We find that Iago uses extremely crude sexual language when talking to Othello about his wife Desdemona, “Were they as prim as goats, as hot as monkeys, as salt as wolves in pride”, which leads to hideous imagery. This would have been extremely disturbing to a Shakespearian audience and also shocking and have added to the audience’s opinion of Iago, making them despise and loathe him even more.
In this scene, Iago is the centre of attention and has some of the most important and thought changing lines. He is the character who has most revealed about him. You can see this from the first words Iago says when he enters. At the very beginning of this scene, Iago immediately plants an idea into Othello’s head about his wife, “Ha? I like not that”, which he nurtures as his baby until the end of the play, when Othello is eventually driven mad by the seed’s roots reaching into his brain and twisting his thoughts.
Another major dramatic irony is the fact that Iago pretends to be a loyal friend to Othello, “I am your own forever”, which the audience would know is by no means true. Iago hates Othello and wants him dead. But his reasons for this are not know, nor ever found out even in the entire play.
Some people say that he wants Othello dead because Iago has suspicions about him having an affair with his wife Emilia (but this is probably not the reason, because he hates his wife Emilia and is cruel and violent towards her, “To have a foolish wife”). Another theory is that Iago wants Desdemona for himself, and to get to her he would have to eliminate Othello and make sure he is out of the picture for good. Or it may be because Iago wants to be promoted in the military, and like the last possible motive, he would need Othello out of the way for such things to happen.
Othello is manipulated and extremely used by the devious Iago. Iago pretend to make friends with him, and manages to fool Othello into thinking so, but Iago is lying and really wants his trust so that he can put thoughts and ideas into his head.
When Othello is first introduced to us at the beginning of this dramatic scene, he is completely in love with his wife Desdemona and would never dare to think a bad thing about her: “Excellent wretch”. Another thing he says about his love towards Desdemona is one of the most important sentences in the whole scene: “and when I love thee not, chaos is come again” (we know that Othello does eventually fall out of love with Desdemona, and that in the end chaos does come. We also know that this is ominous and it is also the most important piece of dramatic irony in this scene). But due to Iago saying untruthful things about Desdemona, Othello becomes panicky, and slowly but surely his opinion and love for his wife begin to break down and become thoughts of suspicion and jealousy, and towards Cassio too; “If she be false, oh then Heaven mocks itself! I’ll not believe it”, “Let me know more- Set on thy wife to observe”. But by the end of the scene, Othello is hideously and dramatically transformed from the once caring and loving husband and respectable military general, to the violent, confused and “green eyed monster”. He no longer cares about his wife and her well-being, nor that of Cassio’s; he just wants Cassio and Desdemona to pay for their supposed affair: “Damn her, lewd minx!” “Within these three days let me hear thee say that Cassio’s not alive.” But deep down, Othello is still very unconvinced about what Iago is saying, as shown later on in the play.
Desdemona is the person on all the main characters’ minds. She is thought of as a “lewd minx”, “good madam” and “bounteous madam”. But she isn’t really any of these. She is unbelievably, if not pathetically, naive and innocent. Within the whole play, she doesn’t say anything bad or wish and one ill.
Desdemona tries to like everyone, and is easily fooled by Iago due to her naivety, “I have no judgement in an honest face”. This is one of the reasons why Othello believes that she is cheating on him with Cassio, because she is friendly with him. Another reason Othello thinks she may be unattracted to himself is because of his skin colour; “how nature erring from itself” (meaning that nature is going against itself in allowing inter-racial marriage).
He believes that this is a perfectly valid reason though, because in those days black people were hated in the world and were thought of as lower beings, that Caucasians were the superior race, and it was unheard of for a black person to marry a white woman, let alone the white daughter of a high ranking military officer.
Desdemona is pathetically, if not insanely, in love with Othello, but Othello refuses to believe it at the end of Act III (iii).
She is so in love with him that she treats the first gift he gave to her, a handkerchief with strawberries dotted over it that has an amazing story to go with it, as if it were Othello himself. She talks to it, plays with it, loves it, caresses it and cares for it, “Poor lady, she’ll run mad when she shall lack of it.” This shows the audience how loving and kind she is, but also how naive and innocent she is.
She misleadingly believes that she is in the perfect marriage, but she has no reason not to believe this because she knows she has done nothing to upset her husband.
Emilia is also naive, but nowhere near as much as Desdemona. Her main priority is to make her husband Iago very happy, and not to hurt his feelings, even though he mistreats her very much so; “To have a foolish wife”, “A good wench; give it me”. Emilia knows how Iago treats her, but tries to put it at the back of her mind, push it out of the way and to ignore it.
She is as loyal as she can be to Iago, stealing things for him that could mean her losing her job that she likes so much, but it seems that it isn’t enough for Iago.
Kenneth Branagh’s film version of William Shakespeare’s ‘Othello’ is an excellently directed version of the film. He shows the characters as they are written, moody, dark, brooding, violent etc. He also gives them realistic costumes and filmsettings, creating a more atmospheric style to the film. At the start of Act III (iii), you are shown a single shot of a grand stone castle atop a high grassy hill. This shows that the film is set back in the past because castles are not often lived in by kings and queens nowadays. The scene then changes to a balcony inside the castle.
This balcony could be there to create the impression of love, like the infamous scene from Romeo and Juliet where Romeo climbs up to Juliet’s bedroom balcony and starts to declare his love for her.
The scene closes on top of one of the castle’s towers. On the top of the tower Iago and Othello are talking about what should be done about Cassio, but Branagh directs it so that when Iago declares, “I am your own forever” to Othello, they make a blood pack with each other by cutting their left hands with a knife and putting them together making them ‘blood brothers’. This very cleverly shows how strongly Othello trusts Iago and that he believes in him and his word, so he makes his bond with Iago stronger by becoming a part of him.
In my opinion Act III (iii) is the most important scene throughout the whole of the play.
This is because I believe that you find out more about the leading characters in this scene than in any other throughout the play, Iago starts his plan to manipulate Othello which creates drama and interest, and also because it has the most memorable lines in it than any other, such as “I am your own forever” and “If she be false, Oh then Heaven mocks itself.”
All of these pieces come together to create an amazing story of love and heartache, and it shows us how people can be changed in hideous ways just by a small and false idea being put into their mind.
