Awake! What ho, Brabantio! Thieves, thieves!
Look to your house, your daughter, and your bags!
Thieves, thieves!
Act 1, Scene 1
My mother had a maid called Barbary.
She was in love, and he she loved proved mad
And did forsake her. She had a song of willow,
An old thing ’twas, but it expressed her fortune,
And she died singing it. That song tonight
Will not go from my mind.
Foreshadowing / Dramatic Irony
Get you to bed on th’ instant. I will be
returned forthwith. Dismiss your attendant there.
Look ’t be done. (4.3)
Othello
One Michael Cassio, a Florentine,
A fellow almost damned in a fair wife,
That never set a squadron in the field,
Nor the division of a battle knows
More than a spinster—unless the bookish theoric,
Wherein the togèd consuls can propose
As masterly as he. Mere prattle without practice
Is all his soldiership. (1.1)
Cassio has no real experience of being a soldier. He's a geek, and negatively feminine in Iago's eyes.
From this time forth I never will speak word.
Iago
I have no great devotion to the deed,
And yet he hath given me satisfying reasons.
’Tis but a man gone. Forth, my sword! He dies.
O, thou foul thief, where hast thou stowed my
daughter?
Damned as thou art, thou hast enchanted her!
Emotive Language / Symbolism
Let husbands know
Their wives have sense like them. They see, and
smell,
And have their palates both for sweet and sour,
As husbands have. (4.3)
Emilia
Let me have speech with you. To Desdemona. Come,
my dear love,
The purchase made, the fruits are to ensue;
That profit’s yet to come ’tween me and you.—
Goodnight.
Time to consummate the marriage
Nobody. I myself. Farewell.
Commend me to my kind lord. O, farewell.
Desdemona
If she be fair and wise, fairness and wit,
The one’s for use, the other useth it.
Act 2, Scene 1
IAGO
But if I give my wife a handkerchief—...
Why then, ’tis hers, my lord, and being hers,
She may, I think, bestow ’t on any man.
OTHELLO
She is protectress of her honor, too.
May she give that?
IAGO
Her honor is an essence that’s not seen;
They have it very oft that have it not.
But for the handkerchief—
Symbolism / Metaphor
Not tonight, good Iago. I have very poor and
unhappy brains for drinking. (2.3)
Cassio
Iago: (To Montano)
You see this fellow that is gone before?
He’s a soldier fit to stand by Caesar
And give direction; and do but see his vice.
’Tis to his virtue a just equinox,
The one as long as th’ other. ’Tis pity of him.
I fear the trust Othello puts him in,
On some odd time of his infirmity,
Will shake this island. (2.3)
O damned Iago! O inhuman dog!
Roderigo
Keep up your bright swords, for the dew will rust
them.
Good signior, you shall more command with years
Than with your weapons.
Act 1, Scene 2
EMILIA:
O, the more angel she, and you the blacker devil!
(5.2)
Juxtaposition / Colour Imagery
I never did
Offend you in my life, never loved Cassio
But with such general warranty of heaven
As I might love. I never gave him token.
Desdemona
Othello:
Are we turned Turks, and to ourselves do that
Which heaven hath forbid the Ottomites? (2.3)
Have we converted to the religion of the Turkish and become like our enemies?
I kissed thee ere I killed thee. No way but this,
Killing myself, to die upon a kiss.
Othello
OTHELLO
Heaven truly knows that thou art false as hell.
DESDEMONA, standing
To whom, my lord? With whom? How am I false?
OTHELLO
Ah, Desdemon, away, away, away!
DESDEMONA
Alas the heavy day, why do you weep?
Am I the motive of these tears, my lord?
If haply you my father do suspect
An instrument of this your calling back,
Lay not your blame on me. If you have lost him,
I have lost him too.
Act 4, Scene 2
EMILIA:
Villainy, villainy, villainy!
I think upon ’t, I think! I smell ’t! O villainy!
I thought so then. I’ll kill myself for grief!
O villainy! Villainy! (5.2)
Repetition / Emotive Language
I am no strumpet, but of life as honest
As you that thus abuse me. (5.1)
Bianca
IAGO
But if I give my wife a handkerchief—...
Why then, ’tis hers, my lord, and being hers,
She may, I think, bestow ’t on any man.
OTHELLO
She is protectress of her honor, too.
May she give that?
IAGO
Her honor is an essence that’s not seen;
They have it very oft that have it not.
Honour is invisible. There are people who seem virtuous who have actually given away their honour.
Moor, she was chaste. She loved thee, cruel Moor.
So come my soul to bliss, as I speak true.
So speaking as I think, alas, I die.
Emilia