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| Question | Answer |
| “O heaven! How got she out? O treason of the blood!/ Fathers, from hence trust not your daughters’ minds” | Brabantio views Desdemona as a possession. The use of the question “How got she out?” demonstrates how young women were controlled and expected to obey their fathers. He sees Desdemona’s clandestine marriage to Othello as “treason”. |
| “Send for the lady to the Sagittary/ And let her speak of me before her father.” | Othello trusts Desdemona wholly at the start of the play. It would have been unusual during the Jacobean era for women to have their opinions heard. |
| “She loved me for the dangers I had passed,/ And I loved her that she did pity them.” | Whilst Othello and Desdemona’s relationship is built on mutual respect, it could be argued from this that Desdemona is presented as naïve. Does she really love Othello if their relationship is built on “pity”? |
| “I do perceive here a divided duty” | Although Desdemona is still loyal to Brabantio as her father, she tells him that her loyalty to Othello comes first, as her husband. This also demonstrates how women were expected to be submissive to the men who controlled them. |
| “A moth of peace” | Desdemona would feel useless if she was unable to go with Othello to Cyprus and fulfil her role as a wife. However, moths can be destructive, foreshadowing how her goodness and determination to keep the “peace” between Othello and Cassio dooms her marriage. |
| “Look to her, Moor, if thou hast eyes to see:/ She has deceived her father and may thee.” | Brabantio’s warning to Othello plants the idea of Desdemona being deceitful in Othello’s mind. The rhyming couplet adds a sense of foreboding to the warning, demonstrating how Othello will be manipulated by Iago. |
| “O, my soul’s joy,/ If after every tempest comes such calms,/ May the winds blow till they have wakened death” | Othello’s exaggerated language shows his passion for Desdemona, and how she is a source of comfort. However, the reference to “death” hints at what will happen when the sense of balance that Desdemona provides breaks down. |
| “His bed shall seem a school, his board a shrift” | Desdemona intends to act as both a teacher and religious leader for Othello, so he will not be able to get a break from hearing of Cassio even in “bed”. Her assertive nature would have challenged the role of women in society. However, her persistence is what allows Iago to break down her marriage with Othello. |
| “Heaven truly knows that thou art false as hell” | The use of religious imagery shows how women how were accused of being unchaste were viewed as morally corrupt. As the play is set during the War of Cyprus, religion becomes a symbol of tension and conflict. |
| “Let heaven requite it with the serpent’s curse.” | This suggests that whoever has slandered Desdemona has committed a crime worthy of the devil. The reference to the Book of Genesis presents Desdemona as an innocent Eve. It is Othello who is manipulated by the serpent (Iago), reversing the gender roles of the story of Adam and Eve. |
| “Nobody. I myself. Farewell./ Commend me to my kind lord. O, farewell!” | Desdemona uses her final words to protect Othello and even seems to partially blame herself for her murder, showing her loyalty. Desdemona’s ‘posthumous’ lines would have terrified a superstitious Jacobean audience. |
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