Othello: "A black ram is tupping your white ewe"

The contrast of light and dark remains constant throughout the text. What I find very interesting about Iago's speech is its effect on the king. The notion of light and dark has not only been depicted as two extremes, but also as enemies. Without addressing the term "tupping," the king, as well as the typical reader, has already made an association with light being somehow overpowered by darkness/blackness. The idea of dark being associated with evil, wrongdoing, untrustworthiness, is continually perpertuated throughout literature. Acknowledging this fact, we realize the effect of the speech is that as it seems to address preconceived beliefs that gives the excerpt its power.






I think it is important to acknowledge the animal imagery here: this imagery hints at another theme that runs through the text, the animal equated with the moor rendering him lascivious. Black and White is important, here, because it is an attempt to simplify for a moment the otherwise complicated identity of the Moor; his christianity vs. other-ness, his blackness vs. whiteness, his position of power vs. the powerlessness in the matter of his race (he didn't choose it). Further: the mention of black and white lends itself to a dramatic interpretation. How are Black and White staged?
Back to the topic of animal imagery: The animal imagery in this play opens itself to comparison to other animal imagery that we have discussed in lecture, namely the notion that Edmund was bred into the world. Premarital sex, then, also comes into question and likewise the issue of marriage in general. This topic offers many avenues of discussion.