How Does Shakespeare Present Desdemona's Death

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Even though Emilia and Desdemona are both killed by their husbands, they are murdered in quite different ways. Desdemona gets killed in a more personal manner, both because Othello and she really loved each other and she does not seem to pose a threat to the men. Emilia is murdered like a man. In the final scene she stands up to the men, which is why she is threatening to the men, especially Iago, because she does not listen to them.:
EMILA. O God! O heavenly God!
IAGO. ’Zounds, hold your peace.
EMILA. ’Twill out, ’twill out! I peace?
No, I will speak as liberal as the north:
Let heaven and men and devils, let them all,
All, all, cry shame against me, yet I’ll speak.
IAGO. Be wise, and get you home.
EMILA. I will not. (Shakespeare 5.2.215-22) …show more content…

In this play the men take this notion even further, by immediately murdering the women they suspect of being unfaithful or disobedient. Both women are victims of the men, yet their attitudes towards this issue are different. Desdemona seems to accept what is coming over her, while Emilia is trying to not only make Desdemona’s situation right, but also better her own circumstances. Emilia is, especially in this last scene but in the rest of the play as well, more worldly and less naïve than Desdemona. From a man’s point of view in that time period, this could suggest that Emilia has more ‘male’ character features than Desdemona has, which is why Emilia is seen as a threat in the end and killed ‘like a

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