“Of one entire and perfect chrysolite”: Analysing Discourses of Love in Shakespeare’s Othello
“Of one entire and perfect chrysolite”: Analysing Discourses of Love in Shakespeare’s Othello

Summary/Abstract: Despite Othello and Desdemona’s “love story” being a subdued one—it culminates in what one might call a triumph of common sense (“Upon this hint I spake”)—discourses of love inhabit Othello, from crude images, to those marked by medical underpinnings and courtly ideals. To complicate matters, Iago challenges Othello’s reliance on knowledge derived from common sense and takes advantage of his “open nature” to initiate him into his own brand of “critical reading.” This paper calls into question the play’s reliance on a “flawed love” by attempting to construct a phenomenology of love that flows from the discourses shaping Othello’s experience of attachment, as well as his own efforts to formulate it.

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