Of Men and Monsters Iago famously warns Othello, O, beware, my lord, of jealousy. It is the green-eyed monster which doth mock The meat it feeds on. Othello soon suffers the beast’s deadly bite. What makes a monster? Referring to himself in Act IV, Scene 1, Othello calls attention to a physical deformity: "A horned man’s a monster and a beast.” (Why the horns? Othello fears himself a cuckold, and the wronged husband proverbially wore horns.)
OTHELLO
So you can tell some monsters by their horns. They show themselves monsters. How fitting, then, that the Latin word, monstrare, means “to show.” Shakespeare knew his Latin and would have made the connection. He seems to have had it in mind when he wrote Act III, Scene 3. Iago artfully hesitates to accuse Cassio: ...as if there were some monster in his thought Too hideous to be shown. Othello then enjoins him: If thou dost love me, Show me thy thoughts.” Yes, some monsters show themselves, yet others go unseen. They hide, horns and all, in those very thoughts. Iago represents another kind of monster. Looking no different from the next man, he nevertheless hides a deformity in his temperament. Trusted by all, he weaves a web of lies to catch his intended victims, Othello, Desdemona, and Cassio. (Others, like his own wife, are merely collateral damage to him.) The carnage comes about for reasons evident and hidden: Iago harbors allconsuming hatred and perhaps unspeakable desire. The two are sometimes rapacious bedfellows. Can a place make a monster? And is Iago the only one in Cyprus? He claims “civil monster[s]” lurk in many cities, and Shakespeare’s men fit the description. Drunk on wine, the well-bred Cassio grows savage. Consumed by jealousy, the loving Othello commits murder. It’s not a matter of place; “warlike” Cyprus has not aroused these beasts. With the right provocation, they rear their ugly heads anywhere.
Thursday, January 19 at 4PM Friday, January 20 at 4PM and 8PM Saturday, January 21 at 4PM Iseman Theater, 1156 Chapel Street
—GAVIN WHITEHEAD, PRODUCTION DRAMATURG
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2016–17 SEASON