Othello – Themes

Pride – focus on names just as in Romeo and Juliet “were I the Moor, I would not be Iago”
Purity – Elizabethan gardeners associated it with virginity; purest of fruits so when she loses the handkerchief Othello sees her as impure. “spotted with strawberries”
Love/remembrance – repetition as he wishes to relive this moment which makes his love for her more convincing “’twas strange, ’twas passing strange/ ’twas pitiful, ’twas wondrous pitiful”
Death – foreshadows death “O, man’s life’s but a span”
Prudity – punctuation, this is nothing compared to an unauthorised marriage (a woman was “stolen” which is almost a crime) “An unauthorised kiss!”
September 11, 2019