Thoughts on Othello

"O, beware, my lord, of jealousy; It is the green-eyed monster, which doth mock the meat it feeds on."

This quote somehow manages to perfectly sum up all of the conflicts in the play. The plot is overly simple and somewhat ridiculous in its simplicity. It starts off much too slow and then speeds up to a pace more laughable than the complete and utter lack of communication between two people who supposedly love each other. In other words, the popularity of this play is incongruous and confusing. Despite all of this, I cannot find it in myself to hate the play. In fact, 'Othello' is one of my favourite Shakespeare plays. To this day I am still attempting to figure out how this horrible plot and array of infuriating characters somehow manages to give me any enjoyment, and yet it does.

One of the first characters that the audience is introduced to in the play is Iago. Iago is what many people would refer to as the antagonist of the story; I disagree. This is perhaps only because I believe the term to overly simplistic and therefore woefully inadequate for the complexity presented in the play. Some people have theorised about Iago's motivations in the play and the answers range from high functioning sociopath to sadist with a god-complex.  Personally, I believe that Iago is a psychopath. My reasoning for this is that while sociopathy matches his symptoms, it is not quite as severe. Psychopathy is often described as a more severe form of sociopathy. However, there is no way to be sure as in Shakespeare's time, not much was known about mental disorders like those. It seems to me that Iago doesn't know why he does the things that he does. He likes the feeling of manipulating people and causing them pain and he wants to feel that again, but he doesn't know why. This is responsible for the many excuses he makes throughout the play. Iago is also referred to as 'honest Iago' and this is so common it is laughable. Despite his complete and utter lack of honesty, Iago is the only character in the play whose soliloquies are vocalised to the audience. Therefore he is the characters whose mind the audience gets the best look at and yet he is the least understood character. The irony of this is almost as strong as the irony of his nickname.

Othello is the eponymous character of the play which is confusing as it seems that he has the least amount of control over the events that occur. He also does not fit into the stereotype of eponymous Shakespearean characters as usually, they would be higher up figures in society, like kings, instead of mere generals. This change, however, only seems to have further inflated the character's ego,  an infamous trademark for male characters in Shakespeare plays. This overabundance of ego is not his only problem as it is accompanied by dangerously low self-confidence. This is one of the main reasons for his startling naivety, leading him to blindly trust Iago in a way usually reserved for children. Iago, for his part, constantly uses this trust to further his malicious plans and leaves you wanting to rip out all of the individual strands of your hair. When it finally comes to the inevitable moment where he kills his wife, I was left with no more emotion to spare for the "tragic" events happening before my eyes. It seems to me that Othello might actually have been thinking that he was saving Desdemona's soul. One thing that can be said about Othello is that he is a man of very strong faith, no matter what that may be,  and therefore it is very likely that he genuinely believes in the concept of honour killing. Othello claims to be Christian, yet he frequently makes references to pagan gods and even believes that an Egyptian man charmed his mother's handkerchief. This leads me to believe that he is not quite as devout as he wants Desdemona to think he is. 

The woman around whom the whole story seems to be centered is the fair maiden Desdemona.  The chillingly naive, and very young, woman who marries an old man with a lot of influence. What else is new? It's a tale as old as time. But usually, the young opportunistic woman doesn't end up lying dead, swaddled in her wedding sheets.  She's usually not a devout and pure Christian either but you'd expect that fact to cause a happier end to the story, not a sadder one. Her complete and utter oblivion around the thoughts and feelings of her husband is another point of frustration for any poor unfortunate soul who happens to love this play as much as I do.  Her acceptance of Othello's actions towards her is not so much heartbreaking as a clear sign of the need for a feminist movement and someone to tell her to grow a spine. Her actions fill me not with sympathy but a strong desire to reach into the play, pull her out, and inform her that Catholicism is not a good reason to tolerate his abuse.