She loved me for the dangers I had passed, and I loved her that she did pity them. Hold thou public commoner, impudent strumpet! O cursed slave, blow me about in winds, roast me in sulphur! O Desdemona, Desdemona, dead! Schizo?
Melodramatic? Like way too OTT? Or just great lines butchered by not so great acting? In any case, that was Othello in a 30 second nutshell.
But if you want a detailed analysis on the good, the bad and the tragic of this famous Shakespearean hero, make sure to watch on. Let's start with a quick summary of the play. We're in Renaissance Venice and two characters, Iago and Rodrigo, are bitching about a man called Othello.
Othello is a general in the Venetian army and he also happens to be a foreigner. Specifically, he is an African Moor. Now, Rodrigo hates Othello because Othello is married to his crush, Desdemona.
Iago hates Othello too, but for rather complex reasons. As a lower ranking soldier, he reports to Othello, who is his captain. But Iago is salty about the fact that he's just been passed over for a promotion, which has gone to his colleague, the now lieutenant Michael Cassio.
So Iago hatches a plot to tarnish and poison relationships around him, first by setting Cassio up in a drunken brawl so that he loses his professional reputation, and then by slandering Desdemona's good name and telling Othello that she's cheated on him with Cassio. Now Othello doesn't want to believe this at first, But he soon finds himself enmeshed in Iago's deadly web of lies. The more is driven to rage and irrationality, which culminates in him murdering his innocent wife.
Of course, the truth is then exposed and when Othello realises the wrong that he's done, it's too late and so he commits suicide and the play ends with Cassio becoming ruler of Cyprus and Iago finally punished. Like Shylock in The Merchant of Venice, Othello is a foreigner in a white Phoenician society, and like the Jew, the Moor is discriminated against by the white Phoenicians around him. He is referred to in the play by numerous racial epithets such as the Black Othello, Thick Lips, a Baboon, the Black Ram, etc.
But his military value as an able, valiant warrior is nonetheless useful for the state. We see some of Othello's best moments as a general. when he shows his ability to rise above conflict, encourage civil discourse, and look past the ignorant bigotry against him.
For example, when Desdemona's dad, Brabantio, and Rodrigo come charging at him with swords in Act 1, Scene 2, Othello refuses to engage in the conflict, but instead tells Brabantio to chill the hell out. Okay, maybe not exactly in those words, but here's what he says. Keep up your swords, for the dew will rust them. Good Signor, you shall more command with years than with your weapons. The dew is a biblical symbol of God's blessing, and by invoking this peaceful image, the moor shows his elevated stature and wins our trust at the start of the play.
There is also the zeugma of more command with years than with your weapons. Suqma is the technique of using one word to modify two other words, but in different meanings. So here, the verb command modifies both the nouns years and weapons.
Othello is suggesting then that the elderly Bramantio should keep his composure and command with the years of his experience, which would gain him a lot more respect than to command with his weapons, waving a sword about and losing his dignity as a senator. But we soon get to see the less noble and more human side of Othello after Iago starts planting the seed of suspicion and jealousy in the Moor's mind. He is worried that Desdemona will grow tired of him and he starts working himself up over his deep insecurities such as being a black foreigner and being a lot older than his wife. Soon enough he doesn't need much concrete proof to convince himself that Desdemona must have made him a cuckold. And we see that the confidence that he had projected in Acts 1 and 2 is but built on sand.
And this is perhaps best revealed in one of his soliloquies in Act 3, Scene 3, when he reflects ...happily, for I am black, and have not those soft parts of conversation that chamberers have, or for I am declined into the veil of years, yet that's not much. She's gone, I am abused, and my relief must be to loathe her. O curse of marriage, that we can call these delicate creatures ours, and not their appetites.
I had rather be a toad and live upon the vapor of a dungeon than keep a corner in the thing I love for others'uses. Now if you ever needed an example of a 180 degree about-face turn, there you have it. Othello's faith in Desdemona's faithfulness goes from firm to non-existent, and his feelings for her turn from love to loathing all in the course of one scene.
His mind is an absolute one, as he cannot see beyond the black and white confines of his tunnel vision. We also see that Othello holds a rather cynical view towards women, comparing wives to delicate creatures with voracious appetites, which makes them sound more like animals than humans. Not to mention that he's also quite possessive as a husband. But back in the 1600s, gender equality in marriages wasn't quite the vogue yet. So this notion of a husband owning his wife wouldn't be as controversial and unpalatable as it be today.
Still, Othello, how could you not see the truth? Finally, we get to the heart of this tragedy, and that is seeing Othello stripped of all nobility, reduced to a raving, irrational, matricidal killer. He is the victim of human and social forces conspiring against him. True.
But he is also the victim of his own insecurities and rashness of mind. Now what makes this murder of Desdemona so painful to watch isn't the fact that he behaves like a psychopath, but that he kills her with such earnest conviction that he is somehow righting a wrong and making a sacrifice on behalf of all the men in the world. As he says at the start of Act 5, Scene 3, Moments before muffling his wife to death.
It is the cause. It is the cause. My soul.
Let me not name it to you, you chaste stars. It is the cause. Yet I'll not shed her blood, nor scar that whiter skin of hers than snow, and smooth as monumental bastard.
Yet she must die, else she'll betray more men. Now in this moment, we see that Othello summons up the cosmos in the phrase, you chased stars. And he's making the point that what he is about to do is bigger than himself and greater than any self-interest. It's about preserving this notion of the ideal.
And so Desdemona must be taken out to prevent the marital ideal. of faithfulness from being further eroded. But he must also not shed blood nor scar skin, so that Desdemona's beauty can still be retained as a reminder of what could have been. By thrice repeating the claim, it is the cause, Othello ramps up the dramatic irony in this moment and reminds us that the real cause of his fall is one of trusting the bad and doubting the good.
And there you have it guys, Othello's good, bad and tragic. If you're studying this play, I hope you found this helpful, and if you did, I'd really appreciate it if you could click the thumbs up button below and subscribe to this channel if you want more literature, study videos, and resources down the line. I also have a blog post analyzing the theme of jealousy in the play Othello, which you can check out in the description box below. Thanks for watching guys, and I'll see you in the next video. Bye!