01 Thursday March 24

Thursday the 24th of March’s class started off with a reminder to read Peter Barry’s cultural materialism chapter as well as the two essays on blackboard. In addition there are two essays on Othello under Othello 1 and Othello 2 which are good sources.

Tyler Stewart Intro to Literary Studies Dr. Mathur 3/26/2011                                  Thursday March 24th Othello is one of three tragedies written by William Shakespeare. For this class we read the first two acts and discussed the characters relationships. Mainly we discussed Iago and Othello’s relationship and why Iago has so much trouble accepting Othello. An overview for the class was Iago’s hate for Othello, Iago’s soliloquy in act 1, and Othello in general. The first two acts of Othello show Shakespeare’s use of certain characters and certain styles of writing to express different emotions throughout the play. We first examined Iago’s style of speech in the first two acts. When analyzing Iago we look at his name and connect it to the Bible, because he is named after the apostle James, Iago, translating to “Moor killer”. He despises Othello, the moor, because of he did not give Iago the promotion to lieutenant, and is jealous of his relationship to his wife, Desdemona. There is a brief sign of an Oedipus complex due to Othello seen as a father figure and Iago being obsessed with other people’s sex. Iago is racist toward Othello and attempts to fight, plot and manipulate his way into more power than Othello. Therefore by sleeping with Desdemona he fulfills his desire for more power and his oedipal complex. His lines are always in prose as opposed to most of the others who speak in verse. We determined this difference is to imply class separation. Also Iago has the most soliloquies. During one of his soliloquies, 1.1.85-155, Shakespeare gives Iago puns to identify Othello. Othello is a Moor so Iago uses words such as: black ram, Barbary horse, moor, lascivious, extravagant and wheeling, and thick lips. These derogatory puns Iago uses toward Othello are used to degrade Othello so Iago can become more powerful than him. By Iago saying these things, he is raising his ego and in effect gaining false power. This soliloquy is spoken before we meet Othello in the play. Shakespeare himself is playing a role in this by aiding Iago in his search for power, because by letting us see Iago degrade Othello we cannot helped but be swayed to Iago’s side. This is true because we already have a connection with Iago, but have only heard of Othello. Othello has a sense of Orientalism due to the stories he tells Desdemona that are filled with mysterious talk of his far away land, which woo her. He is also shown as very rational. For example when he is faced with accusations of his alleged rape of Iago’s daughter he replies calmly and well mannered. He is well mannered but is also a warrior, and very opposite from his wife. His wife, though she was very proactive in the forming of her marriage to Othello, she is naïve, domesticated, a different race, and of a different social class than Othello. These differences only heighten Othello’s maturity, warrior prowess, and his difference in race. With our analysis during Thursday’s class we discovered: Iago’s despise for Othello, Iago’s use of puns are to degrade Othello so he can gain power and Othello’s controversial character.