[davem]

Originally Posted by Bb

davem, you are being particularly naughty here. Steiner's observation was,

Quote:

these two nuances are beautifully apposite to Iachimo

But was that what Shakespeare meant by calling Iachimo 'yellow'. Yes, the current meaning of yellow may be apposite, but it is not necessary to our understanding of Iachimo's character, which Shakespeare makes clear to us in other ways. My question would be whether Shakespeare was using the term 'yellow' to tell us something else about his character. Now, not being familiar with Elizabethan english I can't say whether 'yellow' had some other meaning in that period, but if it did then we should try & find out what that meaning was & take that on board, because it may add more depth to the character & tell us more about him. The danger is that if we get too caught up with this 'coincidence' that 'yellow' 'currently' carries implications of cowardice, then we may miss what Shakespeare is trying to tell us. Steiner's observation is (perhaps) interesting, but it could lead us to miss something more important. In fact, just doing a quick search I find that 'the color was traditionally associated rather with treachery'. So, its quite possible that Postumous was here statingnot that Iachimo was cowardly or jealous, but that he was treacherous. If this was the case we learn a little more about both Iachimo and Postumous than the mere yellow=cowardice/jealousy tells us - which is, as I said before, something we already know about Iachimo because Shakespeare has already told us it in other ways.

My point about 'gay' & 'queer' was simply that words do change meaning over the centuries, even come to mean something quite different to what they originally meant. It was in response to Steiner's

Shakespeare at times seems to 'hear' inside a word or phrase the history of its future echoes.

& was merely intended to show that its possibly just a fluke that the current meaning of 'yellow' fits one aspect of Iachimo's character, & that if 'yellow' had developed a different meaning then Steiner's point would just collapse. In short, its hardly a case - as far as I can see - of Shakespeare being able to ''hear' inside a word or phrase the history of its future echoes' & more one of an interesting (if possibly misleading, as far as our understanding of the characters goes) co-incidence which has been made way too much of by someone who wants to impute some kind of 'psychic' power to his literary hero. What would he have made of the appellation if 'yellow' had come to refer in modern parlance to homosexuality? Would he have read some kind of gay subtext into the story, or just ignored the whole thing?