Tragic Elements

Question 1

Desdemona’s kindness to Cassio

Answer 1

Act 3 scene 3 temptation scene
-Ambiguous to Othello
-Iago is mentally dexterous and uses this to his gain make’s suspicion

Question 2

Othello’s vacillation

Answer 2

Ambiguity and internal conflict

Question 3

“To be direct and honest is not safe”

Answer 3

Act 3 scene 3 temptation scene

-Iago’s motives are ambiguous
-Notorious the ambiguous and complex motives
-Over a personal grudge to Othello
-Jealousy over Othellos success
-desire for power and control
-lack of morality, moral emptiness he has no vendetta it is shared desire to ruin others

Question 4

“Haply for I am black”

Answer 4

Inevitably

-Othello is isolated as he is a black man in a white Venetian society
-he is othered prejudged - shapes his identity as he is inexperienced
-Internalised racism

-Othello sees himself as lesser and unworthy
-his racial difference becomes part of his psychological undoing

Question 5

End of war with Turks

Answer 5

Inevitably

-loss of purpose focus on personal life
-End of military setting, loss of masculinity - reputation
-Othello’s identity shift from hero to outcast from from a man of action to a man in domestic life

Question 6

Venice

Answer 6

Tragic setting
Act 1
-place of contradictions
-Cosmopolitan wealth power justice
-Dark side deep seated prejudice to outcasts in inequality racism

Question 7

Cyprus

Answer 7

Tragic setting
Act 2-5
-isolated and desolate location
-Remote island physical separation
-Military setting psychological impact masculinity, reputation

Question 8

“ I took you for that cunning hall of Venice”

Answer 8

Treatment of woman

Act 4 scene 2
-Vulgar language a fellow lots of eloquence lots of nobility
-cunning is ironic as Iago and embodies that idea and Othello trusts-double standards in jacobean society
-Desdemona is a Christian respectful woman

Question 9

“Thieves thieves thieves! Loon to your house your daughter and your bags”

Answer 9

Treatment of woman

Act 1 scene 1
-Desdemona is objectified seen as worthy as a commodity (bag)
-there’s of possession
-Foreshadowing Iago’s plans as he later steals and becomes a thief Othello’s peace of mind, Desdemona ls life and cassios reputation

Question 10

“ let husbands know their wives have sense like them”

Answer 10

Treatment of woman

Act 4 scene 3
-Emilia as a voice of feminism awareness
-Challenging the societal inequalities between women and men showing her agency in a Jacobean society