Sleeping Patterns In Othello

“Nothing will medicine thee to that sweet sleep which you owe to yesterday.” This is an adaptation from a scene in Shakespeare’s “Othello” where Iago speaks to Othello about his ‘unfaithful’ wife. Iago says this to Othello to explain to him that he will never sleep as comfortably, and soundly as he did the night before. Neither drugs nor sleeping pills will provide Othello the comfort he will seek at night. Now though this may seem to be an exaggerated statement, it doesn’t come with some truth. In fact psychologically, the stress Othello receives from the news of his wife could lead to issues in his daily life and could, in fact, affect his sleeping patterns. To understand how such a thing is possible, we must first understand how exactly sleep works.
There are four stages of Non-REM sleep. In the first stage, you can be awakened without difficulty but it may leave the person feeling as if he or she has not slept. In the second stage, the body temperature and heart rate drop. At this point, your body gets ready to enter deep sleep. The last two stages are deep sleep stages, with the fourth being more intense. These stages are known as slow-wave, or delta, sleep. If woken up, you may feel disoriented for a while. REM sleep is described as sleep where rapid eye movement occurs. It is also known as “active sleep.” It is during REM sleep that we being to dream. On average a person can have 3 to 5 periods of REM sleep per night. REM sleep is characterized by a number of other features including rapid, low-voltage brain waves, irregular breathing and heart rate, and involuntary muscle movement. Sleep provides the human body with the energy it needs to keep on going. During the state of sleep, the body’s metabolic processes slow down and energy consumption is kept to a minimum. The human body requires rest to sustain its everyday activities, and hence sleep is