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Othello: Act IV, Scene 2

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Othello
Act IV, Scene 2

Cyprus. A room in the castle.

Ira Aldridge's first appearance at Covent Gardens in the role of Othello

Ira Aldridge's first appearance at Covent Gardens in the role of Othello

circa 1825

  1. Enter Othello and Emilia.

Othello

1
  1. You have seen nothing then?

Emilia

2
  1. Nor ever heard—nor ever did suspect.

Othello

3
  1. Yes, you have seen Cassio and she together.

Emilia

4 - 5
  1. But then I saw no harm, and then I heard
  2. Each syllable that breath made up between them.

Othello

6
  1. What? Did they never whisper?

Emilia

7
  1.                               Never, my lord.

Othello

8
  1. Nor send you out o’ th’ way?

Emilia

9
  1. Never.

Othello

10
  1. To fetch her fan, her gloves, her mask, nor nothing?

Emilia

11
  1. Never, my lord.

Othello

12
  1. That’s strange.

Emilia

13 - 20
  1. I durst, my lord, to wager she is honest;
  2. Lay down my soul at stake. If you think other,
  3. Remove your thought; it doth abuse your bosom.
  4. If any wretch have put this in your head,
  5. Let heaven requite it with the serpent’s curse!
  6. For if she be not honest, chaste, and true,
  7. There’s no man happy; the purest of their wives
  8. Is foul as slander.

Othello

21 - 25
  1.                     Bid her come hither; go.
  2. Exit Emilia.
  3. She says enough; yet she’s a simple bawd
  4. That cannot say as much. This is a subtile whore,
  5. A closet lock and key of villainous secrets;
  6. And yet she’ll kneel and pray; I have seen her do’t.
  1. Enter Desdemona and Emilia.

Desdemona

26
  1. My lord, what is your will?

Othello

27
  1.                             Pray you, chuck, come hither.

Desdemona

28
  1. What is your pleasure?

Othello

29 - 30
  1.                        Let me see your eyes;
  2. Look in my face.

Desdemona

31
  1.                  What horrible fancy’s this?

Othello

32 - 35
  1. To Emilia.
  2. Some of your function, mistress;
  3. Leave procreants alone, and shut the door;
  4. Cough, or cry “hem,” if anybody come.
  5. Your mystery, your mystery; nay, dispatch.
  1. Exit Emilia.

Desdemona

36 - 38
  1. Upon my knee, what doth your speech import?
  2. I understand a fury in your words,
  3. But not the words.

Othello

39
  1. Why? What art thou?

Desdemona

40 - 41
  1.                     Your wife, my lord; your true
  2. And loyal wife.

Othello

42 - 45
  1.                 Come swear it, damn thyself,
  2. Lest being like one of heaven, the devils themselves
  3. Should fear to seize thee; therefore be double damn’d:
  4. Swear thou art honest.

Desdemona

46
  1.                        Heaven doth truly know it.

Othello

47
  1. Heaven truly knows that thou art false as hell.

Desdemona

48
  1. To whom, my lord? With whom? How am I false?

Othello

49
  1. Ah, Desdemon! Away, away, away!

Desdemona

50 - 55
  1. Alas the heavy day! Why do you weep?
  2. Am I the motive of these tears, my lord?
  3. If haply you my father do suspect
  4. An instrument of this your calling back,
  5. Lay not your blame on me. If you have lost him,
  6. Why, I have lost him too.
Desdemona

Desdemona

Dante Gabriel Rossetti, circa 1880

Othello

56 - 73
  1.                           Had it pleas’d heaven
  2. To try me with affliction, had they rain’d
  3. All kind of sores and shames on my bare head,
  4. Steep’d me in poverty to the very lips,
  5. Given to captivity me and my utmost hopes,
  6. I should have found in some place of my soul
  7. A drop of patience; but, alas, to make me
  8. The fixed figure for the time of scorn
  9. To point his slow unmoving finger at!
  10. Yet could I bear that too, well, very well;
  11. But there, where I have garner’d up my heart,
  12. Where either I must live or bear no life;
  13. The fountain from the which my current runs
  14. Or else dries up: to be discarded thence!
  15. Or keep it as a cistern for foul toads
  16. To knot and gender in! Turn thy complexion there,
  17. Patience, thou young and rose-lipp’d cherubin—
  18. Ay, here look grim as hell!

Desdemona

74
  1. I hope my noble lord esteems me honest.

Othello

75 - 79
  1. O ay, as summer flies are in the shambles,
  2. That quicken even with blowing. O thou weed!
  3. Who art so lovely fair and smell’st so sweet
  4. That the sense aches at thee, would thou hadst never been
  5. born!

Desdemona

80
  1. Alas, what ignorant sin have I committed?

Othello

81 - 91
  1. Was this fair paper, this most goodly book,
  2. Made to write “whore” upon? What committed?
  3. Committed? O thou public commoner,
  4. I should make very forges of my cheeks,
  5. That would to cinders burn up modesty,
  6. Did I but speak thy deeds. What committed?
  7. Heaven stops the nose at it, and the moon winks;
  8. The bawdy wind, that kisses all it meets,
  9. Is hush’d within the hollow mine of earth
  10. And will not hear’t. What committed?
  11. Impudent strumpet!

Desdemona

92
  1.                    By heaven, you do me wrong.

Othello

93
  1. Are not you a strumpet?

Desdemona

94 - 97
  1.                         No, as I am a Christian.
  2. If to preserve this vessel for my lord
  3. From any other foul unlawful touch
  4. Be not to be a strumpet, I am none.

Othello

98
  1. What, not a whore?

Desdemona

99
  1.                    No, as I shall be sav’d.

Othello

100
  1. Is’t possible?

Desdemona

101
  1. O, heaven forgive us!

Othello

102 - 109
  1.                       I cry you mercy then.
  2. I took you for that cunning whore of Venice
  3. That married with Othello.—
  4. Raising his voice.
  5.                             You, mistress,
  6. Enter Emilia.
  7. That have the office opposite to Saint Peter,
  8. And keeps the gate of hell! You, you! Ay, you!
  9. We have done our course; there’s money for your pains.
  10. I pray you turn the key and keep our counsel.
  1. Exit.

Emilia

110 - 111
  1. Alas, what does this gentleman conceive?
  2. How do you, madam? How do you, my good lady?
Othello and Desdemona

Othello and Desdemona

John Everett Millais, circa 1841

Desdemona

112
  1. Faith, half asleep.

Emilia

113
  1. Good madam, what’s the matter with my lord?

Desdemona

114
  1. With who?

Emilia

115
  1. Why, with my lord, madam.

Desdemona

116
  1. Who is thy lord?

Emilia

117
  1.                  He that is yours, sweet lady.

Desdemona

118 - 122
  1. I have none. Do not talk to me, Emilia;
  2. I cannot weep, nor answers have I none
  3. But what should go by water. Prithee tonight
  4. Lay on my bed my wedding-sheets—remember;
  5. And call thy husband hither.

Emilia

123
  1.                              Here’s a change indeed!
  1. Exit.

Desdemona

124 - 126
  1. ’Tis meet I should be us’d so, very meet.
  2. How have I been behav’d, that he might stick
  3. The small’st opinion on my least misuse?
  1. Enter Iago and Emilia.

Iago

127
  1. What is your pleasure, madam? How is’t with you?

Desdemona

128 - 131
  1. I cannot tell. Those that do teach young babes
  2. Do it with gentle means and easy tasks.
  3. He might have chid me so; for in good faith
  4. I am a child to chiding.

Iago

132
  1.                          What is the matter, lady?

Emilia

133 - 135
  1. Alas, Iago, my lord hath so bewhor’d her,
  2. Thrown such despite and heavy terms upon her,
  3. That true hearts cannot bear it.

Desdemona

136
  1. Am I that name, Iago?

Iago

137
  1.                       What name, fair lady?

Desdemona

138
  1. Such as she said my lord did say I was.

Emilia

139 - 140
  1. He call’d her whore. A beggar in his drink
  2. Could not have laid such terms upon his callet.

Iago

141
  1. Why did he so?

Desdemona

142
  1. I do not know; I am sure I am none such.

Iago

143
  1. Do not weep, do not weep. Alas the day!

Emilia

144 - 146
  1. Hath she forsook so many noble matches?
  2. Her father? And her country? And her friends?
  3. To be call’d whore? Would it not make one weep?

Desdemona

147
  1. It is my wretched fortune.

Iago

148 - 149
  1.                            Beshrew him for’t!
  2. How comes this trick upon him?

Desdemona

150
  1.                                Nay, heaven doth know.

Emilia

151 - 154
  1. I will be hang’d if some eternal villain,
  2. Some busy and insinuating rogue,
  3. Some cogging, cozening slave, to get some office,
  4. Have not devis’d this slander. I will be hang’d else.

Iago

155
  1. Fie, there is no such man; it is impossible.

Desdemona

156
  1. If any such there be, heaven pardon him!

Emilia

157 - 165
  1. A halter pardon him! And hell gnaw his bones!
  2. Why should he call her whore? Who keeps her company?
  3. What place? What time? What form? What likelihood?
  4. The Moor’s abus’d by some most villainous knave,
  5. Some base notorious knave, some scurvy fellow.
  6. O heaven, that such companions thou’dst unfold,
  7. And put in every honest hand a whip
  8. To lash the rascals naked through the world
  9. Even from the east to th’ west!
John McCullough as Othello

John McCullough as Othello

New York Times, 1916

Iago

166
  1.                                 Speak within door.

Emilia

167 - 169
  1. O fie upon them! Some such squire he was
  2. That turn’d your wit the seamy side without,
  3. And made you to suspect me with the Moor.

Iago

170
  1. You are a fool; go to.

Desdemona

171 - 187
  1.                        Alas, Iago,
  2. What shall I do to win my lord again?
  3. Good friend, go to him; for by this light of heaven,
  4. I know not how I lost him. Here I kneel:
  5. If e’er my will did trespass ’gainst his love,
  6. Either in discourse of thought or actual deed,
  7. Or that mine eyes, mine ears, or any sense
  8. Delighted them in any other form;
  9. Or that I do not yet, and ever did,
  10. And ever will (though he do shake me off
  11. To beggarly divorcement) love him dearly,
  12. Comfort forswear me! Unkindness may do much,
  13. And his unkindness may defeat my life,
  14. But never taint my love. I cannot say “whore.”
  15. It does abhor me now I speak the word;
  16. To do the act that might the addition earn,
  17. Not the world’s mass of vanity could make me.

Iago

188 - 190
  1. I pray you be content; ’tis but his humor.
  2. The business of the state does him offense,
  3. And he does chide with you.

Desdemona

191
  1. If ’twere no other—

Iago

192 - 196
  1.                     It is but so, I warrant.
  2. Trumpets within.
  3. Hark how these instruments summon to supper!
  4. The messengers of Venice stays the meat.
  5. Go in, and weep not; all things shall be well.
  6. Exeunt Desdemona and Emilia.
  7. Enter Roderigo.
  8. How now, Roderigo?

Roderigo

197
  1. I do not find that thou deal’st justly with me.

Iago

198
  1. What in the contrary?

Roderigo

199 - 204
  1. Every day thou daff’st me with some device, Iago, and
  2. rather, as it seems to me now, keep’st from me all
  3. conveniency than suppliest me with the least advantage of
  4. hope. I will indeed no longer endure it; nor am I yet
  5. persuaded to put up in peace what already I have foolishly
  6. suff’red.

Iago

205
  1. Will you hear me, Roderigo?

Roderigo

206 - 207
  1. Faith, I have heard too much; for your words and
  2. performances are no kin together.

Iago

208
  1. You charge me most unjustly.

Roderigo

209 - 213
  1. With nought but truth. I have wasted myself out of my means.
  2. The jewels you have had from me to deliver Desdemona would
  3. half have corrupted a votarist. You have told me she hath
  4. receiv’d them and return’d me expectations and comforts of
  5. sudden respect and acquaintance, but I find none.

Iago

214
  1. Well, go to; very well.

Roderigo

215 - 217
  1. Very well! Go to! I cannot go to, man, nor ’tis not very
  2. well. By this hand, I think it is scurvy, and begin to find
  3. myself fopp’d in it.

Iago

218
  1. Very well.

Roderigo

219 - 222
  1. I tell you ’tis not very well. I will make myself known to
  2. Desdemona. If she will return me my jewels, I will give over
  3. my suit and repent my unlawful solicitation; if not, assure
  4. yourself I will seek satisfaction of you.

Upon my knee, what doth your speech import?

L. Marchetti, 1900

Iago

223
  1. You have said now.

Roderigo

224
  1. Ay; and said nothing but what I protest intendment of doing.

Iago

225 - 229
  1. Why, now I see there’s mettle in thee, and even from this
  2. instant do build on thee a better opinion than ever before.
  3. Give me thy hand, Roderigo. Thou hast taken against me a
  4. most just exception; but yet I protest I have dealt most
  5. directly in thy affair.

Roderigo

230
  1. It hath not appear’d.

Iago

231 - 237
  1. I grant indeed it hath not appear’d; and your suspicion is
  2. not without wit and judgment. But, Roderigo, if thou hast
  3. that in thee indeed, which I have greater reason to believe
  4. now than ever (I mean purpose, courage, and valor), this
  5. night show it. If thou the next night following enjoy not
  6. Desdemona, take me from this world with treachery and devise
  7. engines for my life.

Roderigo

238
  1. Well; what is it? Is it within reason and compass?

Iago

239 - 240
  1. Sir, there is especial commission come from Venice to depute
  2. Cassio in Othello’s place.

Roderigo

241 - 242
  1. Is that true? Why then Othello and Desdemona return again to
  2. Venice.

Iago

243 - 246
  1. O no; he goes into Mauritania and taketh away with him the
  2. fair Desdemona, unless his abode be ling’red here by some
  3. accident; wherein none can be so determinate as the removing
  4. of Cassio.

Roderigo

247
  1. How do you mean, removing him?

Iago

248 - 249
  1. Why, by making him uncapable of Othello’s place: knocking
  2. out his brains.

Roderigo

250
  1. And that you would have me to do?

Iago

251 - 260
  1. Ay; if you dare do yourself a profit and a right. He sups
  2. tonight with a harlotry, and thither will I go to him—he
  3. knows not yet of his honorable fortune. If you will watch
  4. his going thence (which I will fashion to fall out between
  5. twelve and one), you may take him at your pleasure. I will
  6. be near to second your attempt, and he shall fall between
  7. us. Come, stand not amaz’d at it, but go along with me; I
  8. will show you such a necessity in his death that you shall
  9. think yourself bound to put it on him. It is now high
  10. supper-time, and the night grows to waste. About it.

Roderigo

261
  1. I will hear further reason for this.

Iago

262
  1. And you shall be satisfied.
  1. Exeunt.

Byam Shaw, 1901

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