Othello Act 4 Scene 1

Do you really think so? (The scene opens in the middle of an argument we never heard the start of. Iago has been working on him off-stage, and we come in partway through.)

Think so, Iago?

What —

to kiss in private?

A kiss nobody permitted!

Or to lie naked in bed with a male friend

for an hour or more, meaning no harm by it?

Naked in bed, Iago, and mean no harm?

That's hypocrisy turned against the devil himself.

People who intend to be virtuous and still do that

are being tempted by the devil through their own virtue — and they're tempting

heaven.

If they do nothing, it's a forgivable slip.

But if I give my wife a handkerchief —

What then?

Why then it's hers, my lord, and being hers

she may, I suppose, give it to any man she likes.

She's the keeper of her honour too.

May she give that away?

Her honour is something invisible.

Plenty of women are credited with it who haven't got it.

But as for the handkerchief —

By heaven, I would gladly have forgotten it.

You said — oh, it comes back over my memory

the way a raven passes over a plague-house,

an omen to everyone inside — that he had my handkerchief.

Yes. What of it?

That isn't good now.

What

if I'd said I had seen him wrong you?

Or heard him say — for there are villains about

who, having by their own hard pestering,

or by some woman's own willing infatuation,

talked her round or satisfied her, cannot help

blurting it out afterwards —

Has he said something?

He has, my lord — but rest assured,

nothing he wouldn't swear his way back out of.

What has he said?

Well — that he did. I don't know what he did.

What? What?

Lie —

With her?

With her — on her — whatever you like.

Lie with her? Lie on her? We say 'lie on her'

when we mean tell lies about her. Lie with her — God's wounds, that's

sickening. Handkerchief — confessions — handkerchief. (His mind is coming apart on the word itself. He can no longer hold 'lying about her' and 'lying with her' as separate things, which is exactly the confusion the whole plot has been built out of.)

To confess, and be hanged for his trouble.

Hanged first and confess afterwards — I shake

at it. Nature wouldn't clothe herself in a darkness like this

for no reason. It isn't mere

words that shake me like this. Pah! Noses, ears and

lips — is it possible? Confess — handkerchief — oh,

devil!

Work away,

my medicine, work. This is how gullible fools are

caught,

and how many decent, faithful women,

entirely innocent, get disgraced. — Hello there! My lord!

My lord, I say. Othello! (He calls it medicine. He has called it poison, plague and sulphur already; the word changes but the pride in it never does.)

What is it, Cassio?

What's wrong?

My lord has fallen into an epileptic fit.

This is his second. He had one yesterday. (There was no fit yesterday. Iago invents a medical history on the spot, and Cassio will carry it away as fact.)

Rub his temples.

No, leave him.

The seizure has to run its course quietly.

Otherwise he foams at the mouth and shortly

breaks out into savage madness. Look — he's stirring.

Would you step away for a little while?

He'll come round shortly. When he's gone,

there's something important I want to discuss with you.

How are you, general? You haven't hurt your head?

Are you mocking me?

I'm not mocking you, by heaven.

I only wish you'd take your luck like a man.

A man with horns is a monster and an animal. (A husband whose wife was unfaithful was said to grow invisible horns. The joke is centuries old and everyone in the audience knows it, which is what makes it unbearable to him.)

Then there are plenty of animals in any large city,

and plenty of monsters in respectable society.

Did he admit it?

Good sir — be a man.

Consider that every bearded man who's married

may be pulling the same cart as you. There are millions alive right now

who lie every night in beds that are not theirs alone

and would swear they were. Your position is better than theirs.

Oh, it's hell's own spite, the devil's chief joke,

to kiss an unfaithful woman in a bed you feel safe in

and think her faithful. No — let me know the truth,

and knowing what I am, I know what she will be.

Oh, you're wise, certainly.

Stand aside for a while.

Just keep yourself inside the bounds of patience.

While you were lying here, overwhelmed with grief —

an emotion very unbecoming in a man like you —

Cassio came by. I got rid of him

and made plausible excuses for your fit,

and told him to come back shortly and talk to me here,

which he promised to do. Just hide yourself away,

and watch the sneers, the jeers and open contempt

living in every part of his face.

Because I'll make him tell the story over again —

where, how, how often, how long ago and when

he has had your wife and is going to have her again.

Just watch how he moves. But patience —

or I'll say you're nothing but temper

and not a man at all.

Listen to me, Iago:

you'll find me extremely clever at being patient —

but, do you hear me, extremely bloody.

That's not a bad thing.

But keep to the rhythm of it. Will you stand aside?

Now I'll question Cassio about Bianca —

a woman who by selling her body

buys herself food and clothes. She's a creature

who adores Cassio, which is the prostitute's curse:

to fool many men and be fooled by one.

When he hears her mentioned, he can't hold back

from laughing helplessly. Here he comes. (He tells us the name he is about to use, and then never uses it again in Othello's hearing. From this point on Cassio says only 'she' and 'her'. That missing name is the whole trick, so the modern column leaves the pronouns bare too — supplying 'Bianca' would hand you the one piece of information Othello lacks.)

As he smiles, Othello will go mad,

and his untutored jealousy is bound to read

poor Cassio's smiles, gestures and easy manner

completely wrong. — How are you, lieutenant?

The worse for your calling me by the title

whose loss is killing me.

Work on Desdemona and you'll have it back for certain.

Now, if this request were in Bianca's gift,

how fast you'd get it!

(laughing) Oh, the poor wretch.

Look how he's laughing already!

I never saw a woman love a man like that.

Poor thing — honestly, I think she does love me.

Now he denies it half-heartedly and laughs it off.

Listen, Cassio —

Now he's pressing him

to tell the whole thing again. Go on. Good, good.

She's putting it about that you're going to marry her.

Do you intend to?

Ha, ha, ha!

Are you holding a victory parade, Roman? A triumph? (A triumph was the parade Rome gave a general who had conquered something. Othello, who has actually had them, is watching a man laugh and seeing a celebration of his own defeat.)

Me, marry her? What, a woman who sells herself? Please give

my brains a bit of credit. Don't think me that far gone.

Ha, ha, ha!

So, so, so. The winners are the ones who laugh.

The word going round is that you're marrying her.

Tell me you're joking.

I'm an outright villain if I'm not telling the truth.

So you've marked me, have you? Right.

That's the little monkey's own story. She's

convinced I'll marry her out of her own affection and

wishful thinking, not because I promised anything.

Iago's signalling to me. Now he's starting the story.

She was here just now. She follows me

everywhere. The other day I was talking on the

seafront with some Venetians, and along comes

the little plaything, and — I swear — throws herself round my

neck like this!

Crying 'Oh, dear Cassio,' or something like it — his

gesture tells me so. (Everything Othello says in this scene is a guess about words he cannot hear. He is inventing the dialogue and then believing it.)

So she hangs off me and lolls about and weeps on me, and

shakes me and pulls at me. Ha, ha, ha!

Now he's describing how she dragged him into my

bedroom. — Oh, I can see that nose of yours, but not yet the

dog I'm going to throw it to.

Well — I'll have to stop seeing her.

Good God, look — here she comes.

She's a proper polecat — a perfumed

one, mind. — What do you mean by following me

everywhere?

Let the devil and his mother follow you about. What did

you mean by that handkerchief you gave me

just now? I was a fine fool to take it. I'm to copy

the pattern, am I? A likely story, that you

found it in your room and don't know who

left it there. This is some hussy's love-token, and I'm to

copy the pattern. Here — give it back to your tart.

Wherever you got it, I'll copy nothing off it.

What's all this, my sweet Bianca? What's this?

By heaven — that must be my handkerchief! (The ocular proof he demanded in Act 3 has finally arrived, and it is a real object he correctly identifies. Every single thing he concludes from it is wrong.)

If you want to come to supper tonight, you can. If

you don't, come when you're next in the mood

for it.

After her — go on, after her.

I'll have to. She'll make a scene in the street otherwise.

Will you have supper there?

I intend to, yes.

Well, I may see you there — I'd very much

like a word with you.

Do come. Will you?

Enough — say no more.

(coming forward) How shall I murder him,

Iago?

Did you notice how he laughed about his own vice?

Oh, Iago.

And did you see the handkerchief?

Was that mine?

Yours, I swear it. And to see how much he values

that foolish woman your wife — she gave it to him, and

he's given it to his whore.

I'd take nine years to kill him. A fine

woman, a beautiful woman, a sweet woman.

No — you have to forget that.

Yes. Let her rot and die and be damned

tonight, because she isn't going to live. No — my heart has turned

to stone. I hit it and it hurts my hand. Oh, the

world hasn't a sweeter creature in it. She could lie beside

an emperor and give him orders.

No — that's not the road for you.

Hang her, I'm only saying what she is. So

delicate with her needle, a wonderful musician —

she could sing the savagery out of a bear.

And such a rich, quick, inventive mind.

All that makes her worse.

Oh, a thousand times worse. — And then

such a gentle nature.

Yes. Too gentle. (Othello spends this exchange listing everything he loves about his wife, and Iago turns each item into evidence as it arrives. 'Gentle' meant well-born and kind; Iago hears it as available.)

No, that's true enough. But the pity of it,

Iago. Oh, Iago — the pity of it, Iago.

If you're this soft about her wickedness, give her

a licence to do it. If it doesn't bother you,

it's nobody else's business.

I'll chop her into portions of meat. Cheat on me?

Oh, it's vile of her.

With my own officer!

That's viler still.

Get me some poison, Iago — tonight. I won't

argue it out with her, in case her body and her beauty

disarm my resolve again. Tonight, Iago.

Don't use poison. Strangle her in her bed —

the very bed she's contaminated. (Othello asks for a method and Iago supplies a better one. He chooses the place, and turns the killing into a punishment that fits the crime he invented.)

Good. Good. The justice of it appeals to me. Very

good.

And as for Cassio — let me take him on. You'll

hear more by midnight.

Excellent.

What's that trumpet?

Something from Venice, I'll bet.

It's Lodovico. This is from the Duke.

Look — your wife is with him.

God save you, worthy general.

And you, sir, with all my heart.

The Duke and the Senators of Venice send their greetings.

I kiss the document that carries their wishes.

And what's the news, good cousin Lodovico?

I'm very glad to see you, sir.

Welcome to Cyprus.

Thank you. How is Lieutenant Cassio?

Alive, sir.

Cousin, there's been an unhappy rift

between him and my lord — but you'll put it right.

Are you sure of that?

My lord?

(reading) 'Do not fail to do this, as you

will answer for it' —

He wasn't speaking to you — he's absorbed in the letter.

Is there a split between my lord and Cassio?

A very unhappy one. I'd do a great deal

to reconcile them, for the love I have for Cassio. (She is standing in front of her husband, a Venetian nobleman and an audience, saying she loves Cassio. She means it exactly as she says it, and it is the last unguarded sentence she gets to speak in this scene.)

Fire and brimstone!

My lord?

Are you in your right mind?

What — is he angry?

Perhaps the letter upset him.

I believe they're ordering him home

and putting Cassio in charge here instead.

Honestly, I'm glad of it.

Really.

My lord?

I'm glad to see you out of your mind.

Othello — sweetheart!

(striking her) Devil!

I have not deserved this.

My lord, they wouldn't believe this in Venice

even if I swore I'd seen it. This is too much.

Apologise to her. She's crying.

Oh, devil, devil.

If the earth could be made pregnant by a woman's tears,

every drop she sheds would hatch into a crocodile.

Get out of my sight.

I won't stay here and offend you.

Truly an obedient lady.

I beg your lordship to call her back.

Madam.

My lord?

What do you want with her, sir?

Who — me, my lord?

Yes. You wanted me to make her turn round.

Sir, she can turn, and turn, and still carry on,

and turn again. And she can cry, sir. Cry.

And she's obedient — as you say, obedient.

Very obedient. — Carry on with your weeping. —

As to this letter, sir — oh, beautifully acted grief! —

I'm ordered home. — Get out.

I'll send for you later. — Sir, I obey the order

and will return to Venice. — Away with you, be gone!

Cassio can have my post. And, sir, tonight

I'd ask you to have supper with me.

You're welcome to Cyprus, sir. Goats and

monkeys! (In Act 3 Iago told him he would never catch them at it, not even if they were 'as prime as goats, as hot as monkeys.' Othello is now saying Iago's words out loud in front of a Venetian ambassador, and has no idea whose they are.)

Is this the noble Moor our whole senate

calls equal to anything? Is this the character

that passion couldn't shake, whose solid virtue

no stray shot of accident or dart of chance

could graze, let alone pierce? (This is the first time anyone from Venice has seen him since Act 1. The word the Senate used for him was 'sufficient' — equal to whatever you give him — and Lodovico is watching that judgement come apart in an afternoon.)

He is much

changed.

Is he sane? Isn't he going out of his mind?

He is what he is. It isn't for me to give my opinion

of what he might be. If he isn't what he might be,

I wish to heaven he were.

What — strike his wife?

That wasn't well done, certainly. Though I wish I could be sure

that blow will turn out to be the worst of it.

Is it his habit?

Or did the letters stir up his temper

and create this fault out of nothing?

Ah, well.

It wouldn't be honourable of me to say

what I've seen and know. You'll be able to observe

him,

and his own behaviour will describe him well enough

that I can spare my words. Just go after him

and watch how he goes on.

I'm sorry to have been so wrong about him.