Othello - Act 3

This act creates even more suspense to the play because Iago's plan keeps working out perfectly.  He plants the seed into Othello's mind the idea that Desdemona could be cheating on him.  Othello is worrying about it for the rest of the act trying to figure out if she really is cheating on him.  Throughout the act, the suspense keeps increasing to find out when Othello is going to call out Desdemona for cheating on him.  Iago's deception continues when he tells lies about what Cassio said in his sleep.  He said he heard Cassio say, "Sweet Desdemona, let us be wary, let us hide our loves."  Cassio did not say this, but Iago is trying to give some evidence to Othello that his opinion is true.  Othello has the final straw and orders Cassio to be dead within three days.  I am wondering how Iago plans to do this.  If he is considered Cassio's friend, then will he get someone else to kill Cassio or will he do it himself?  After Iago receives Desdemona's handkerchief, he decides to use it against her to complete the assumptions that were placed in Othello's mind.

Othello - Act II

Question #2 on pg. 1119

This play is definitely a melodrama because it tries to get the reader (or viewer) to appeal to the characters' emotions.  Throughout the play, Iago in the only character on stage but saying his thoughts to himself out loud in order for the audience to know what he's thinking.  Often times, the reader will side with the character who is the one giving all the information to the audience because they sort of act like a narrator.  In this play, I seem to side with Iago even though he is the bad guy.  He is deceiving many people in this act including Montano, Cassio, and Othello.  Iago convinces Cassio to drink wine until he's drunk by saying that "they are our friends.  But one cup - I'll drink for you." (II.iii.31)  Just like Iago wanted everything to happen, Cassio gets drunk and into a fight and almost kills Montano.  After, Iago gets Othello to trust him, and it makes the reader seem to think that what Iago is doing may be okay.  Experiencing the drama in this play is a significant factor since the play focuses on all of the drama being played out in the story.  Shakespeare liked to incorporate the audience and their feelings in his works, and Othello is no different from his other works.

Othello - Act I

Question #1 on pg. 1119

This play employs realistic conventions because it is something that we can relate to doing in our society today. In this act, two men, Roderigo and Iago, go to Barbantio's house because they heard that is daughter was married behind his back.  He initially explained thought that "[Othello] hast enchanted her" (I.ii.63) and tricked Desdemona into marrying him, but Desdemona is really in love with Othello.  I can definitely see this happening in society now as having a daughter go behind her father's back and get hitched could very easily happen today.  On the spectrum, I believe that this play falls on the side of literalistic imitation of reality.  Nothing extraordinary like magic or miracles have occurred so far.  To be honest, I don't know what the "norm" is in a play so I don't know if there were breaks from it.  So far, I can tell that the play has been very dramatic with characters' emotions constantly changing.  One thing I did notice that Iago changes the way he speaks when he's around different people.  He speaks in prose when with Roderigo, but he talks in poetry to other people in order to impress them.  I think most of this act was focused on introducing the plot and characters more than anything else.