Weekly Response 9/17

1) It (evasion from race) is further complicated by the fact that the habit of ignoring race is understood to be a graceful, even generous, liberal gesture.  To notice is to recognize an already discredited difference (Morrison 1008). 

1a) “Haply for I am black, And have not those soft parts of conversation That chamberers have,” (Othello Act 3, Scene 3-265).

2) Does Othello’s ethnicity play a part into his eventual demise and the judgment of the characters around him?

3) The quote “Haply for I am black” is (I could be incorrect) the only time Othello brings up his ethnicity to the audience.  Othello brings his ethnicity up in a “laundry list” of why Desmondia may not love him anymore. Personally, I never saw “race” as playing a big part in Shakespeare’s tragic plot.  Iago seems to have other motivations behind the fall of Othello than simply because he is “black”.  Yet, as I read Toni Morrison’s “Playing in the Dark”, I started to consider if “race” was being kindly  avoided in Othello.

            Toni Morrison believes that our current literary history in America is not giving enough credit to how much of an impact Africans had on the culture.  Instead, literature is mainly influenced from a white males’ perspective.  After reading Toni Morrison’s article, I began to realize how little “race” played a part in the play’s plot.  I tried to remember times in the play where Othello’s ethnicity was brought up, but I only found a few “quibs” from Iago.  I started to ponder the idea that Iago wanted vengeance on Othello because of his race, but could find very little claims to prove it.  This left me somewhat disheartened because I thought I would be able to connect the two texts together for this close reading.  I concluded that Othello’s demise was based on the fact that Shakespeare wanted a “massive” tragedy to occur and maybe ignoring race was, as Morrison called it, “a liberal gesture”.