Othello stands alone among William Shakespeare's tragedies. Whereas Macbeth and Hamlet play out against a backdrop of politics and war, Othello zooms in on a small group of characters, focusing on their private lives. Those characters include Othello, a respected general of (apparently) African heritage; Desdemona, his beautiful Venetian wife, and Iago, his trusted — but far from trustworthy — adviser. With this intimate cast, Shakespeare weaves a devastating tale of love, jealousy, pride, and racial discrimination, whose themes still resonate today.
Othello
Glossary
Reified - Make something more concrete or real.
Shrewd - Showing good powers of judgement.
Catalyst - A substance able to increase the rate of a chemical reaction without itself being consumed or changed by the reacting chemicals.
Mercantile - Relating to trade.
Vanquished - Defeated.
Dichotomy - The difference between two completely opposite things.
Enmity - Feelings of hate.
Sentient - Able to perceive or feel things.
Objective - Relating to external realities rather than internal states. The opposite is subjective. These are important concepts in philosophy but also notoriously hard to clearly define.
Patriarchal - A society in which adult men have a monopoly on power. In these societies, men tend to hold all political positions, and women and children are also expected to obey the men in their families.
Elopement - A wedding planned suddenly or in secret, without knowledge of family or friends.
Pilfered - Stolen.