Othello topics for commentary: Please choose 1 of the topics below and write approximately 2 pages; no need to create a 5-paragraph essay, but try to respond to your topic by referring to specific scenes/moments in the text.
What is Othello’s tragic flaw? How is it evident? What are its consequences?
What lesson(s) are illustrated in this play that could be universally applicable (here and now)?
At the end of the play, when Othello knows all the truths about each person in his life, he asks Cassio (speaking about Iago): “Will you, I pray, demand that demi-devil/Why he hath thus ensnared my soul and body?” (Vii)
So, what is the answer to this question (why is Iago determined to ruin Othello’s life)?
Here are Othello’s dying words (to Cassio and Lodovico):
Soft you! A word or two before you go.
I have done the state some service, and they know’t.
No more of that. I pray you, in your letters,
When you shall these unlucky deeds relate,
Speak of me as I am. Nothing extenuate,
Nor set down aught in malice. Them must you speak
Of one that loved not wisely, but too well;
Of one not easily jealous, but, being wrought,
Perplexed in the extreme; of one whose hands,
Like the base Judean, threw a pearl away
Richer than all his tribe; of one whose subdued eyes,
Albeit unused to the melting mood,
Drops tears as fast as the Arabian trees
Their medicinable gum. Set you down this.
And say besides that in Aleppo once,
Where a malignant and turbaned Turk
Beat a Venetian and traduced the state,
I took by th’ throat the circumcised dog
And smote him – thus. (He stabs himself.) Vii
Analyze Othello’s speech to reach your final conclusion about the quality of his character. Do you commend or condone his suicide? Do you commend or condone his actions throughout the play? Do you find this speech entirely tragic, uplifting, or some combination of both?
