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How Does Iago Use Animal Metaphors In Othello

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How Does Iago Use Animal Metaphors In Othello
If black rams and jackdaws are the bestial transmutations of Othello, then hens and baboons become the objects with which Iago verbalizes his misogyny. Iago’s dehumanization of the love shared between men and women adds another component to Iago’s possible queer identity: “I have never found / man that knew how to love himself. Ere I would say / I would drown myself for the love of a guinea hen, I / would change my humanity with a baboon” (1.2.355-58). Iago clearly holds the gender dynamic between the sexes in utter disdain. Like the jackdaws, the specificity of Iago’s animal metaphors also beg commentary. Both the guinea hen and baboon are creatures that are foreign to Europe, hence Iago’s insult gains an added exclusionary valence in association

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    We talked a lot about Iago's constant use of sexual imagery. We also discussed his use of beasts and animal imagery to describe people and his consistent desire to reduce men and their actions to that of beasts. 

 

"Ere I would say I would drown myself for the love of a guinea-hen, 

I would change my humanity with a baboon." (1.3.312-3) - Iago uses the derisory "guinea-hen", a euphemism for a prostitute. 

"drown cats and blind puppies" (Iago 1.3.332-3) 

"[Othello] will be as tenderly led by the nose / As asses are." (Iago 

1.3.395-6) 

"with as little a web as this will I ensnare as great a fly as 

Cassio" (Iago 2.1.165-6) 

"indeed my invention / Comes from my pate as birdlime does from 

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it would stick to birds' feet and so trap them. 

Iago uses an image of hunting dogs weighed down to prevent them 

moving too fast to describe the way he manipulates Roderigo "this 

poor trash of Venice" (2.1.294) 

"Or keep it in a cistern (septic tank) for foul toads / To know and 

gender in!" - an image of toads all tumbled together, copulating

(Othello 4.2.60-1) 

"as summer flies are in the shambles, / That quicken even with 

blowing" (Othello 4.2.65-6) - an image of flies breeding rapidly 

around butcher's shops 

There are references to goats, monkeys - allegedly lascivious 

creatures 

There are references to dogs and worms and a snake: 


Roderigo calls Iago "O inhuman dog!" (5.1.62) 

Lodovico calls Iago "O, Spartan dog" (5.2.357) - Spartan dogs 

were notoriously fierce.
 Lodovico calls Iago a "viper" (5.2.282)

"The worms were hallowed that did breed the silk" (Othello 3.4.73)

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