Key Ideas

• Love, Historical Context and Historicism (Act 5, Scene 1)

  All the time, the key thing that Iago achieves here is the misrepresentation of love.
• Roderigo

  • At point of death, Roderigo sees clearly for the first time that he will not be able to find true love, and that trying to buy someone’s love with money will not work.
• Bianca's love

  • When Bianca says, ‘O my dear Cassio, my sweet Cassio’ she shows real distress at Cassio’s injuries, which confirms that her love for him is more than just sexual passion.
  • Given difference circumstances their love might have prevailed more easily.
  • In the imagined world there is still a chance for it to flourish in the New World.
• Contrast

  • When Othello arrives we see his professed admiration for Iago, coupled with his newly violent plans for Desdemona.
  • It is clear that these now contrast poignantly from his declarations of love in Act 1.
• Tragedy (Act 5, Scene 1)

  It is critical that at this point Othello mishears things—for it reinforces the point that he has misheard throughout the play.
• Hamartia

  • Roderigo and Cassio could potentially destroy Iago’s plot so Iago realises that they need to be dealt with.
  • Roderigo therefore meets a tragic end; but comes to realise his own error because he knows how Iago has duped him.
  • His hamartia echoes the later wider hamartia of Othello.
  • The punishment for Cassio is to be maimed.
• Mishearing

  • It is critical that at this point Othello mishears things—for it reinforces the point that he has misheard throughout the play.
  • He is still doing it at the end.
• Honour

  • It is of course, predictable that Iago will use Bianca as the person who set up the plot to kill Cassio.
  • Bianca is innocent of this but at this point Iago is no longer worried about who he hurts or who is embroiled in his plan.
  • This shows the depth of his depravity.
  • Iago now has no honour to lose.
• Inevitability of the tragedy

  • The final events in the tragedy are set up by Iago’s last lines here: ‘This is the night / That either make me or fordoes me quite’.
  • The audience is aware that the fordoing will, in fact, be inflicted on Desdemona and Othello.
  • Lines such as this now indicate the inevitability of the tragedy about to occur.
• The audience

  • At this point the audience is experiencing the first moments of catharsis.
  • Pity and fear runs through their minds as the immensity of the tragedy and Iago’s manipulation truly start to unfold.