Insider's Guide: Language in Othello

William Shakespeare wrote Othello sometime around 1603 during a period of creativity that also gave us as you like it Hamlet King Lear and Macbeth in each of those plays Shakespeare explored the power of language and the ways in which words create characters identities and shaped their fates words also affect how we the audience feel about the characters by asking us for a response words drive the plot language is powerful and Shakespeare was very specific about his choice of words for example let's look at three language devices Shakespeare uses in a fellow words as power words as character and words as a conversation with the audience a beautiful language is going to be important in any play but I think language is particularly significant in the world of Othello the first thing we realize is that language is power and it is not just power for Iago at the start of the play Othello is very clear about how and he and Desdemona fell in love and it's a love that happened through language through the stories that Othello tells my story being done she gave me for my pains a world of Sighs she swore a faith twas strange twas passing strange twas pitiful twas wondrous pitiful she wished she had not heard it yet she wished that heaven had made her such a man that is a positive power of language but then when you put that powerful tool in a villains hands it's absolutely corrupt Iago manages to do most of the evil that he does with the word and it's not always big dramatic moments like beware my lord of jealousy it is the green-eyed monster which is a fabulous dramatic moment but that's not how it begins it begins much more subtly with I like not that I heard me say even now that light's not back when I left my wife what it's not like and when I told me he was of my counsel in my whole course of wooing now cry it indeed if thou does love me show me thy force might as you know I love you I think that us and for I know that full of love and honesty and waste by words before thou gives them breath therefore these stops have nine frighten either more from Michael Cassio I dare be sworn I think that he is honest I think so too men should be what they see yet there's more in this so that he's getting a fellow's back up he's making him feel even more vulnerable with those sort of subtle little hints of my thoughts Iago is a kind of master of language challenged him wronged and makes his ear a stranger to thy thoughts and I think that's what makes this play so fascinating and also so frightening we see what a few words can do to deceive and to destroy words are power and in a play where words create the entire world characters that don't talk much are struggling for a voice Emilia and Desdemona both realize way too late what what has been happening women just have less information in that time period they're able to do less they have less education they're not allowed to go in public as much you know underscored it women are always fighting in Shakespeare and in Shakespeare's time to have a larger voice women's speech is really quite problematic in the Renaissance and that's because women were instructed to be chaste to be silent and to be obedient those were the prescriptions for a virtuous woman the more Desdemona speaks about Cassio the more Othello thinks she is unfaithful but we also see women's speech as power one of my favorite things is how essential it is for Emilia to speak at the end of the play um when we are in that bedroom and we see Desdemona's dead body and Amelia enters and a fellow presents all of the information to Amelia and to the other men who enter the room he had my wife's handkerchief Emilia understands how that handkerchief came in Cassio's possession she is the only person who can solve this problem for us so the audience is dying for Amelia to speak and she draws attention to her own speech she says it will out I will speak as liberally as the north and of course Iago is actually going to call her a for that Oh dull more that handkerchief they'll speak stuff I found by fortune indeed gave my husband our often with a solemn earnestness more than indeed belonged to such a trifle he begged of me distilled villainous she given Cassio no unless I found it and I did give my husband Booth the lawyers high heaven I do not I do not gentlemen amelia is killed for speaking the truth one of the ideas Shakespeare is exploring in a fellow is the ability for language to both express and to hide truth a fellow is tricked not by deeds but by the clever manipulation of words Desdemona dies because of words spoken about her and Iago tells us directly that his lies are merely free and honest advice [Music] I dare be swollen I think that he is honest and speaking of honest that word appears over and over in this play now in the Renaissance the word honest meant different things for men and for women for men honest meant someone who's trustworthy it refers to honor and loyalty for women the word honest was primarily referring to chastity now in this play honest is used around 50 times and about half of those times it is referring to Iago honest Iago yes the villain is referred to as honest in this play which is certainly ironic honest Iago o my fellow honest Iago Iago he's so honest what an honest fellow Yago is it's relentless it's really relentless that Iago is is loyal that Iago is a man of his word that Iago is trustworthy the know fellow wants to believe in us and I think that's why he keeps calling him honest honest Iago Iago is not only honest truthful he has a certain goodness of character Desdemona truly believes that of him there's not a single person on the stage that doesn't think that Iago is a forthright honest trustworthy character the word honestly in a fellow is used so frequently and even the algo uses it when we're referring to Cassio and I think everyone else thinks it's a wonderful thing honesty is the first thing you're honest with yourself you're honest with your God and you're honest with your friends I don't think I was interested in that because when he refers to Cassio as an honest fool I think the honest is just as damning as the full part for while this honest fool plies Desdemona to repair his fortunes and she for him pleads strongly to the moor there is another repetitive word used to describe a character this time in reference to a fellow the word more is almost used in place of a name for a fellow I throughout the whole first half of the play they say the more this the more approaches here comes the more and you know that that in using a label like that serves to reduce somebody's identity even further gives them the sense of the other something that's different makes him an outsider in the title of the play or fellow the more of Venice yes I think that he is identified as an outsider right from the get-go because you know Venice didn't have Moors her father loved me oft invited me still questioned me the story of my life from year to year immediately says well this is a story about a man from another part of the world living in another part of the world he is a former slave turned general which is unique he is a former Muslim turned Christian which is unique he is a solitary man up until the time he marries Desdemona which is also unique in a time where all these men would have lives so there are many things that make Othello other other than just race and I think that that is what makes this place so interesting to do over and over again because you can unravel so many layers of it it is here but yet confused through the use of soliloquy the characters talk directly to the audience sharing their plots motives and innermost thoughts which they keep secret from the other characters on stage there is no deception in Shakespeare unless the character says I'm going to be deceptive now because Shakespeare wrote people to say exactly what they were doing what's so interesting about the way that Shakespeare uses deception in the play Othello especially through the medium of Yago is that the audience for the play are one step ahead of the characters in the play Iago says very directly either to the audience I'm going to go do some deception right now or to Rodrigo he'll say hey listen here's this way we're going to deceive other people are you on board love me he opens that game to the audience and what's so nervous is that we immediately become collaborators with Iago whether we like it or not because we're his best friend he starts talking to us immediately we kind of like him he makes us laugh he's very funny and then when he's stuck he asked us for help how am I then a villain to counsel Cassio to this parallel course directly to his own good the journey has to be to get the audience on your side so at the end they're complicit in the acts that have occurred they haven't stopped anything that the end the audience should feel a little violated a little dirty a little bit part of the action the play Othello shows just how powerful words can be all of the damage done to the characters in the play begins with language and it's no accident that Iago one of Shakespeare's greatest villains doesn't meet his end like any of the other villains he silences him Shakespeare does but I think he also it becomes more tragic if there is no comeuppance for the villain will you I pray demand that demi devil why here thus and slurred my soul and body demand mean nothing what do you know you know from this time forth I never will speak word you you

Channel: FolgerLibrary

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Keywords: othello, language, words, folger, shakespeare, iago, power, education, insider's guide

Id: trhHBQRJUcQ

Length: 10min 46sec (646 seconds)

Published: Wed Oct 31 2012