User:Minimac cindi

=Othello Soliloquy - The Creation Process=

Chosen Character - Emilia -Placement of Soliloquy in play - Act 5, Scene 2, 215
 Emilia is a female character in the Shakespearian drama 'Othello' who strongly displays the effects of gender power on women. Emilia, unaware of his malicious nature, is married to Iago, and is also the Lady of Othello's wife; Desdemona. Sexually, intellectually, economically and professionally, the women of 'Othello' find themselves disempowered and rendered inferior due to the influence of the men in their lives. Emilia experiences the impact of the power that gender has over her thoughts and actions. This is apparent not only through her position in society, the way she is treated in a disposable manner by her husband but also in her everyday duties. Emilia is aware that her opinion is regarded as less important than males, and feels profoundly the effects of the unjust nature of the way that women are suppressed by men, and Emilia voices this controversial opinion to Desdemona in the play. Yet Emilia also finds herself enarmoured by Iago. Wishing to please his desires, when Iago bids that Emilia steal her Lady's handkerchief, she does so without resistance or question. Emilia is a character with feminist ideals which sharply contrast not only to her obedient actions towards her own husband, but also by the innocent and obedient character of her Lady Desdemona, whose chastity is questioned throughout the play. Iago's through his power over Emilia as a male, uses his ability to fool her from discovering his plot to manipulate and overpower Othello. Because of his manipulation of Emilia, he succeeds also in blinding her to the fact that he has made her an accessory to the crime. This demonstrates the role of men in society and the power that they have over women's thoughts and actions.  Because of this enlightened outlook, Emilia is an appropriate character for a soliloquy because her feminist attitudes contrast greatly to Desdemona and to what is expected of women by society. Emilia's dilemma lends itself to more creative freedom in the depiction of the dominant male power in 'Othello'. Her actions are contradictory to her strong, feminist opinions she voices in private. This provides a more intriguing range of perspectives to pursue in exploring her conscience in the form of a soliloquy. Throughout 'Othello', Emilia describes both her duty to men, yet also her disregard and distaste for such attitudes and beliefs regarding the inferiority and emotionally driven nature of a woman. Throughout the play, Emilia encounters a struggle between wishing to be a wife who is devoted and dedicated to the wellbeing of her husband, yet also her belief that men suppress and control women superficially and in a dominating and unacceptable fashion. Emilia's inner thoughts are feminist, because throughout the play, she does not let it be known to males or society that she believes the power of man over woman is dominating and intolerable.  While Emilia shows tendencies towards feminism, she still acts in a socially and politically correct fashion throughout the majority of the play, and is manipulated into almost accepting that there can't be any change in the status and treatment of women. Through this inner conflict between moral and social values, Emilia discovers when Othello kills Desdemona, that Iago has in fact been villainous and is solely responsible for the manipulation of her and those around her so that his murderous plot can be successful. In Act 5, Scene 2 when Emilia discovers from Othello that Iago her husband has caused the death of her Lady through manipulative and malicious means, she cries 'O God! O heavenly God!' in utter disbelief and outrage. At this point in the play Emilia is incredulous, and horrified at the cruelty of her husbands actions and of his ability to blind her so easily. This moment is opportune therefore for Emilia to finally voice her thoughts and opinions of the strangling and suppressing power that men have over women in the play as she finally realises the power they have had throughout. The irony can be seen in this added soliloquy as she is detests the control of men and their selfish expectation that women should do as they command, when moments later she is murdered by Iago for not staying quiet as he implores. This further emphasises the struggle to break free of this powerful hold that men have over women. Iago’s deceiving attitude and arrogant words resulted in his sexual power over Emilia, forcing her to beg for his affection, even though she is aware of his disposable attitude.  NOTE: When the soliloquy is placed into the play at point Act 5, Scene 2, 215; the director will ensure a freeze frame. The actors, situated on centre left, will freeze, and Emilia will advance to down right of the stage and begin to speak her thoughts through soliloquy to the audience. 

Use of language and spoken techniques to reflect power and Emilia
 The use of varying language and spoken techniques throughout the 20 lined soliloquy have helped further the display of gender power over Emilia in the Shakespearian play ‘Othello’. The use of metaphorical language, imagery, similes, repetition, alliteration, exclamation and enjambment have helped further demonstrate Emilia’s disgust an disapproval of the power that Iago had over her, that resulted in her being an accessory to the murder of her Lady and best friend; Desdemona.  Metaphorical language is used in various stages of the soliloquy to create vivid imagery such as in stanzas two and five. In this stanza, Othello, and ‘the male’ are described as charcoal. In stanza two it describes “The Moor’s charcoal now ember and ash”. This incorporates irony into the metaphor because of the Moor’s skin colour; however this technique allows the audience to relate the character of men to the burning of coal. The fire burning the coal to ash represents men's power, and the hungry flames represent their passion. The flames engulfing the charcoal represent the uncontrollable and growing manipulative power that men hold over women. The mention of the charcoal now being ember and ash represents the passionate flames that resulted in self destruction as they fell from power, whether it be by death, or the discovery and punishment for their vile plot. The use of similes also has a similar effect on the audience’s understanding of the control that Iago has over Emilia due to his sex.

The use of repetition is used in Emilia’s soliloquy in line 1 of stanza 1, and line 1 of stanza 3. In line 1, stanza 1, Emilia exclaims ‘A fool, a fool, a dreadful fool!’ The repetition of the word ‘fool’ emphasises the horrified, incredulous and guilty attitude of Emilia when she discovers that Iago has manipulated Othello into killing Desdemona. It accentuates that even though Iago has forced her to unknowingly play a part of his vile plot and she although she is disgusted at this dominant male power he has over her, she still blames herself. This further exemplifies the power of gender in regards to Emilia’s psychological state because of the controlling and arrogant attitude of her husband. Alliteration has a similar impact on the emotion of the piece, to demonstrate the anger, hurt and disbelief that Emilia feels after discovering the negative impacts of her husband’s control over her.  Enjambment used in Emilia’s soliloquy is both a language and spoken technique that assists in displaying a greater understanding of the gender power that Iago holds over Emilia. This is through his threatening words and his nature to bestow affection upon her when she is doing something that benefits him. The enjambment such as in ‘What man, what pillar once stood, So solid, and so strong,’ results in short sentences that further emphasis the solid foundations that men have become in society, due to their power. Also, that they keep the rest of the world upright and intact due to their stability and strength of character.  The spoken and written technique of exclamation reflects Iago's deceiving attitude and arrogant words result in his sexual power over Emilia. It shows how this forces her to beg for his affection, even though she is aware of his disposable attitude. When Emilia exclaims ‘Until now so many lives are through !’ verbally exemplifies the horrid results of Iago’s ability to influence Emilia and Desdemona through his status as a male. 

This proves that the use of language and speaking techniques such as similes, repetition, alliteration, exclamation and enjambment have helped further demonstrate Emilia’s disgust an disapproval of the power of men, proving her passionate, independent, controversial and feminist nature throughout the play until her death. They are also used to exemplify the control that Iago had and still has over her emotions, actions and self opinion, furthermore highlighting the negative and manipulative power of gender that impacts Emilia in her everyday actions. 

The process undertaken to compose the soliloquy
 The first task was to overview ‘Othello’ and decide which character I believed would be the most interesting to write a soliloquy based on, and which would provide the most successful representation of a certain power. I realised that I was passionately in disagreement with the sexist attitudes of the men in the play. I found the character of Emilia was enlightening and fresh for the attitudes and time period represented in ‘Othello’. It was in this realisation that I chose the character of Emilia to represent the negative influence of gender power represented by her relationship with Iago.  I then noted the sections of the play where Emilia was heavily influenced by Iago, such as when she attempted to seduce him with Desdemona’s handkerchief. I then decided to write a soliloquy after this scene. However after having attempted numerous times to be able to successfully display the power of gender, I could not see the soliloquy effectively achieving this. I felt this was because Emilia’s actions in aiming to please Iago were contradictory to her negative attitudes expressed to Desdemona in regards to men’s treatment of women. <P> The next step I took was in reading through the play again and deciding to not look for a section where she expresses her views, or shows her suppressed state under Iago, but decided to select the section in play where Emilia finally chooses between her moral and social obligation. This section of the Play was Act 5, Scene 2 where Emilia has just discovered from Othello that Iago manipulated him into killing his wife Desdemona. It is in this moment of realisation that Emilia can see that she was manipulated into being apart of his plotted murder, and was as a result partly responsible for the death of her Lady and best friend. <P> After selecting this prime spot in the play to represent the power Iago had over Emilia, I wrote a draft for my soliloquy. I had this draft checked by my mother, and then by Miss Silva. I took the suggestions they gave me onboard and decided use the imagery of men as charcoal as a reccuring metaphor, and to include more relation to the power of men in my soliloquy rather than stating how I felt. <P> The following process afterwards was to answer the questions relating to why I had chosen Emilia as my character and what language techniques I had used to create a more effective piece. Through this process I was able to reflect upon the process of creating my soliloquy, and I edited it slightly to increase the sense of rhythm, rhyme and to perfect the language techniques I had used to make them create a greater sense of imagery. <P>

Reasons for choosing to represent the information as a Wiki
<P> My reflection questions were to be presented in an ICT format, and I contemplated the pros and cons of choosing each form of ICT representation to find the format that best suited my representation. <P> I decided that Microsoft PowerPoint would not be an appropriate representation because I felt my presentation’s purpose was to create imagery through language, not through pictures, as a PowerPoint presentation is intended. <P> I was not sure how to use a blog on the internet, and felt it an ICT form too personal for the analysis of power in a Shakespearian play, so I decided it was not the best means of representing my information. <P> I then drew the conclusion that creating a Wiki was the most appropriate means for representing my information accurately and clearly. This was because the purpose of Wiki sites is to provide information for a broad audience, and that this was the purpose of my assessment. This meant that publishing my information and soliloquy in a Wiki would be the perfect solution because it could include the necessary information in a more detailed and professional format, yet it could also be more easily set out. The main feature of a Wiki is blocks of writing, and so the choice for representing my reflection here was a successful one. I did not encounter any technological difficulties with this ICT form. <P> Written By Cyndall McInerney