6.8–Sample Analysis of a Play

“Cry shame against me, yet I’ll speak”:
The Silent and Speaking Emilia of Othello

Hannah Elizabeth Bowling

For much of Othello, Emilia functions as Desdemona’s silent shadow. She does not appear on stage until Act 2, Scene 7; she only has 3 lines for the duration of said scene. Indeed, in a play of 3,681 lines, she has only approximately 249 speaking lines, barely 7% of the lines in the play. Shakespeare seems to indicate to his audience through such a small speaking role the sheer un-importance of this character. Yet it is her unassuming nature that makes her the perfect pivot by which the play turns. Of Emilia’s speaking time, almost 40% of it occurs within the last act of the play, indicative of the pivotal role that she plays in this act and by extension her fundamental significance to the play overall.

Hannah Elizabeth begins with a strong opening that immediately identifies the topic of the essay (Emilia in Othello) and uses alliteration (“silent shadow”) to rhetorically engage the reader.

In Act 5, the “silent shadow” Emilia proves the most powerful character in the entire play both in word and deed. Towards the end of scene 1, Iago tells Emilia “run you to the citadel and tell my lord and lady what hath happed” (5.1.148–9). She is the messenger sent to Othello and Desdemona to apprise them of Cassio’s near-death experience and of the death of Rodrigo ( 5.1.148–150). Her message of Cassio’s brush with death serves to alert Othello of the suspicious nature of the murder-pact he has made with Iago previously, sowing the first seeds of doubt in Iago (5.2.142–3). When she arrives later in the scene at Othello and Desdemona’s bedchamber door, she interrupts Othello in the act of smothering Desdemona. However, it is not until she enters that Desdemona, miraculously and temporarily revived, delivers her parting lines of “o falsely, falsely murdered…a guiltless death I die” (5.2.144, 150). Her physical presence at the death of Desdemona moves her both metaphorically and literally from the periphery of much of the action and plot of the play to the forefront (5.2.144–153).

Note the effective callback to “silent shadow” in the introduction.

However, the best example of her power can be found towards the end of Act 5, Scene 2. Emilia’s physical presence in the bedchamber with Othello and Desdemona allows for her to serve as testimony on three different occasions: as the aforementioned messenger of Rodrigo’s death, of Iago’s deception, and of Desdemona’s fidelity. “You told a lie, an odious, damnèd lie! Upon my soul, a lie, a wicked lie!” she cries upon confronting Iago for his deception (5.2.216–7). “I am bound to speak…your reports have set the murder on,” she continues, positioning herself as a truth-bringer compared to Iago’s falsehoods. She then proclaims to her audience, emphasizing Iago’s prominent role in contributing to Desdemona’s death, that “I found [the handkerchief], and I did give’t my husband” (5.2.274–5). Despite Iago’s constant bombardment of curses like “villainous whore!” and “filth, thou liest,” she persists in making explicit what the play’s audience is already aware of: that Iago requested Desdemona’s handkerchief from Emilia in order to frame her as involved in an extramarital affair with Cassio to Othello.

“However” serves as a great transitional word that signals that this paragraph differs from the previous one.

Emila’s position as Desdemona’s attendant and closest confidant combined with her witness of Desdemona’s death allows her to serve as an effective witness of Emila’s virtuous character. “She was too fond of her most filthy bargain,” Emilia says to Othello, simultaneously defending Desdemona’s love for Othello in combination with an angry, racist condemnation of Othello himself (5.2.192). “Though has killed the sweetest innocent that e’er did lift up eye” she continues, maintaining Desdemona’s fidelity despite Iago and Othello’s combined efforts to discredit her virtue (5.2.237–8). Ultimately it is not her words that prove the most effective in persuading the men present but the bodily harm she endures at the hands of her husband that sways their opinion. After Emilia lays out the entirety of Iago’s deception, Iago kills her in a fit of rage before exiting the stage. With her final breath, she requests to be laid beside her mistress and tells Othello that “Moor, she was chaste. She loved thee, cruel Moor. So come my soul to bliss, as I speak true. So speaking as I think, alas, I die” (5.2.299–301). Even to the point of death, Emilia is adamant of Desdemona’s chastity, and it is her death that ultimately persuades Othello.

“Ultimately” is an excellent word for signaling both the conclusion of an idea and for highlighting the writer’s argument.

Thus, Shakespeare utilizes Emilia as one of the most silent characters in the play to reveal the surprising, hidden elements known by the audience to the rest of the characters, thereby making her one of the most pivotal characters. With well over a third of her spoken lines occurring in the last act of Othello and devoted to exposing both her husband’s mistreatment of the newly married Othello and Desdemona due to his jealousy of Othello and Desdemona’s marital fidelity to her husband, Emilia is the character upon which the climax of the plot hinges. Her presence, both living and dead, serves as a weighty testimony to the truth in the wake of her husband’s lies; while fundamental to the action of Act 5, her significance extends beyond this finite space to the totality of the play.

The final sentence is a strong conclusion that reiterates the significance of the essay’s thesis and points to future work where the thesis could be developed further.

Works Cited