Lanham Method Revision
Bitterness regarding the nature of women is obvious even in the historical context of Shakespeare’s tragedy Othello where, during that time period, women were not valued as equal human beings with rights. Shakespeare constantly harangues women indirectly through his characters who portray slave-like women, their only jobs being classical women’s duties (cooking, cleaning, etc.) and sex. He puts a much darker spin on women in society, which at least commanded some respect for the roles they did play.
The blatant examples of this male dominance and female weakness are practically constant during the course of the play. Iago has a discussion with the rest of the main characters about the qualities of women. Desdemona challenges Iago to praise a woman who is worthy. She asks him to say what he thinks of a woman who is beautiful and smart, then one who is ugly but smart, and then one who is beautiful but foolish. Iago is cynical and bitter about women’s qualities saying that the women with beauty and wit simply know how to use their beauty for their own gain, women who are ugly and smart will find a “white that shall her blackness fit,” meaning she will be able to trick a quality man into fitting with her and marrying her, and of the woman who is beautiful but dumb, he says there has never been such a woman because even her foolishness allows her beauty to take her as high as she can go, making it intelligence after all, not foolishness.
check out this revision (below). Notice, too, how/why I used semicolons in that last sentence... make sense? I didn't change out the passive voice in this first sentence, but I did trim out a lot of prepositional phrases.
ReplyDeleteREVISED
In Shakespeare's day, women were not valued as equal human beings with rights. This belief found expression in many ways in Othello , where Shakespeare constantly portrays slave-like women, their only jobs being domestic duties (cooking, cleaning, etc.) and sex. He puts a much darker spin on women in society, who at least commanded some respect for the roles they did play.
Othello provides several blatant examples of male dominance and female weakness throughout the play. For example, when Iago starts up a discussion among the main characters on the qualities of women, Desdemona challenges him to find a woman worthy of praise. She asks him what he thinks of a woman who is beautiful and smart, then one who is ugly but smart, and then one who is beautiful but foolish. Iago cynically replies that a woman with beauty and wit simply knows how to use her beauty for her own gain; a woman who is ugly and smart will find a “white that shall her blackness fit,” meaning she will be able to trick a quality man into marrying her; and a woman who is beautiful but dumb does not exist because even her foolishness allows her beauty to take her as high as she can go, making her foolishness intelligence after all.