race

Cards (4)

  • “Blackamoors” in plays and pageants were usually sinister vices
  • Desdemona claims to be colour-blind claiming she “saw Othello’s visage in his mind”, yet Othello affirms his nobility as “she had eyes and chose me”. She also views his origins positively “I think the sun where he was born drew all such humours from him”
  • Actor Paul Robeson: “It is because he is an alien among white people that his mind works so quickly for he feels dishonour more deeply”
  • Caryl Phillips: “The pressures placed upon him rendered his life a tragedy” and “life for him is a game in which he does not know the rules” because of his race.