Femininity In Othello

The question of femininity and what it entails has always played a part in literature. We as readers look for this aspect and its definition through all works of writing, but we focus more on what it means to be a woman and the idea of femininity through works like Shakespeare’s Othello and The Miller’s Tale from Chaucer’s “The Canterbury Tales”. In these works, the authors define femininity through varying descriptions of a women’s characteristics and her actions, as it is all perceived from the male perspective. Othello can best be summarized as a story about the consequences of jealousy. It is a story about a man who deeply loves his new wife but when the seed of doubt is planted in his mind by an adversary, that man— Othello—forgets his
He starts with “you are pictures out of doors/Bells in your parlours”, asserting that women are “pictures” while they are away and out of the comfort of their own homes. However, women are also “bells in your parlours”, that is, that women are noisy and obnoxious when they are at home. The author uses the word “pictures” here as a noun, which is translated into “beautiful painted objects” in a footnote corresponding with the word. Iago then continues, describing women as “wild-cats in your kitchens,/Saints in your injuries, devils being offended”, explaining his view of a woman’s nature. “Saints in your injuries” he says, meaning that a woman raises herself up to the level of a saint when she complains about something. By “devils being offended”, the character alludes to women taking on the characteristics of devils when they are offended. Finally, the last line of this section of Iago’s dialogue, “players in your housewifery, and housewives in your beds”, take on a harsher judgment of women. He asserts that women play around in their roles as wives, that they do not take their jobs of being a housewife seriously. Iago’s character also claims women to be “housewives in your beds”, as if that is the one place that they fulfill their wifely duties. As if to defend his earlier statement, he implies that women have a childish nature by noting “you rise to play”, which fortifies his earlier statement where he claimed that women do not take their jobs as married women seriously. Just as well, he continues to back up his earlier opinion. While he stated that women were “housewives in your beds”, meaning that they were hussies, or wanton, now he states that women “go to bed to work”. By Iago’s second choice of words, he implicates the idea that a woman’s duty is to be in her husband’s bed, that it is there where she works and is valued. Through this section of Iago’s dialogue, Shakespeare uses his