It is claimed that Act 3 Scene 3 of Othello is the most important and dramatic scene of the play. Examine the reasons for this claim and explain to what extent you agree with it, by considering its significance in terms of plot, character, theme and Dramatic power.
In Othello (or Othello, the moor of Venice) it is said that act three scene three is the most dramatic in the whole of the play, even though others believe that the last scene is more dramatic due to the deaths of Emilia, Desdemona and Othello. In the next few paragraphs I will be debating whether it is true that act three scene three is most dramatic or not, as well as giving a brief synopsis of the play itself. The play Othello was written by William Shakespeare in the early 1600’s and, like most Shakespearian plays, is set around a tragedy with a “tragic hero” in the centre of it, a tragic hero is the main character of the story and starts of noble and brave, but always dies in the end due to a fatal flaw he made during the story, which in the case of Othello was that he believed Iago about Desdemona having an affair and became jealous and killed her because he thought she was cheating on him and not being loyal to Othello, and when he learned that Iago was lying to him and that he killed Desdemona for no reason, he committed suicide because he was overtaken by jealousy, sadness and grief about the events of the story. The story of Othello is set in Cyprus between the 1500’s and 1600’s and during a war between the Venetian army and Turkey, where the Venetian general was Othello (it was odd for a black man to be that important in a play, mainly because the Elizabethan era was prejudice), this was to show how strong and wise Othello was because he was in control of the worlds most powerful army, and this made it more dramatic because he fell all the way from being the strong general to being a low-life killer, Othello was keeping Cyprus within their control with his lieutenant Michael Cassio, his “trusted” ensign Iago, his wife Desdemona and her housemaid, and wife to Iago, Emilia, and as the story progresses Othello gets tainted by Iago’s lies and becomes jealous and eventually progressing to Othello’s madness and the killing of himself, Desdemona and Emilia.
In the beginning of the play, Othello was seen as a brave and noble man, an example of this is when Iago tells him that Brabantio and his men are looking for Othello so he must hide, he just replies “Not I; I must be found.” This also shows that he is loyal to Desdemona for he wouldn’t run when their relationship has been discovered. He also shows softness in his voice when he speaks and his words are always calm, for example when he says “The sooner, sweet, for you.” to Desdemona he says it softly and caring to help show the comparison to his behaviour after he was lied to by Iago. After Iago told him that Desdemona was having an affair you can see a real difference in Othello’s behaviour, firstly he looses the softness in his voice for example by saying “Ha! Ha! False to me?” and then later losing the elegance in his speech all together by saying stuff like “O monstrous! Monstrous” then getting more aggressive by saying things like “O, blood, blood, blood!” and then finally going insane and obsessed with killing Desdemona by saying “Damn her lewd minx! O, damn her! Come, go with me apart; I will withdraw, to furnish me with some swift means for death for the fair devil” which is basically telling Iago that he is going to kill Desdemona. However, the cause of this is Iago, who is portrayed as a jealous liar, who would even drive someone to insanity and kill them selves for revenge over not getting what he wants, and even though the other characters referred him as “Honest Iago” he was really a villainous mad man intent on getting his own way as seen in his Soliloquy, which means he says his thoughts and ideas out to the audience, this is called dramatic irony which means that we know something that the other characters don’t. Iago is also a chauvinist which means that he only sees women as an sexual object and doesn’t respect them, which is shown when Emilia says “Do not you chide; I have a thing for you” and Iago replies “A thing for me? It is a common thing--” which shows that he thinks that she means sex, so showing that he only sees her as a sexual object. Iago uses the other characters in his plans to get Othello mad, and since they believe Iago is honest, they do what he says believing that he is truthful, an example of this is when he makes Cassio drunk, by saying that he will he would be fine with just a couple of drinks, knowing full well that Rodrigo would get into a fight with him so he would lose his job, and we see in this scene that he lies to twist Othello when he talks to Cassio and tells him that mortal wounds are worse than bad respect but says to Othello “But he that filches from me my good name robs me of that which not enriches him and makes me poor indeed” which implies that nothing is worst than losing respect, he also uses Emilia, when he persuades her off scene to steal Desdemona’s Handkerchief, by tempting her with lies about loving her and promising her stuff if she gets it for him, which he later places in Cassio’s room whist he and Bianca slept. The attitude between Desdemona and Cassio helped Iago with his plans; he knew that Othello would see them together and, then with Iago’s mind games, would believe that they were having an affair, and also knowing that she would do all she could to help him because she had a caring heart, and Emilia even says “I warrant it greaves my husband as if the case was his” meaning that Iago sounded concerned over Cassio’s welfare so that he wouldn’t be suspicious over the fact that he asked Cassio to go to Desdemona the night before. The ways that Iago manipulates Othello is very simple but also very effective, he used a mixture of mockery like “O, beware, my lord, of jealousy”, which is said like a warning, but in truth is making him more jealous by telling him not to be, he makes their meeting at the beginning at the scene sound suspicious by saying “Ha! I like not that”, and he is also repetitive when he speaks just to wind Othello up. The importance in terms of characters is very big impact to how dramatic the scene is, one of these is the way that Iago is shown to have power over Othello by saying things like “Do not rise yet” when he is kneeling and “Once more I take my leave” to show that he is slowly starting to take control and power from Othello’s anger and jealousy, which overall makes it tragic for the audience because we know what is happening and what is going to happen which makes us feel sad for the tragic fate that would happen to Othello later in the play.
