth Muir

Question 34

Othello’s previous experience as a soldier has left him singularly ignorant of women, especially of women of a different race, and his own awareness of this makes it difficult for him to argue rationally with Iago.

Answer 34

Kenneth Muir

Question 35

‘Othello’s tragedy is that he lives according to a set of stories through which eh interprets the world…He is living the life of a chivalric warrior in a world run by money and self-interest.’ ***

Answer 35

Sean McEvoy ***

Question 36

He is a stranger, a man of alien race

Answer 36

Helen Gardner

Question 37

Othello and Iago…[participate] in the age-long warfare of Good and Evil.

Answer 37

S. L. Bethell

Question 38

‘All three women endanger their lives, and two of them lose it, for daring to break silence.”

Answer 38

Marian Cox

Question 39

“The perfection of women is to be characterless…everyone wishes a Desdemona for a wife.”

Answer 39

Coleridge

Question 40

‘A whore’s death for all her innocences.’

Answer 40

Jarvis

Question 41

[Female] ‘characters divide into virgins and saints or whores and devils’

Answer 41

Cox

Question 42

"Cassio's religious love for Desdemona's purity"

Answer 42

Frank Kermode

Question 43

Cassio 'offer(s) a point of comparison with Othello'

Answer 43

Rebecca Warren

Question 44

'Cassio is a puppet in Iago's hands'

Answer 44

Rebecca Warren

Question 45

‘Cassio seems to represent the impishness of youth'

Answer 45

V. Walker

Question 46

‘Emilia is prey to the dominant ideology of wifely virtue.’

Answer 46

Neeley

Question 47

‘[Emilia] accepts her social role. But she does not identify with it.’

Answer 47

Abrahams

Question 48

[Roderigo] ‘activates poisonous impulses in Iago.’

Answer 48

Honingmann

Question 49

[the final scene with the bodies on the bed]‘The monstrous equivalent of a sexual consummation.’

Answer 49

Bristol

Question 50

‘Ideologies…only work because they are not entirely external to us.’

Answer 50

Ania Loomba

Question 51

Venice’s openness could also be viewed as dangerous by a society itself fairly suspicious of outsiders

Answer 51

Ania Loomba

Question 52

"England was increasingly hostile to foreigners, both officially and at popular level."

Answer 52

Ania Loomba

Question 53

"Women and Blacks exist as 'the other'."

Answer 53

Ania Loomba

Question 54

"See Desdemona as a hideous embodiment of the downtrodden woman".

Answer 54

Penny Bramwell

Question 55

'Emilia acts according to "Wifely virtues of silence, obedience and prudence"

Answer 55

Carol Neely

Question 56

'Iago simply exploits a weakness that already existed in Othello's character'

Answer 56

T.S Elliot

Question 57

"Desdemona becomes a stereotype of female passivity."

Answer 57

Jardine