93708615 Bloom s Shakespeare Through the Ages Othello Harold Bloom

Antony and Cleopatra
As You Like It
Hamlet
Henry IV (Part I)
Julius Caesar
King Lear
Macbeth
The Merchant of Venice
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Othello
Romeo and Juliet
The Sonnets
The Taming of the Shrew
The Tempest
Twelfth Night
Bloom’s Shakespeare Through the Ages
Bloom’s Shakespeare Through the Ages
OTHELLO
Edited and with an introduction by
Harold Bloom
Sterling Professor of the Humanities
Yale University
Volume Editor
Neil Heims
Bloom’s Shakespeare Through the Ages: Othello
Copyright © 2008 by Infobase Publishing
Introduction © 2008 by Harold Bloom
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or utilized in any form
or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any
information storage or retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher.
For more information contact:
Bloom’s Literary Criticism
An imprint of Infobase Publishing
132 West 31st Street
New York NY 10001
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Othello / edited and with an introduction by Harold Bloom ; volume
editor, Neil Heims.
p. cm. — (Bloom’s Shakespeare through the ages)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-7910-9575-1 (acid-free paper) 1. Shakespeare, William,
1564-1616. Othello. 2. Othello (Fictitious character) I. Bloom,
Harold. II. Heims, Neil. III. Shakespeare, William, 1564–1616. Othello.
PR2829.O77 2008
822.3’3—dc22 2007026815
Bloom’s Literary Criticism books are available at special discounts when purchased in
bulk quantities for businesses, associations, institutions, or sales promotions. Please call
our Special Sales Department in New York at (212) 967-8800 or (800) 322-8755.
You can find Bloom’s Literary Criticism on the World Wide Web at
http://www.chelseahouse.com
Series design by Erika K. Arroyo
Cover design by Ben Peterson
Cover photo © The Granger Collection, New York
Printed in the United States of America
Bang EJB 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
This book is printed on acid-free paper.
All links and Web addresses were checked and verified to be correct at the time of
publication. Because of the dynamic nature of the Web, some addresses and links
may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid.
Series Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix
Introduction by Harold Bloom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi
Biography of William Shakespeare . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Summary of Othello . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Key Passages in Othello . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
List of Characters in Othello . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
CRITICISM THROUGH THE AGES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
t Othello in the Seventeenth Century . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
1666—Samuel Pepys. From Te Diary of Samuel Pepys. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
1693—Tomas Rymer. From A Short View of Tragedy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
1694—Charles Gildon. “Some Reflections
on Mr. Rymer’s Short View of Tragedy and an Attempt
at a Vindication of Shakespeare,” from “Remarks on the
Plays of Shakespear” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
t Othello in the Eighteenth Century . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
1710—Sir Richard Steele. “On the Funeral of Betterton,”
from Te Tatler . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
1713—John Hughes. “On the Tragedy of Othello,”
from Te Guardian . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
1717—Lewis Teobald. From Te Censor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
1733—Voltaire. “Te Orphan,” from Philosophical Letters . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
1765—Samuel Johnson. Othello (notes), from
Te Plays of William Shakespear . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
CONTENTS
q
1775—Elizabeth Griffith. From Te Morality
of Shakespeare’s Drama Illustrated . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
t Othello in the Nineteenth Century . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
1809—August Wilhelm Schlegel. “Criticisms
on Shakspeare’s Tragedies,” from Lectures on Dramatic
Art and Literature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
1811—Charles Lamb. “On the Tragedies
of Shakespeare,” from Te Reflector. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
1817—William Hazlitt. “Othello,” from Characters
of Shakespear’s Plays . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
1818—Samuel Taylor Coleridge. “Notes on Othello,”
from Lectures and Notes on Shakspere and Other English Poets . . . . . . . . 113
1836—John Quincy Adams. “Te Character
of Desdemona,” from The American Monthly Magazine . . . . . . . . . . . 117
1864—Victor Hugo. From William Shakespeare . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
1880—Algernon Charles Swinburne. From A Study of Shakespeare 127
1897—George Bernard Shaw. “Mainly About
Shakespeare,” from London Saturday Review . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134
t Othello in the Twentieth Century . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
1904—A. C. Bradley. “Othello,” from Shakespearean Tragedy . . . . . . . 138
1927—T. S. Eliot. “Te Hero Cheering Himself Up,” from
“Shakespeare and the Stoicism of Seneca” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156
1930—G. Wilson Knight. “Te Othello Music,”
from Te Wheel of Fire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
1936—William Empson. “Te Best Policy,” from Life
and Letters To-Day. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179
1951—Harold C. Goddard. “Othello,”
from Te Meaning of Shakespeare . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186
1951—Kenneth Burke. “‘Othello’: An Essay
to Illustrate a Method,” from Te Hudson Review . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 224
1956—Robert B. Heilman. “Othello: Te Unheroic
Tragic Hero,” from Magic in the Web: Action and
Language in Othello . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 252
Contents
vi
1961—W. H. Auden. “Te Joker in the Pack,”
from Encounter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261
1983—A. D. Nuttall. “Othello,” from A New Mimesis:
Shakespeare and the Representation of Reality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 280
1992—Harold Bloom. “Introduction,” from Iago . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 292
t Othello in the Twenty-first Century . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 297
2000—Frank Kermode. “Othello,”
from Shakespeare’s Language . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 297
Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 313
Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 315
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 317
Contents
vii
ix
SERIES INTRODUCTION
q
Shakespeare Through the Ages presents not the most current of Shakespeare
criticism, but the best of Shakespeare criticism, from the seventeenth century
to today. In the process, each volume also charts the flow over time of critical
discussion of a particular play. Other useful and fascinating collections of his-
torical Shakespearean criticism exist, but no collection that we know of contains
such a range of commentary on each of Shakespeare’s greatest plays and at the
same time emphasizes the greatest critics in our literary tradition: from John
Dryden in the seventeenth century, to Samuel Johnson in the eighteenth cen-
tury, to William Hazlitt and Samuel Coleridge in the nineteenth century, to
A.C. Bradley and William Empson in the twentieth century, to the most per-
ceptive critics of our own day. This canon of Shakespearean criticism empha-
sizes aesthetic rather than political or social analysis.
Some of the pieces included here are full-length essays; others are excerpts
designed to present a key point. Much (but not all) of the earliest criticism
consists only of brief mentions of specific plays. In addition to the classics of
criticism, some pieces of mainly historical importance have been included, often
to provide background for important reactions from future critics.
Tese volumes are intended for students, particularly those just beginning
their explorations of Shakespeare. We have therefore also included basic
materials designed to provide a solid grounding in each play: a biography of
Shakespeare, a synopsis of the play, a list of characters, and an explication of
key passages. In addition, each selection of the criticism of a particular century
begins with an introductory essay discussing the general nature of that century’s
commentary and the particular issues and controversies addressed by critics
presented in the volume.
Shakespeare was “not of an age, but for all time,” but much Shakespeare
criticism is decidedly for its own age, of lasting importance only to the scholar
who wrote it. Students today read the criticism most readily available to them,
which means essays printed in recent books and journals, especially those journals
made available on the Internet. Older criticism is too often buried in out-of-print
books on forgotten shelves of libraries or in defunct periodicals. Terefore, many
Othello x
students, particularly younger students, have no way of knowing that some of the
most profound criticism of Shakespeare’s plays was written decades or centuries
ago. We hope this series remedies that problem, and, more importantly, we hope
it infuses students with the enthusiasm of the critics in these volumes for the
beauty and power of Shakespeare’s plays.
xi
INTRODUCTION BY
HAROLD BLOOM
q
Iago is the genius or bad angel of Othello and of Othello. It marks us that we
know more readily how to assimilate Iago than to value Othello. Even my best
students are wary of sympathizing with Othello. He baffles them: how can the
great captain-general so rapidly collapse into incoherence, murderousness, and
apparent self-pity?
If each of us had an Iago as personal spirit, would we do better?
Te tragedy Othello suffers because it is preceded by Hamlet, and followed
by King Lear, Macbeth, Antony and Cleopatra. Othello does not match the
protagonists of those dramas, and yet Iago does. Te imbalance between Othello
and his devilish Ancient or ensign unsettles us these days. But that is part of
Shakespeare’s design in a play whose peculiar painfulness rivals King Lear’s.
Iago has been a fecund ancestor in high literature. His progeny include Satan
in Milton’s Paradise Lost, Claggart in Melville’s Billy Budd, and Judge Holden
in Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian. Coleridge spoke of Iago’s “motiveless
malignancy”, but when Satan speaks of his Sense of Injured Merit we encounter
Iago’s fierce motive. He has been passed over for promotion and Cassio, a staff
officer and not a warrior, has been given the post by Othello.
Te wound to Iago, as we discern, is onto-theological. He had worshipped
Othello as war-god. Betrayed, Iago activates his pyromaniac drive to carry war
into the camp of peace. A true believer bereft of his fiery faith, Iago uncovers in
himself a genius for destroying his captain-general.
Edmund in King Lear is the grand strategist of catastrophe, composing the
play with the lives of the other characters. Iago, an extraordinary improviser,
is rather the tactician of absolute evil. He does not set out with the object of
Desdemona’s murder by Othello, but embraces the horror when the Moor warns
him that he must prove Desdemona a whore or else himself be slain by the
overlord of mercenary soldiers.
Magnificent as his triumphalism becomes, Iago remains secondary to the
tragic hero, Othello. In the twentieth century, critics like the abominable T. S.
Eliot and the equally dogmatic F. R. Leavis deprecated Othello, denying him
Othello xii
tragic stature. We can learn from them how not to go about reading so painful
a drama as Shakespeare writes.
Othello, like Lear, has never known himself well. A fighter since childhood,
he has fully earned his professional eminence. His gift is for commanding
others, and for maintaining the separation of war from peace. Serene in his own
sublimity, he believes in the honor of arms, and cannot believe that his trust is
ever wrongly bestowed. Affinities abound with Antony and with Coriolanus,
two other sad captains who fall apart as the contradictions in their own natures
encounter overwhelming stress.
How can tragic dignity be maintained if one is reduced to incoherence by
Iago’s subtle art? Shakespeare is uncanny in preserving a residue of Othello’s
self-identity which can be reaffirmed in his suicidal final speech. Eliot and
Leavis thought that Othello was only cheering himself up at the end, but that is
caricature and not accurate analysis.
Hegel, who valued Shakespeare above all other writers, famously thought
that tragedy came about as a conflict “between right and right”. A. C. Bradley
endorsed the Hegelian theory of tragedy, but I find it remote from Shakespearean
actuality. Tere is no right on either side of the contraries that rend Othello
apart. Te Moor is victimized by a devil, and has no chance whatsoever.
What was Shakespeare trying to do for himself as poet-dramatist by writing
Te Tragedy of Othello? After the impasse of Hamlet, Othello clears the way for the
incredible breakthrough in which Antony and Cleopatra followed the composition
first of King Lear and then of Macbeth, thus concluding just fourteen consecutive
months in which three masterworks were brought forth. I surmise that the
agony of Othello was a kind of ritual sacrifice to the dark gods of creativity
so as to enable Lear, Macbeth and Antony to rise up out of the maelstrom of
Shakespeare’s capacious spirit.
Times go by turns, and Te Tragedy of Othello has come back from Eliotic
disapproval. Since Eliot was every kind of a racist, including a virulent anti-
Semitic, we can suppose that Othello’s African background also provoked the
poet-critic of Te Waste Land. To this day, there is no critical agreement upon
what does or does not happen in the play. I do not believe that the marriage
between Desdemona and the Moor ever is consummated. Elliptical at his
subtlest, Shakespeare is content to leave it uncertain. Te profound sadness of
Othello is appropriately increased by this dubiety. As readers we must construe
for ourselves, and bear the play’s shadows as they throng among us.
1
BIOGRAPHY OF
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
q
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE was born in Stratford-on-Avon in April 1564
into a family of some prominence. His father, John Shakespeare, was a glover
and merchant of leather goods who earned enough to marry Mary Arden, the
daughter of his father’s landlord, in 1557. John Shakespeare was a prominent
citizen in Stratford, and at one point, he served as an alderman and bailiff.
Shakespeare presumably attended the Stratford grammar school, where he
would have received an education in Latin, but he did not go on to either Oxford
or Cambridge universities. Little is recorded about Shakespeare’s early life;
indeed, the first record of his life after his christening is of his marriage to Anne
Hathaway in 1582 in the church at Temple Grafton, near Stratford. He would
have been required to obtain a special license from the bishop as security that
there was no impediment to the marriage. Peter Alexander states in his book
Shakespeare’s Life and Art that marriage at this time in England required neither
a church nor a priest or, for that matter, even a document—only a declaration
of the contracting parties in the presence of witnesses. Tus, it was customary,
though not mandatory, to follow the marriage with a church ceremony.
Little is known about William and Anne Shakespeare’s marriage. Teir first
child, Susanna, was born in May 1583 and twins, Hamnet and Judith, in 1585.
Later on, Susanna married Dr. John Hall, but the younger daughter, Judith,
remained unmarried. When Hamnet died in Stratford in 1596, the boy was
only 11 years old.
We have no record of Shakespeare’s activities for the seven years after the
birth of his twins, but by 1592 he was in London working as an actor. He was
also apparently well known as a playwright, for reference is made of him by his
contemporary Robert Greene in A Groatsworth of Wit, as “an upstart crow.”
Several companies of actors were in London at this time. Shakespeare may
have had connection with one or more of them before 1592, but we have no
record that tells us definitely. However, we do know of his long association with
the most famous and successful troupe, the Lord Chamberlain’s Men. (When
James I came to the throne in 1603, after Elizabeth’s death, the troupe’s name
Othello 2
changed to the King’s Men.) In 1599 the Lord Chamberlain’s Men provided the
financial backing for the construction of their own theater, the Globe.
Te Globe was begun by a carpenter named James Burbage and finished by
his two sons, Cuthbert and Robert. To escape the jurisdiction of the Corporation
of London, which was composed of conservative Puritans who opposed the
theater’s “licentiousness,” James Burbage built the Globe just outside London, in
the Liberty of Holywell, beside Finsbury Fields. Tis also meant that the Globe
was safer from the threats that lurked in London’s crowded streets, like plague
and other diseases, as well as rioting mobs. When James Burbage died in 1597,
his sons completed the Globe’s construction. Shakespeare played a vital role,
financially and otherwise, in the construction of the theater, which was finally
occupied sometime before May 16, 1599.
Shakespeare not only acted with the Globe’s company of actors; he was also
a shareholder and eventually became the troupe’s most important playwright.
Te company included London’s most famous actors, who inspired the creation
of some of Shakespeare’s best-known characters, such as Hamlet and Lear, as
well as his clowns and fools.
In his early years, however, Shakespeare did not confine himself to the
theater. He also composed some mythological-erotic poetry, such as Venus
and Adonis and Te Rape of Lucrece, both of which were dedicated to the earl of
Southampton. Shakespeare was successful enough that in 1597 he was able to
purchase his own home in Stratford, which he called New Place. He could even
call himself a gentleman, for his father had been granted a coat of arms.
By 1598 Shakespeare had written some of his most famous works, Romeo
and Juliet, Te Comedy of Errors, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Te Merchant of
Venice, Two Gentlemen of Verona, and Love’s Labour’s Lost, as well as his historical
plays Richard II, Richard III, Henry IV, and King John. Somewhere around the
turn of the century, Shakespeare wrote his romantic comedies As You Like It,
Twelfth Night, and Much Ado About Nothing, as well as Henry V, the last of his
history plays in the Prince Hal series. During the next 10 years he wrote his
great tragedies, Hamlet, Macbeth, Othello, King Lear, and Antony and Cleopatra.
At this time, the theater was burgeoning in London; the public took an avid
interest in drama, the audiences were large, the plays demonstrated an enormous
range of subjects, and playwrights competed for approval. By 1613, however, the
rising tide of Puritanism had changed the theater. With the desertion of the
theaters by the middle classes, the acting companies were compelled to depend
more on the aristocracy, which also meant that they now had to cater to a more
sophisticated audience.
Perhaps this change in London’s artistic atmosphere contributed to
Shakespeare’s reasons for leaving London after 1612. His retirement from the
theater is sometimes thought to be evidence that his artistic skills were waning.
During this time, however, he wrote Te Tempest and Henry VIII. He also
3
wrote the “tragicomedies,” Pericles, Cymbeline, and Te Winter’s Tale. Tese were
thought to be inspired by Shakespeare’s personal problems and have sometimes
been considered proof of his greatly diminished abilities.
However, so far as biographical facts indicate, the circumstances of his life
at this time do not imply any personal problems. He was in good health and
financially secure, and he enjoyed an excellent reputation. Indeed, although he
was settled in Stratford at this time, he made frequent visits to London, enjoying
and participating in events at the royal court, directing rehearsals, and attending
to other business matters.
In addition to his brilliant and enormous contributions to the theater,
Shakespeare remained a poetic genius throughout the years, publishing a
renowned and critically acclaimed sonnet cycle in 1609 (most of the sonnets
were written many years earlier). Shakespeare’s contribution to this popular
poetic genre are all the more amazing in his break with contemporary notions
of subject matter. Shakespeare idealized the beauty of man as an object of praise
and devotion (rather than the Petrarchan tradition of the idealized, unattainable
woman). In the same spirit of breaking with tradition, Shakespeare also treated
themes previously considered off limits—the dark, sexual side of a woman as
opposed to the Petrarchan ideal of a chaste and remote love object. He also
expanded the sonnet’s emotional range, including such emotions as delight,
pride, shame, disgust, sadness, and fear.
When Shakespeare died in 1616, no collected edition of his works had
ever been published, although some of his plays had been printed in separate
unauthorized editions. (Some of these were taken from his manuscripts, some
from the actors’ prompt books, and others were reconstructed from memory by
actors or spectators.) In 1623 two members of the King’s Men, John Hemings
and Henry Condell, published a collection of all the plays they considered to be
authentic, the First Folio.
Included in the First Folio is a poem by Shakespeare’s contemporary Ben
Jonson, an outstanding playwright and critic in his own right. Jonson paid
tribute to Shakespeare’s genius, proclaiming his superiority to what previously
had been held as the models for literary excellence—the Greek and Latin writers.
“Triumph, my Britain, thou hast one to show / To whom all scenes of Europe
homage owe. / He was not of an age, but for all time!”
Jonson was the first to state what has been said so many times since. Having
captured what is permanent and universal to all human beings at all times,
Shakespeare’s genius continues to inspire us—and the critical debate about his
works never ceases.
Biography of William Shakespeare
4
5
SUMMARY OF
OTHELLO
q
Act I
The action of Othello begins late at night, in the middle of an argument between
two men as they walk through the empty streets of Venice. Roderigo has been
wooing Desdemona and has trusted Iago to be his go-between. He has given
him quite a bit of money, too, which was to be used to buy gifts for Desdemona.
But now Roderigo has learned that Desdemona has married Othello, that
very night. He suspects that Iago has known about their alliance all along and
has been using him. Iago protests his ignorance and, to further his credibility
as well as to deflect Roderigo’s wrath, tells him how much he hates Othello.
He complains that he was passed over for the position of Othello’s lieutenant
and made his ensign, or standard bearer, and the position was given to Cassio,
whom Iago describes as an inferior man and a sort of dandy. Not quite placated,
Roderigo challenges Iago to explain why he remains in the service of a general,
Othello, whom he loathes. Iago explains to Roderigo that he is only biding his
time, that he is not serving Othello, but himself, and that he has a scheme. He
does not say what particular end he is pursuing. But he does identify his prin-
cipal way of proceeding, by deceit and dissimulation:
[W]hen my outward action doth demonstrate
Te native act and figure of my heart
In compliment extern, ’tis not long after
But I will wear my heart upon my sleeve
For daws to peck at: I am not what I am.
Roderigo’s only response to Iago’s very revealing speech is to wonder about
how rich Othello must be if he could get Desdemona. He refers to Othello not
by name, but by using a racial slur, “the thick-lips.”
As they speak, Iago and Roderigo are walking toward the house of
Brabantio, Desdemona’s father. Under his windows, Iago prompts Roderigo to
wake Brabantio, and they both begin loudly calling his name. When Brabantio
comes onto his balcony, Iago addresses him, under cover, using Roderigo as
a front, asking if his house is safe and all his family inside. He cries out,
Othello 6
using the image of sheep mating, that Desdemona and Othello are married,
characterizing Othello as an old black ram and Desdemona as a white ewe who
are together “making the beast with two backs.” When Brabantio demands
to know who is there, Roderigo identifies himself and Iago remains in the
shadows. Convinced that his daughter is not at home, Brabantio calls for the
arrest of Othello, which, as a member of the Venetian senate, he has the power
to do.
As Brabantio is dressing to join Roderigo in the street, Iago slips away to join
Othello at the inn where he and Desdemona plan to spend their wedding night.
Brabantio goes to round up his relatives and police officers in order to follow
Roderigo to where Othello is and arrest him.
Te scene shifts to the inn. Outside, Iago is telling Othello how he restrained
himself from killing a man who had been speaking maliciously of Othello. Te
audience has just seen that he himself was the man. (But Othello has not.) He
then turns to the topic of Othello’s marriage and asks if it has been performed,
warning him of the power Desdemona’s father wields. Othello responds with
confidence and dignity that he is not afraid of what Brabantio can do, that he
has faith that the senate of Venice will recognize the considerable service he has
done as its general, and that he is proud of his own lineage. Moreover, he points
out, his motive in the marriage is love—otherwise he would not have forfeited
the freedom of bachelorhood.
A troop of men approaches the inn. Iago warns it must come from Brabantio
to take Othello and advises Othello to go inside. Othello rebuffs him, stating,
“Not I. I must be found. / My parts, my title, and my perfect soul / Shall
manifest me rightly.” It is not a troop sent out by Brabantio, however, but an
escort, headed by Cassio, sent by the Venetian senate. Te senate is in emergency
session because news has arrived that the Turkish fleet is headed to Cyprus, a
Venetian stronghold. Othello is being summoned to the senate, in his capacity
as general, to lead a Venetian force to Cyprus and repel the Turks. Othello
goes inside for a moment, and Cassio asks Iago what Othello is doing at the
inn. When Iago tells him Othello has been married, Cassio asks, “To who?”
Before Iago can answer, Othello returns. As they are about to proceed to the
senate house, Brabantio’s band enters, and Brabantio commands his men to seize
Othello. Iago, with drawn sword, challenges Roderigo (who had not long before
been his companion and whom he had set on to do what he is now challenging
him for doing, leading Brabantio to the inn in order to apprehend Othello), and a
general melee threatens. Iago is trying to make chaos. Appearing to be protecting
Othello, he is, in fact, endangering him. But Othello calms everything. “Keep
up your bright swords,” he says, and adds, showing his ability to speak with a
courtier’s wit, “for the dew will rust them.” He adds, respectfully, addressing
Desdemona’s father, “Good signior, you shall more command with years / Tan
with your weapons.”
Summary of Othello 7
Brabantio is not pacified by this deference, which, after all, comes after
the deed. He calls Othello a thief and accuses him of being an enchanter
who used magic and drugs to bind Desdemona to him. Brabantio makes the
case against Othello that Iago will later hypothesize and Othello will finally
internalize. How could Desdemona go against her nature and marry a black
man whom she would be more inclined to fear than to love? At this point,
however, Othello stands his ground calmly and once again halts an outbreak
of violence. He asks Brabantio where he would like him to go to answer his
charges. “To prison,” he retorts. Othello is almost teasing in his response,
so full of confidence is he. If I go with you to prison, he replies, how can I
appear before the Duke, who has summoned me on important state business?
Brabantio does not relent but orders that they proceed to the senate, where
he may present his case.
At the senate the Duke is analyzing the information he is receiving regarding
the strength of the Turkish fleet headed for Cyprus when a messenger arrives
to announce that the Turkish fleet has veered and is heading for Rhodes. Te
senators determine this must be a trick, “a pageant / To keep us in false gaze.”
It turns out to be just that, and the senators learn that the first fleet was merely
joining a larger fleet near Rhodes and returning with it to Venice. Here is a
mirroring of Iago’s deceptions, which make Othello’s gaze false and thus make
him see things falsely.
Brabantio and Othello arrive at the senate, and the Duke greets each man,
telling Othello that he is dispatching him to fight against the Turks. Brabantio
informs the senate he has come on private, not state, business. When he cries
out in grief, “My daughter,” the senators think she is dead, but he says it is
worse: She has been enchanted and stolen from him by Othello. Te Duke
remains calm and asks Othello what he can say in his defense. Othello delivers
a short oration, admitting that he has married Desdemona and minimizing
his skill as a speaker because of his life as a soldier; he says he will try to
show how he won Desdemona. Despite Brabantio’s interruption and repeated
accusations that he used witchcraft, Othello is allowed to continue. He tells
the senate to call for Desdemona at the inn and let her speak to them herself.
While messengers are sent to bring Desdemona to the senate, Othello tells
his story of their wooing. Te significant aspects are: 1) that he had originally
been Brabantio’s friend, and 2) that it was Desdemona who made her love
known to him and solicited his in return. His summation, “She loved me
for the dangers I had passed, / And I loved her that she did pity them,” must
give the audience or readers pause. Te eloquence of his formulation belies
its fatality. He did not love her for herself alone but for the way he found
himself nobly and heroically reflected in her. When he will not find the image
of himself there that he seeks, that exists only because it is reflected in her,
“chaos is come again.”
Othello 8
Te Duke’s response is that he thinks Othello’s tale would win his daughter,
too. Tat remark highlights the power of language, and Iago’s corruption of
language, upon which the plot of Othello is so dependent. Before Desdemona
speaks, Brabantio concedes that if her marriage to Othello is not the result of
some magical practice, he will yield, especially since he no longer has any choice
in the matter.
Brabantio asks Desdemona “Where most you owe obedience,” and she
responds that she “perceive[s] . . . a divided duty,” that the duty her mother owed
to Brabantio she now owes to Othello, her husband. Brabantio, withdrawing in
defeat, nevertheless delivers a fatal warning: “Look to her Moor, if thou hast eyes
to see. / She has deceived her father, and may thee.” It is fatal not because it is
true but precisely because it is not. Brabantio’s ill-meant and angry warning is
harmful because it supports Othello’s chaotic mistake later.
Te domestic issue apparently resolved, the senate returns to the matter of
Cyprus and the Turks. Desdemona entreats the senate to allow her to live with her
husband in Cyprus and not be left behind in Venice. In her petition, she begins
by acknowledging what marrying Othello involved. She calls it “My downright
violence.” She says she “saw Othello’s visage in his mind” (significantly for the
arguments Iago will later use to undermine Othello, she does not say she found
what to like about him in his actual face but rather in his mind) and wants to
share his adventures, for which she loved him, so that they can be hers, too. Te
senate adjourns after deciding the fleet’s departure should be that night and
that Desdemona should be entrusted to Iago’s care on the voyage while Othello
travels on another ship.
As they were the first to appear in the only act of Othello that takes place in
Venice, so Roderigo and Iago are the last. Remaining after the senators have filed
out, Roderigo laments that he will kill himself now that he has definitively lost
Desdemona. Iago convinces him not to despair but rather to turn his property
into money and follow the fleet to Cyprus, continuing his quest for Desdemona.
She will not, Iago assures him, stay faithful to someone as distasteful as the Moor
must become to her, considering her youth and her Venetian tastes. During the
formation of this intrigue, Shakespeare also continues to develop Iago’s religion,
as it were, the things he holds as fundamental to his self-definition—primarily
that he is the creator of himself and of the way others perceive reality. Te scene
ends with a soliloquy in which Iago promises to use his power in order to create
complete chaos.
Act II
Act II begins on the seashore of Cyprus as several Venetians from the fortress
look to the sea, which is tempestuous, and speculate about the fate of the
Turkish fleet. A messenger enters, bearing the news that the storm confounded
the Turkish fleet and, consequently, their design on Cyprus has been frustrated.
Summary of Othello 9
One after another, then, ships arrive from Venice. The first brings Cassio and
his party. Cassio reports that the Turkish fleet has indeed been destroyed, but
his happy news is tempered by his anxiety for the safety of Othello’s ship, which
was separated from the rest of the fleet during the storm. Next to arrive is the
vessel carrying Desdemona, who is accompanied by Iago and his wife, Emilia,
who also acts as Desdemona’s maid and companion.
All the chief actors, except for Othello himself, are now collected onstage,
awaiting the arrival of Othello’s ship. During this interval of apparent comic
relief, they pass the time, as Desdemona says of herself in an aside, “not merry”
but to “beguile” their anxiety about Othello by seeming so. In this context
they reveal their essential characteristics outside the context of the plot. Cassio
shows himself to be a refined gentleman, a courtier in the tradition prescribed
by Baldassare Castiglione in his handbook Te Courtier. A soldier, he is also
accomplished in the use of fine, decorated, and refined language and in
gallant behavior—especially behavior that shows his devotion to women. On
Desdemona’s arrival, he greets her after asking the “men of Cypress, let her
have your knees” as “the grace of heaven.” When Emilia, Iago’s wife, emerges,
he kisses her, explaining to Iago that it ought not “gall your patience . . . Tat I
extend my manners. ’Tis my breeding.”
Iago then begins an interlude of comic ribaldry. He tells Cassio that he would
have enough of Emilia if he got as much of her lip as Iago gets of her tongue. But
all the while Emilia is silent, while Desdemona quietly supports her. “Alas, she
has no speech,” Desdemona says, countering Iago’s portrayal of her as outspoken
or a scold. Tis unspeaking Emilia, who can go through the play hardly noticed,
as a sort of machinery of the plot, will burst forth with a torrent of searing and
honest language in the last act of Othello.
Desdemona reveals herself, too, in her aside. She tells the audience that
she is not actually merry but seems the thing she is not in order to “beguile,”
to trick, the oppressive feeling away. Desdemona is not a one-dimensional or
passive character. She is a complex figure whom Shakespeare draws much more
by innuendo, from her responses in particular situations, than by probing her the
way he does Othello. Te ways of her personality—not her virtue or her love—
are what lend fuel to Iago’s later assault upon her husband. Tere hangs over any
reading of Desdemona the sense that she did dissemble, even if innocently, as
her father claims. And later (III, iii, 20–26), when she promises aid to Cassio,
she exclaims,
assure thee,
If I do vow a friendship, I’ll perform it
To the last article: my lord shall never rest;
I’ll watch him tame and talk him out of patience;
His bed shall seem a school, his board a shrift;
Othello 10
I’ll intermingle every thing he does
With Cassio’s suit.
When she goes about her task, it is with an ardor that might irritate the fondest
husband—even one who has not already been subverted, like Othello, in his
ability to see straight. She persists in her demand to know when Othello will
see Cassio: “tomorrow night, or Tuesday morn, / On Tuesday noon, or night,
or Tuesday morn. / I prithee, name the time, but let it not / extend three days.”
She begs and bargains and stipulates. And then she begins the middle section
of what is becoming a short oration, lecturing Othello on the insignificance of
Cassio’s fault, even recognizing that the conditions of war can change the way
things are done. When Othello does not respond, she reminds him, “I wonder
in my soul / What you should ask me, that I should deny you.” When he finally
yields and says, “Let him come when he will; / I will deny thee nothing,” and
she has won her suit, she is yet not content. “Why, this is not a boon; / ’Tis I
should entreat you wear your gloves / Or feed on nourishing dishes or keep you
warm / . . . Nay, when I have a suit / Wherein I mean to touch your love indeed,
/ It shall be full of poise and weight, / And fearful to be granted.” Othello reas-
sures her that he will grant her suit regarding Cassio and asks her to leave him
for a while. She obeys, but not without a sharp riposte: “Shall I deny you? No.
Farewell, my lord.” It is this side of Desdemona that is foreshadowed in the
character in Act II, scene 1, who banters with Iago.
As the interlude of waiting ends, Iago observes Cassio speaking to Desdemona
and notices his gestures, how he takes her by the hand or kisses his three fingers
as he speaks, and formulates his plot, incorporating the material he has just
seen. When Othello arrives, there is more for him to observe. Othello takes
Desdemona in his arms and renews his vow of love to her. Tey are both roused
to such an ecstatic passion of joy that they nearly totter in their happiness. Iago
notices that, too. “I cannot speak enough of this content,” Othello exclaims after
describing the ecstasy of his soul, “It stops me here [touching his heart]; it is too
much of joy.” In an aside, blending his voice with their experience, Iago says, “O,
you are well-tuned now! / But I’ll set down the pegs that make this music.”
Before Iago does, however, Shakespeare devotes 10 lines to a picture of
peace. Othello declares, “Our wars are done,” greets old friends, speaks sweetly
to Desdemona, and orders Iago to supervise the unloading of his ship. Before
Iago obeys, when all the other actors have left the stage, again there appear on it
only the stage manager and his principal prop, Roderigo, and Iago begins to set
his plot and the rest of Othello itself in motion.
Honing the arguments he will later employ directly to Othello—particularly
that for a young woman of Desdemona’s complexion and class, marriage with
Othello is against nature—Iago convinces Roderigo that Desdemona is in love
with Cassio. He explains that Cassio is to command the guard that keeps order
Summary of Othello 11
in Cyprus that night and instructs Roderigo to provoke him into a fight. By this
strategy, Iago says, Roderigo will advance his cause with Desdemona. He agrees
and Iago continues to develop the script of his plot, working himself up to carry
it out in a soliloquy that ends the scene.
A herald appears and reads Othello’s proclamation, which announces a
triumphant celebration of the defeat of the Turkish fleet and of his marriage,
with dances, bonfires, feasting, and reveling that night in Cyprus between five
o’clock and eleven.
As Othello parts from Cassio that evening, leaving him responsibility for
the watch, he confirms that “Iago is most honest” when Cassio mentions that he
has already given instructions about the watch to Iago. Othello leaves and Iago
enters. Rather than setting down to business, as Cassio orders, Iago counters
merrily, “Not this hour, lieutenant; ’tis not yet ten o’ the clock. Our general cast
us thus early for the love of his Desdemona; who let us not therefore blame:
he hath not yet made wanton the night with her; and she is sport for Jove.”
Cassio politely corrects him when he counters Iago’s lascivious description of
Desdemona, saying, “She’s a most exquisite lady.” But Iago transforms his effort
with another debasing comment: “And I’ll warrant her full of game.” Once
again Cassio goes on the defensive, saying, “Indeed, she’s a most fresh and
delicate nature.” Teir contest in verbal representation continues for a few more
rounds, finally ending in Iago’s triumphant, “well, happiness to their sheets!”
He then invites Cassio to take a stoup of wine with him. When Cassio declines,
citing his inability to hold his liquor, Iago persists and prevails, especially after
Montano has given Cassio a little to drink. Once Cassio is inebriated, the plot
unfolds as Iago had planned it earlier with Roderigo. Casio is seen drunk on
duty. Roderigo gets Cassio into a skirmish. Drunken, brawling, and derelict in
his duty, Cassio is disgraced. Iago, in testifying about him to Othello, twists
rhetoric to make himself sound as if he were advocating for him when he is, in
actuality, testifying against him. It is Othello, with his authority, who quells
the riot instigated by Cassio’s brawling, who questions his ensign, who rebukes
his lieutenant, who sees to the care of the wounded, who deputizes Iago with
authority while Cassio is in disgrace, and who comforts Desdemona, who had
been awakened by the hubbub.
After everyone has departed, once again Iago remains, but rather than have
Roderigo as his dupe/marionette, now he has Cassio. Like Roderigo bewailing
his failure to win Desdemona, Cassio now bewails his drunken behavior and its
consequences. As he used Roderigo’s desires to further his own ends, so Iago
uses Cassio’s and advises him to sue to Desdemona to intervene with Othello for
him. Iago knows the materials he is working with and which he must transform
to seem other than they are in Othello’s mind, for his description of Desdemona
is remarkably true. Tat he knows what she is really like and how good she
is—yet is unaffected by it except in as much as he wishes to crush her—is what
Othello 12
gives fearsomeness to his strength. He says of her, as he explains to Cassio why
it would be a good idea to petition Desdemona’s intervention, that “[s]he is of so
free, so kind, so apt, so blessed a disposition, she holds it a vice in her goodness
not to do more than she is requested.” He will use this goodness in her and make
it look like evil, defining “debased ardor” rather than “blessed disposition” as the
reason for her advocacy for Cassio.
Cassio leaves, grateful to Iago for his ear and his advice (unable to see him
for what he is, the man who maneuvered him into his troubles). In a devilishly
charming soliloquy, Iago then tries his art directly on the audience, acting
delightful as he delights in the subversiveness of his evil. He makes the audience,
by enjoying or fearing him, aware of his power; the viewers are complicit with
him, nearly co-conspirators. Roderigo enters and interrupts his soliloquy, once
again complaining: He is accomplishing nothing in Cyprus, he is spending
his money, and tonight he was beaten up in a brawl. No longer needing him
to move his plot forward, Iago puts Roderigo off by telling him to be patient.
Once alone, Iago schemes. Now he needs his wife, Emilia, not Roderigo, to go
to Desdemona with entreaties from Cassio. He also needs to guide Othello to
the spot where Cassio will solicit Desdemona’s aid. In other words, he has just
outlined Act III, scene 3, of Othello.
Act III
The third act begins the next morning, when Cassio, following Iago’s advice
with Venetian excess, plants a band of musicians under their window to
serenade Othello and Desdemona when they rise. A clown, also present,
makes ribald jokes as he mocks the musicians and drives them out. He then
teases Cassio, first changing the meaning of his words, giving an innocuous
comic foreshadowing of Iago’s sinister device. “Do you hear me, mine honest
friend,” Cassio says to the clown. The clown twists his words to be able to
respond, “I hear not your honest friend. I hear you.” As the clown parts with
Cassio, further mocking his f lorid eloquence, Iago enters, making sure the
stage is set. He is assured Cassio is ready to play his part, and he says he’ ll
send Desdemona to him immediately; he will also take Othello aside so that
“your converse and business / May be more free.” It is just this tactic of his
that Othello’s character has made him shun every time Iago has advised him
to be secretive. But Cassio accepts Iago’s assurance of privacy with humble
thanks, even after Emilia assures him that in the conversation she has just
overheard between Desdemona and Othello, Othello was favorably inclined
toward him.
Scene 2 is but six lines long. It shows the public Othello guiding a delegation
inspecting the fortress and handing letters addressed to the Venetian senate to
Iago. Othello instructs Iago to give these letters to the pilot of the ship leaving
for Venice. It shows Othello in control and Iago subordinate.
Summary of Othello 13
As is his way, Iago is playing a double game and does not, in fact, provide
Cassio with privacy when he speaks with Desdemona. As he has planned it,
Iago steers Othello to their interview. As the interview ends and Desdemona
has promised to use her full art and influence with Othello to help Cassio,
Emilia announces that she sees Othello approaching. Cassio does not choose
to stay. By this action he becomes the image of suspicion when Iago mutters,
as if to himself, but loud enough for Othello to hear, “Ha! I like not that.”
When Othello asks what he said, Iago, rather than answering, responds with
the vaguely unsettling, “Nothing my lord; or if,” but breaks off with a dismissive,
“I know not what.” He has framed the situation so that when Othello says, “Was
not that Cassio parted from my wife?” there is something ominous surrounding
his words. Iago’s response is a deft “Cassio, my lord? No, sure, I cannot think it /
Tat he would steal away so guilty-like, / Seeing you coming.” In the rhetorical
act of seeming to exculpate Cassio, he actually incriminates him.
Te strength of Desdemona’s solicitation, to an unjaundiced eye, would only
give it greater credibility. But because Othello’s perspective is being shaped by
Iago, Desdemona’s ardor only suggests the wrong kind of attachment to Cassio.
While Othello is apparently not alarmed by the ardor and insistence with which
Desdemona argues in Cassio’s favor in the first part of Act III, scene 3, its after-
impression helps Iago when he later shapes Othello’s thoughts to doubt her
honesty and faithfulness. In Act III, scene 3, Othello assures Desdemona that
he will grant her suit and asks her to leave him for a while. Alone with Othello
now, Iago asks insinuatingly if Cassio knew about Othello’s love for Desdemona
before their marriage, while Othello was wooing her. Othello answers he did,
“from first to last.” When he then asks, “Why dost thou ask?” Iago’s apparently
innocuous answer, “but for a satisfaction of my thought, / No further harm,”
rings with the sound of something sinister. When Othello adds, defensively, that
Cassio had been their go-between, Iago only says the puzzling, “Indeed?,” which
rattles Othello. “Indeed?” Othello repeats and then asserts, “Ay, indeed!” Othello
asks, “Discern’st thou aught in that? / Is he not honest?” But Iago replies only
by repeating his word, “Honest, my lord?” “Honest? Ay, honest,” Othello states
again. When Iago equivocates in his answer, Othello demands of him what he
thinks, but Iago only repeats Othello’s word as he had before: “Tink, my lord?”
At the end of his rope, Othello pushes his words back at him, crying out, “Tink,
my lord! By heaven, thou echoest me.” Othello is nearly hooked now. “What are
you hiding from me?” is the gist of his tirade, and he is ready to hear and accept
anything Iago might reveal. Iago keeps taking him in circles, seeming to speak as
his friend and protector, until he infects him with the idea that Desdemona has
been unfaithful to him with Cassio and that she could not possibly not have been,
given the disparity between her and Othello, given Othello’s inferiority, given his
race and age. Othello’s very struggle not to believe what Iago insinuates brings
him nearer belief. In order to reject Iago’s estimate of him, he must entertain it. In
Othello 14
order to struggle against the idea of Desdemona’s infidelity, he must imagine it.
Once imagined, it looms over him and finally consumes him.
Iago leaves Othello to a tormented reflection on his own inadequacies. Ten
Desdemona enters, seeing him in his debilitated state, and asks if he is not well.
When he says with bitter self-mockery that he has “a pain upon my forehead,”
which she understands as a headache, he means to suggest that he feels the horns
of a cuckolded husband growing upon his forehead. She attempts to tie her
handkerchief around his head in order to soothe the ache, but her gesture only
annoys him. As he pushes her away, she drops the handkerchief and follows him
out, confused by his ill-tempered response. Emilia, who has been with her, sees
the handkerchief and picks it up. She mentions she is glad to find it because Iago
has repeatedly asked her to steal it, although she says she has no idea why. She
resolves to have the handkerchief copied, give her husband the copy, and return
the original to Desdemona, thus betraying neither her duty to her husband nor
to her mistress.
When Iago reenters and finds Emilia alone, he begins to scold her, but she
says she has “a thing for you,” and he teases her, saying it’s “a common thing to
have a foolish wife.” Goaded, she shows him the handkerchief to tease him but
not yet to give it. He snatches it from her, however, and bids her to think no
more about it and to leave him. She obeys, and Iago begins to weave the next
strands of his plot, which involve dropping the handkerchief in Cassio’s room and
cementing Othello’s jealousy with “trifles light as air.” When Othello returns,
Iago sees that his subversion is nearly accomplished. In the remainder of the scene,
he wins Othello’s trust entirely through innuendo, feigned reluctance to say what
he knows, and outright lies. He succeeds in bringing Othello to the full rage of
tormenting jealousy and simultaneously forges a bond of enduring service to him.
Te fourth scene of Act III shifts locations to a street in Cyprus. Desdemona
and Emilia are looking for Cassio’s house so Desdemona can tell him that she
has won his suit for him. In the context of Iago’s lies about her and Cassio, it is
telling that Shakespeare immediately makes it clear that Desdemona does not
even know where Cassio lives. Te clown, of whom she asks directions, plays
with her words rather than answering her questions. She asks him where Cassio
“lies,” using the word in the sense of where he lodges. But the clown takes it in
the sense of “where does he tell a falsehood” and refuses to answer for fear of
calling a soldier a liar. When Desdemona changes her language, the clown says
that he would lie if he answered because he does not know. Tis interlude offers
comic relief in the midst of the painful unfolding of a man’s destruction and the
murder of a youthful spirit. But it also reflects the problem of the malleability of
language, which is a theme at the heart of the play, since Iago fashions reality in
Othello’s mind with words falsely used.
Te clown is dispatched to see if he can find where Cassio resides. Alone with
Emilia, Desdemona is upset that she cannot find her handkerchief. She tells
Summary of Othello 15
what great value it is to Othello and how such a lost handkerchief could make a
husband jealous—therefore, she is grateful that Othello is not a jealous man. She
defends him against Emilia’s challenge, but the scene that follows—in which
Othello demands the handkerchief from Desdemona with increasing jealous
fury—allows Emilia to say of him, “Is not this man jealous?” Desdemona herself
is confused, saying, “I never saw this before.” As Emilia retorts how women are
in general ill-used by their husbands, Iago enters, directing Cassio to speak with
Desdemona. She tells him that she cannot do anything right now, but she will
help when she can, and he must be patient, because Othello is displeased with
her. Hearing this, Iago intervenes, “Is my lord angry?” and says he will go to
attend to him.
Speaking by themselves, Desdemona and Emilia wonder what is troubling
Othello, praying that it is not that “monster,” jealousy. As they leave, Cassio
remains onstage, and Bianca, a prostitute in love with Cassio, enters. She chides
him for avoiding her, and he tells her that he has “with leaden thoughts been
pressed” but will make up for it in the future. He gives her the handkerchief
to take out and copy, since he likes the work. She protests that it was given
him by a beloved, but he tells her not to be “vile,” that he found it in his room
and does not know how it got there. When he asks her then to leave him, she
protests, but he says he does not want Othello to see him with a woman. He
says he will walk a little way with her and then leave her. With the acceptance
of circumstances women are expected to grant, she says, “’Tis very good. I must
be circumstanced” [accept circumstances].
Act IV
Like the first act of the play, Act IV of Othello begins in the middle of a con-
versation. Now, however, it is not between Iago and Roderigo but rather Iago
and Othello. Othello has taken Roderigo’s place as Iago’s gull, or dupe. Iago has
so deeply penetrated Othello’s consciousness that he can fabricate reality in his
mind simply by stringing words together and making up painful erotic scenarios
that trumpet Othello’s betrayal:
Iago: Will you think so?
Othello: Tink so, Iago!
Iago: What,
To kiss in private?
Othello: An unauthorized kiss.
Iago: Or to be naked with her friend in bed
An hour or more, not meaning any harm?
Othello 16
Othello: Naked in bed, Iago, and not mean harm!
It is hypocrisy against the devil:
Tey that mean virtuously, and yet do so,
Te devil their virtue tempts, and they tempt heaven.
Iago: So they do nothing, ’tis a venial slip:
But if I give my wife a handkerchief, —
Brilliant psychologist that he is, Iago segues from these imaginings to the
concrete matter of the missing handkerchief, yoking the truthfulness of those
images to that apparent fact. Te success of his assault is obvious when Othello,
raving, “falls in a trance.” While he is in a fit, Cassio enters. Iago explains that
Othello is subject to such fit but tells Cassio he wants to speak with him once
Othello has recovered.
Iago leaves and sets up the next scene. Othello, hidden and unobserved, will
eavesdrop on a scene of Iago and Cassio talking lasciviously, he thinks, about
Desdemona. It is actually Bianca, however, who is the butt of their ribaldry.
Othello then watches as Bianca angrily returns Desdemona’s handkerchief,
insulted that she is being used to copy “some minx’s token.”
Alone with Iago, Othello cries of Cassio, “How shall I murder him, Iago?”
Regarding Desdemona, he orders, “Get me some poison, Iago, this night.” He is
delighted to be overruled by Iago’s injunction: “Do it not with poison. Strangle
her in her bed, even the bed she has contaminated.” Othello repeats, “Good,
good! . . . Very good.” Into the midst of this conversation, Desdemona and a
deputation from Venice on state business, led by Lodovico, enter. As Othello
reads letters from the senate ordering him to leave Cyprus for Mauritania, he
overhears the polite conversation between Desdemona and Lodovico, in which
she tells him regretfully of the falling out between her husband and Cassio. It
angers him. When Lodovico tells her that he thinks the letters order Othello
away, making Cassio governor of Cyprus, she responds, “Trust me. I am glad
on’t.” Othello explodes, yells, and strikes her, shocking all who behold the blow.
Lodovico intervenes and asks Othello to “make her amends.” But Othello only
continues to rage, claiming she weeps “crocodile” tears and ordering her “out of
my sight,” blind to the terrible irony that she already is: He can no longer see
her. He only sees Iago’s phantom, with which Iago has replaced her in Othello’s
mind. Iago, thereby, has subverted Desdemona as well as Othello, for each word
or action of hers will be interpreted not in the context of herself but in the
context of Iago’s version of her, which has replaced her in Othello’s mind.
Desdemona starts to leave, saying to Othello, “I will not stay to offend
you.” Lodovico implores Othello to call her back, and Othello does, using the
opportunity to further humiliate Desdemona and himself. “What would you
with her, sir?” he asks Lodovico once Desdemona has returned. Lodovico is
Summary of Othello 17
surprised, as he did not desire anything with her but only that she should be
called back and be asked forgiveness. Othello speaks of her as disobedient and
a “whore” and leaves, cursing to himself. When Lodovico is alone with Iago,
he voices his astonishment and questions him about Othello. Iago begins to
attempt to ensnare him with innuendo against Othello, assurances of his own
reluctance to speak, and suggestions that Lodovico look for himself.
Te scene shifts. Othello is questioning Emilia about Desdemona. Emilia
assures him with all her eloquence that Desdemona is pure and faithful. But
when Othello bids her go fetch Desdemona, he thinks to himself that Emilia
is nothing but a brothel mistress who will speak well of any of her girls. Of
Desdemona he is convinced,
Tis is a subtle whore,
A closet lock and key of villanous secrets
And yet she’ll kneel and pray; I have seen her do’t.
In this way Desdemona is negated, and her good actions are transformed, in
his mind, into indications of her falseness. She pleads with him on her knees,
but he merely sees her further damning herself with denials. He brands her
a whore and, when she pleads she is none, he apologizes by saying he made a
mistake when he took her for his wife. When he leaves, he summons Emilia
and treats her as a brothel keeper, throwing her some coins. He is in a rage of
perverse pleasure, enjoying the wit with which he accompanies his and his wife’s
degradation.
Alone with her mistress, Emilia begins to show concern for Desdemona. Te
quiet presence she had exhibited up to this point changes under the weight of
circumstances. Emilia now becomes a strong, sure, and comic voice in the play.
Even in front of Iago she curses the man who might infect another man’s mind
to jealousy and drive him to the madness that now torments Othello and his
wife. Foreshadowing their interplay in Act V, scene 2, Iago tells his wife to be
quiet. Now she is. Ten she will not be.
When Desdemona and Emilia leave, Roderigo steps forward. Now he is at
his wit’s end, he tells Iago. He fears Iago is cheating him, his money is gone,
and he will not put up with it any longer. He wants restitution of the monies
he has given Iago in the attempt to corrupt Desdemona. Iago disarms him by
congratulating him for his pluck in asserting himself. Iago tells Roderigo after
one such act of real assertion, killing Cassio, Desdemona will be his. Roderigo
leaves, mulling over Iago’s plot.
Scene 3 begins at the Citadel, where Othello and Desdemona live. Othello is
leaving with Lodovico and ordering Desdemona to get ready for bed. Alone and
preparing for bed, Desdemona feels herself haunted by a song of unfaithfulness
that she remembers her mother’s maid, Barbary, singing after her own lover
Othello 18
“proved mad / And did forsake her.” Reflective after her song, Desdemona asks
Emilia if there really are women who are unfaithful to their husbands and if she
would do so “for all the world.” Emilia responds, taking the words “for all the
world” literally, and says she would “for the whole world.” But Desdemona says
she would not be unfaithful for anything. Starting by speaking of women’s faults,
Emilia quickly turns to their husbands and shows that they are the real cause of
their wives’ faults. She offers a category of similarities women share with men
and concludes by reiterating that the ills women commit are in response to ill-
treatment by men. But Desdemona says she prays for the strength and the ability
not to do “bad” because bad was done to her “but by bad mend”—somehow to
bring good from evil.
Act V
Out in the street, Iago readies Roderigo for the part he will play in what
must be a climax in the drama Iago has directed: Cassio’s murder in a street
brawl. Iago plans Roderigo’s, too, out of fear that Roderigo might try to
regain the sums he gave Iago and tell what he knows of Iago’s machinations.
Cassio passes by. Roderigo lunges out at him, sword drawn. Cassio responds
with his sword. They fight. Roderigo is injured; Cassio, cut in the leg and
maimed. Othello enters to survey the results of the fight and is pleased to hear
“The voice of Cassio” crying out, “I am maimed forever. Help, ho! Murder!
Murder!” Othello blesses Iago’s “noble sense of thy friend’s wrong” and leaves
for Desdemona’s bedchamber, where he vows, “Thy bed, lust stained, shall
with lust’s blood be spotted.”
After Othello withdraws, Lodovico and Gratiano pass by and hear Cassio’s
and Roderigo’s cries for help. Iago then enters, carrying a light and a weapon, an
irreproachable representative of authority. He is the first to put forth a question.
“Who’s there?” he demands. “What noise is this that cries on murder?” Hearing
Cassio’s voice, he asks him who has done this. Cassio does not know but says
he thinks that one of them is nearby. Iago asks Lodovico and Gratiano for help.
Seeing the wounded Roderigo, Iago falls upon him, crying, “Tat’s one of them,”
and, stabbing Roderigo, calls “O murd’rous slave! O villain!” Roderigo, only
upon being fatally wounded, fully realizes how he has been abused. “O Damned
Iago! O inhuman dog!” he curses. After he dies, attention is then paid to Cassio,
whose wound is bound. When Bianca passes by and hears Cassio’s cries, she
approaches him with comfort, but Iago apprehends her, saying she is a strumpet,
a prostitute who may somehow be involved in the crime. Cassio is removed in a
chair, and Iago follows to see him cared for. He orders Emilia to hasten to the
Citadel to tell Othello and Desdemona of the night’s events.
Scene 2, the final scene of Othello, is breathtaking for its dramatic and verbal
poetry. Othello enters to find Desdemona asleep beside a still-burning candle
and, with great delicacy, grieves over what he is about to do. He is convinced he is
Summary of Othello 19
impelled by honor, not by a base impulse. He realizes the weight of a human life:
He can relight a candle he snuffs out, but he cannot make breath he has stopped
breathe again. He kisses Desdemona in her sleep, torn between his love for her
and his diseased sense of love and justice, which demands her death. She wakes.
With a sense that he is performing a holy action, he asks Desdemona if she has
prayed. She says she has, and he asks her to remember “any crime / Unreconciled
as yet to heaven and grace,” so that she may add it to her prayers because he
“would not kill thy unprepared spirit . . . / I would not kill thy soul.” Alarmed,
Desdemona says, “Talk you of killing?” His acknowledgement triggers her cry
of “heaven / have mercy on me!” He replies, “Amen, with all my heart.” She
then begs him not to kill her. He tells her to remember her sins. She protests,
“Tey are loves I bear to you.” “For that thou diest,” he answers. Desdemona
pleads with him, but he tells her to “be still.” Saying she will, nevertheless, she
asks him, “What’s the matter?” He tells her: “Te handkerchief which I so loved
and gave thee, / Tou gav’st to Cassio.” He responds to her denial by warning
her that she is on her deathbed and, therefore, must not perjure herself. Her
protestations have no effect. He is beyond believing anything she says. He saw
the handkerchief in Cassio’s hands, he says. “He found it then,” she counters.
She swears she never gave it to him and implores Othello: “Send for him hither.
/ Let him confess the truth.” Othello responds that Cassio has confessed “[t]hat
he has used thee,” and Iago has killed him. When Desdemona groans, “Alas, he
is betrayed, and I undone,” Othello storms, “Out strumpet! Weep’st thou for him
to my face?” Enraged, he then strangles her as she struggles. As Desdemona’s
resistance melts and she lies dying, Emilia calls from outside the bedroom door.
Othello hears her and guesses she has come “to speak of Cassio’s death.” He
hesitates to admit her to the bedchamber, for “If she come in, she’ll sure speak
to my wife.” And then the enormity, finality, and horror of what he has done
hit him:
My wife! my wife! what wife? I have no wife.
O insupportable! O heavy hour!
Methinks it should be now a huge eclipse
Of sun and moon, and that the affrighted globe
Should yawn at alteration.
When Emilia enters, she does not, at first, see Desdemona murdered on
her bed but instead tells Othello that Cassio has killed Roderigo. Othello,
not hearing what she actually said, responds, “Roderigo killed? And Cassio
killed?” When she responds, “No, Cassio is not killed,” Othello cries out, “Not
Cassio killed? Ten murder’s out of tune, / And sweet revenge grows harsh.”
Significantly, almost as if it were a slip of the tongue, Othello, in his fury that
Cassio has not been killed, reveals that revenge, not justice or sacrifice, was the
motive for his murdering Desdemona. As he speaks, Emilia hears a dying cry
Othello 20
from Desdemona, “falsely, falsely murdered.” Emilia cries for help, and when
she demands to know “who hath done this deed,” Desdemona responds in her
last breaths, “Nobody—I myself. Farewell. / Commend me to my kind lord,”
and dies, even in death maintaining her absolute loyalty to her husband. It is
the only falsehood that she utters in the course of the play. Othello, at first, tries
to deny his responsibility: “Why, how should she be murdered?” he asks; “You
heard her say herself, it was not I.” But then he confronts himself and groans,
“She’s like a liar gone to burning hell! / ’Twas I that killed her.” His confession is
not yet acknowledgment of a wrong, however, for he justifies himself by saying
that Desdemona was false, “a whore.” Emilia calls him a devil and says he lies.
Othello insists that “Cassio did top her” and, in corroboration, she ought to “[a]sk
thy husband.” Te exchange between them mirrors and reverses the exchange
between Iago and Othello in Act III, scene 3, beginning at line 99, in which Iago
echoes Othello’s words to make him doubtful of what he thinks. In Act V, scene
2, when Emilia hears Othello implicate Iago in the murder of Desdemona and
the attack on Cassio, she replies, dumbfounded, “My husband?” Othello repeats,
“Ty husband.” With each further revelation that Othello makes against Iago,
Emilia repeats with greater alarm, “My husband,” until Othello says to her—as
he had once said to Iago, “By heaven, thou echoest me”—“What needs this
iterance? Woman, I say thy husband.”
“If he say so,” Emilia retorts, “may his pernicious soul / Rot half a grain a day.
He lies to the heart. / She was too fond of her most filthy bargain.” Provoked by
her words, Othello draws his sword against her to quiet her, but she is fearless
with outrage and cries out for “Help! / Te Moor hath killed my mistress!
Murder! murder!” Her cry brings Montano and Gratiano, two Venetian nobles
deployed in the administration of Cyprus, as well as Iago. Immediately upon
seeing her husband, she scolds him, “You have done well, / Tat men must lay
their murders on your neck.” She orders him to “[d]isprove this villain” [Othello]
and deny that he told him Desdemona was false. Equivocation being useless
under her grilling, Iago admits, “I did.” Emilia cries out, “You told a lie, an
odious damned lie! / Upon my soul, a lie! A wicked lie!” Her honest and open
denunciation of Iago breaks the hold he has had on language throughout the
play. Despite the actual horror of the events upon the stage, the audience
and readers can now experience the opposite of the dread that Iago’s speech
invites, the relief of hearing truth proclaimed and crooked things made straight.
Strengthened by the very act of speaking, Emilia asks Iago, “She false with Cassio?
Did you say with Cassio?” He confesses he did but attempts to use his husband’s
prerogative and instructs her, “Go to, charm your tongue.” She defies him: “I
will not charm my tongue; I am bound to speak: / My mistress lies murdered
in her bed.” While the attendants in the chamber respond in amazement and
Othello says, “It is true, indeed,” Emilia continues to pour forth her anger and
defiance, calling out “villany” and refusing to obey Iago’s command to go home.
Summary of Othello 21
In his grief, Othello attempts to explain his act and justify it, thus assuring
himself, if his explanation is credited, that he has not fallen from his position
of honor. He tells how a handkerchief he gave Desdemona was then given by
Desdemona to Cassio. Emilia continues her magnificent aria, beginning, “O
God! O heavenly God!” Iago interrupts, telling her to be quiet. She refuses, and
he draws his sword. But she continues,
O thou dull Moor! that handkerchief thou speak’st of
I found by fortune and did give my husband;
For often, with a solemn earnestness,
More than indeed belong’d to such a trifle,
He begg’d of me to steal it.
Iago calls her a “villainous whore,” ironically the same slander he sought
to attach to Desdemona. But Emilia continues to defy him and explains that
Desdemona did not give the handkerchief to Cassio; that she, Emilia, found it
“And I did give’t my husband.” Now enlightened, complete darkness overcomes
Othello. He runs, sword drawn, at Iago but is prevented from stabbing him;
however, during this business, Iago stabs Emilia, joining Othello in wife murder.
Emilia is laid beside Desdemona in death. Iago flees. As Emilia lies dying,
singing the willow song Desdemona had sung when preparing for bed, Othello
decides to kill himself, for his “honor” ought not to outlive the “honesty” of
Desdemona’s chastity and the faithfulness and “honesty” of Emilia’s revelation.
At this point, nearly everything that is going to happen in Othello has
happened. Iago will be captured, refuse to speak further, and be removed to
be tortured and made to confess. Cassio will be deputed in Othello’s place, and
Lodovico will return to Venice to make a report to the senate. Te only thing
remaining is Othello himself. He kills himself. But as he suffers his pre-death
agony, in the most exquisite and powerful verse, Othello bares himself and finds
himself unbearable. He tears himself apart, convinced that the last service he
can do for the Venetian state is to kill himself as one who has offended, in his
fall, the city-state of Venice itself.
23
KEY PASSAGES IN
OTHELLO
q
Act I, i, 58–66
Were I the Moor, I would not be Iago:
In following him, I follow but myself;
Heaven is my judge, not I for love and duty,
But seeming so, for my peculiar end:
For when my outward action doth demonstrate
Te native act and figure of my heart
In compliment extern, ’tis not long after
But I will wear my heart upon my sleeve
For daws to peck at: I am not what I am.
Shakespeare begins Othello in the middle of a conversation between Iago and
Roderigo. As they speak, the spectator or reader becomes aware of the issues
that drive each. For Roderigo, it is love for Desdemona. For Iago, it is hatred
of Othello. Iago has just told Roderigo that Othello has that very night mar-
ried Desdemona. Roderigo is incensed that Iago has not let him know of the
impending marriage sooner, especially because Iago has represented himself
to Roderigo as a go-between for him and has taken money from him, presum-
ably to buy gifts for Desdemona in support of Roderigo’s courtship.
Tis passage occurs just after Iago tells Roderigo that he hates Othello
for having promoted Michael Cassio, instead of himself, to be his lieutenant.
Roderigo challenges him, saying that he would not serve Othello under such
circumstances. After Iago explains, “I follow him to serve my turn upon him,”
he talks about himself, giving this sharply defined and accurate description of
himself.
Te great western Socratic belief encapsulated in the phrase “Know thyself ” is
usually thought of as a key to virtue. Given this speech of his, it is clear that Iago
does know himself. In his case, however, the Socratic maxim is subverted by a
Machiavellian duplicity. Iago knows himself because, he believes, he constructs
himself through the power of his own will. Iago’s knowledge of himself is not
a mark of virtue but rather a technique of evil. Yet in his ambiguous formula,
Othello 24
“Were I the Moor, I would not be Iago,” he reveals something about himself that
he may not know. If he were Othello, he seems to be saying, he would not want
to have a person like Iago around him, because of the illwill Iago bears him and
the evil he will commit. But there is the sense of another meaning in his words,
too. If he were Othello, whom he would prefer to be and regrets not being, he
would not have to be Iago.
What he does say clearly, and what will inform the ways in which the
audience or reader perceives his every word and deed—and which the characters
in the play, to their great disadvantage, do not know—is that he is not what he
seems to be and that everything he says and does is calculated to deceive.
QQQ
Act I, i, 68–74
Call up her father,
Rouse him: make after him, poison his delight,
Proclaim him in the streets; incense her kinsmen,
And, though he in a fertile climate dwell,
Plague him with flies: though that his joy be joy,
Yet throw such changes of vexation on’t,
As it may lose some colour.
With these words directing Roderigo to arouse Brabantio, Iago begins the
action of the play and reveals the depths of his delight in causing and observing
painful suffering.
QQQ
Act I, i, 83–89
’Zounds, sir, you’re robb’d; for shame, put on your gown;
Your heart is burst, you have lost half your soul;
Even now, now, very now, an old black ram
Is tupping your white ewe. Arise, arise;
Awake the snorting citizens with the bell,
Or else the devil will make a grandsire of you:
Arise, I say.
Here is Iago, in his role as author/director of the action of the play, telling
Brabantio what to feel, what to do, what his motivation is, and what action he
must take. To start off his campaign against Othello, Iago rouses Desdemona’s
father to let him know his daughter has eloped with Othello. He speaks in
graphically obscene language. Nevertheless, in its raw eloquence it is a linguistic
Key Passages in Othello 25
delight and presents an indelibly defining image of the marriage of Othello and
Desdemona.
Despite what the audience or readers know about Iago, he insinuates himself
into an intimate relationship with them. He charms them as he will Othello
and the other characters in the play. He is full of brio and vitality. When he
refers to the act of sexual intercourse between Othello and Desdemona as “an
old black ram / . . . tupping your white ewe,” he is, despite his maliciousness,
nearly irresistible, just as he is when he describes them, at line 112, as “making
the beast with two backs.”
In addition to telling Brabantio what has happened, Iago also instructs him
in how to react and rouses him to heightened feeling, not only with his graphic
obscenity but also by his narration of those feelings, as if he were a director
motivating an actor: “Your heart has burst, you have lost your soul. / Even now,
now, very now . . .”
QQQ
Act I, ii, 29–30
Iago: You were best go in.
Othello: Not I; I must be found.
Iago’s first attempt to practice upon Othello fails. Despite the approach of a
troop of men possibly sent by Brabantio, Othello stands firm, exhibiting no
sense of guilt. He faces situations; he does not run from them. And that is true
of him even to the manner of his death. In contrast, Cassio, in Act III, scene
3, line 30, at the end of his interview with Desdemona, does the opposite. He
leaves when Othello approaches, consequently making himself look guilty. Had
he stayed, as Desdemona suggested, things would have gone better all around,
and Iago would have been robbed of material to further his deception.
QQQ
Act I, ii, 59–86
Othello: Keep up your bright swords, for the dew will rust them.
Good signior, you shall more command with years
Tan with your weapons.
Brabantio: O thou foul thief, where hast thou stow’d my daughter?
Damn’d as thou art, thou hast enchanted her;
For I’ll refer me to all things of sense,
If she in chains of magic were not bound,
Whether a maid so tender, fair and happy,
So opposite to marriage that she shunned
Othello 26
Te wealthy curled darlings of our nation,
Would ever have, to incur a general mock,
Run from her guardage to the sooty bosom
Of such a thing as thou, to fear, not to delight.
Judge me the world, if ’tis not gross in sense
Tat thou hast practised on her with foul charms,
Abused her delicate youth with drugs or minerals
Tat weaken motion: I’ll have’t disputed on;
’Tis probable and palpable to thinking.
I therefore apprehend and do attach thee
For an abuser of the world, a practiser
Of arts inhibited and out of warrant.
Lay hold upon him: if he do resist,
Subdue him at his peril.
Othello: Hold your hands,
Both you of my inclining, and the rest:
Were it my cue to fight, I should have known it
Without a prompter. Where will you that I go
To answer this your charge?
This early depiction of Othello in the midst of confusion shows not only the
strength of his character, the clarity of his mind, his confidence in himself, and
the firmness of his authority but also the commanding eloquence and authentic
grandeur of his speech.
QQQ
Act I, iii, 76–109
Othello: Most potent, grave, and reverend signiors,
My very noble and approved good masters,
Tat I have ta’en away this old man’s daughter,
It is most true; true, I have married her:
Te very head and front of my offending
Hath this extent, no more. Rude am I in my speech,
And little bless’d with the soft phrase of peace:
For since these arms of mine had seven years’ pith,
Till now some nine moons wasted, they have used
Teir dearest action in the tented field,
And little of this great world can I speak,
More than pertains to feats of broil and battle,
And therefore little shall I grace my cause
In speaking for myself. Yet, by your gracious patience,
Key Passages in Othello 27
I will a round unvarnish’d tale deliver
Of my whole course of love; what drugs, what charms,
What conjuration and what mighty magic,
For such proceeding I am charged withal,
I won his daughter.
Brabantio: A maiden never bold;
Of spirit so still and quiet, that her motion
Blush’d at herself; and she, in spite of nature,
Of years, of country, credit, every thing,
To fall in love with what she fear’d to look on!
It is a judgment maim’d and most imperfect
Tat will confess perfection so could err
Against all rules of nature, and must be driven
To find out practises of cunning hell,
Why this should be. I therefore vouch again
Tat with some mixtures powerful o’er the blood,
Or with some dram conjured to this effect,
He wrought upon her.
Duke of Venice: To vouch this, is no proof,
Without more wider and more overt test
Tan these thin habits and poor likelihoods
Of modern seeming do prefer against him.
These 33 lines, in which Othello, Brabantio, and the Duke speak, not only set
forward the present business and project the characteristics of each of the speak-
ers. They also serve as an overture to the play itself, introducing the themes that
will provide the matter for the action of the play.
Othello, in his address to the senators, shows the probity of his character,
his faith in himself, and his ability to deny Brabantio’s accusations that he
subverted Desdemona’s will with drugs and magic. But what Othello does not
say shows there is something about himself that gives him pause and, if it were
to be excavated, could undermine his self-confidence. Te issue of Brabantio’s
objection to his color and culture, although akin to it, displaces it. But Othello,
after all, did elope with Desdemona rather than openly marry her after properly
requesting her hand of her father, whom, he says at line 128, “loved me.” Why
he chose not to get married openly he does not address, and he is not asked to.
Te troubling undercurrent that will eventually drown Othello and
Desdemona in its upsurge is referred to by Brabantio as he interrupts Othello in
the above passage. Desdemona, Brabantio says, could not “fall in love with what
she fear’d to look on!” Te marriage goes “[a]gainst all rules of nature.” He is,
of course, referring to their racial disparity. While it is true that Desdemona’s
response was not as her father describes it, the elopement suggests that Othello
Othello 28
sensed that asking her father for her hand would have brought forth resistance
to his blackness, which, so far in Venice, he had managed to avoid and which his
pride required him not to confront.
Brabantio’s indictment, moreover, unintended though it is, is also an
indictment of Desdemona—one that will prove ominous later on. She may
have appeared to her father, at least, as a “maiden never bold, / Of spirit so
still and quiet that her motion / Blushed at herself.” Such seeming, however, is
contradicted by her own bold and freely chosen behavior. While she appeared
one way to her father, she was, in fact, not at all that way. She had a will of her
own. It is that aspect of her that Brabantio will hurl at Othello at line 289 when
he surrenders his opposition to her marriage but warns, “Look to her, Moor,
if thou hast eyes to see: / She has deceived her father, and may thee.” All the
ingredients necessary for Iago’s plot are here presented.
When the Duke intervenes, his admonition to Brabantio, that “To vouch
this, is no proof,” is not only wise and temperate but also foreshadows Othello’s
own unwise temperance when he demands of Iago “ocular proof ” of Desdemona’s
infidelity.
QQQ
Act I, iii, 316–329
’Tis in ourselves that we are thus or thus. Our bodies are our gardens,
to the which our wills are gardeners: so that if we will plant nettles, or
sow lettuce, set hyssop and weed up thyme, supply it with one gender of
herbs, or distract it with many, either to have it sterile with idleness, or
manured with industry, why, the power and corrigible authority of this
lies in our wills. If the balance of our lives had not one scale of reason to
poise another of sensuality, the blood and baseness of our natures would
conduct us to most preposterous conclusions: but we have reason to cool
our raging motions, our carnal stings, our unbitted lusts, whereof I take
this that you call love to be a sect or scion.
In this passage, using the image of a gardener tending a garden, Iago sets
forth his credo of human freedom. He imagines each person divided into a
garden and a gardener who tends him or her. He suggests that it is up to each
person to create his or her own identity. He asserts the atheistic notion that
individuals are not bound or defined by the will and shaping of a higher cre-
ator. Not bound by or to anything, people are, Iago determines, free creatures
who, by intellect, create themselves as they choose to, self-advantage being
their truest guide.
QQQ
Key Passages in Othello 29
Act II, i, 177–195
Othello: It gives me wonder great as my content
To see you here before me. O my soul’s joy!
If after every tempest come such calms,
May the winds blow till they have waken’d death!
And let the labouring bark climb hills of seas
Olympus-high and duck again as low
As hell’s from heaven! If it were now to die,
’Twere now to be most happy; for, I fear,
My soul hath her content so absolute
Tat not another comfort like to this
Succeeds in unknown fate.
Desdemona: Te heavens forbid
But that our loves and comforts should increase,
Even as our days do grow!
Othello: Amen to that, sweet powers!
I cannot speak enough of this content;
It stops me here; it is too much of joy:
Tey kiss
And this, and this, the greatest discords be
Tat e’er our hearts shall make!
Iago: [aside] O, you are well tuned now!
But I’ll set down the pegs that make this music,
As honest as I am.
Othello’s meeting with Desdemona when he arrives safely in Cyprus is scored
like a trio. Othello and Desdemona embrace as he pours forth his delight in
“see[ing] you here before me. O my soul’s joy!” In his exaltation there is, how-
ever buried, the slightest measure of anxiety: “My soul hath her content so
absolute / That not another comfort like to this/ Succeeds in unknown fate.”
Desdemona answers him, “The heavens forbid / But that our loves and comforts
should increase / Even as our days do grow.” Othello says “Amen,” and speak-
ing of his overwhelming happiness, he kisses her, praying that these kisses “the
greatest discords be.”
Iago, the third voice of the trio, then enters, conjoining himself with the
lovers by usurping the musical metaphor in Othello’s word “discord,” saying, “O,
you are well tuned now! / But I’ll set down the pegs that make this music.” Tis
cluster shows how the very height of Othello’s emotion is just what is necessary
for the vertigo Iago will induce. Te trio ends with Iago’s charming, disarming
joke at his own expense. He makes the audience complicit in his plot by the
wicked self-mockery of his words: “As honest as I am.”
Othello 30
Act II, i, 276–303
Tat Cassio loves her, I do well believe it;
Tat she loves him, ’tis apt and of great credit:
Te Moor, howbeit that I endure him not,
Is of a constant, loving, noble nature,
And I dare think he’ll prove to Desdemona
A most dear husband. Now, I do love her too;
Not out of absolute lust, though peradventure
I stand accountant for as great a sin,
But partly led to diet my revenge,
For that I do suspect the lusty Moor
Hath leap’d into my seat; the thought whereof
Doth, like a poisonous mineral, gnaw my inwards;
And nothing can or shall content my soul
Till I am even’d with him, wife for wife,
Or failing so, yet that I put the Moor
At least into a jealousy so strong
Tat judgment cannot cure. Which thing to do,
If this poor trash of Venice, whom I trash
For his quick hunting, stand the putting on,
I’ll have our Michael Cassio on the hip,
Abuse him to the Moor in the rank garb—
For I fear Cassio with my night-cap too—
Make the Moor thank me, love me, and reward me.
For making him egregiously an ass
And practising upon his peace and quiet
Even to madness. ’Tis here, but yet confused:
Knavery’s plain face is never seen tin used.
Iago’s soliloquy here is not an honest expression of his inner mind, nor is it
meant to be. It is an exposition of the workings of his inner mind. It shows him
brainstorming, spinning a plot, making an outline. It shows how he “psychs
himself up” for the project at hand by imagining Othello and Cassio sleeping
with his wife, Emilia, and by imagining himself desiring Desdemona. He is
setting forth a series of suppositions and testing their reasonableness. He is
putting together a story. Whether the story is true or not is irrelevant as long
as it is believable and as long as he can get himself into the state of believing
it himself. Why should Cassio not love Desdemona? Why should she not love
him? Why should he not believe his own wife has been unfaithful? All these
things are possible. What makes them impossible is only the nature of the two
people, Desdemona and Cassio, but his scheme must override their natures,
Key Passages in Othello 31
which it does by focusing on Othello’s insecurity and by subverting their speech
via Othello’s prejudiced judgment. He must “put the Moor / . . . into a jealousy
so strong / That judgment cannot cure.”
QQQ
Act II, iii, 106
Te lieutenant is to be saved before the ancient.
This is Cassio speaking, drunk on the wine with which Iago has plied him. He
is shown to be argumentative, and in the argument his own sense of pride and
position asserts itself. It makes the motive for his fight with Roderigo credible
when, in angry confusion, he cries at line 144, “A knave teach me my duty?”
QQQ
Act II, iii, 343–350
For whiles this honest fool
Plies Desdemona to repair his fortunes
And she for him pleads strongly to the Moor,
I’ll pour this pestilence into his ear,
Tat she repeals him for her body’s lust;
And by how much she strives to do him good,
She shall undo her credit with the Moor.
So will I turn her virtue into pitch . . .
In a nutshell, Iago presents his plot and the plot of the play. It is his genius to
make things seem like what they are not and to subvert meaning, making good
appear to be evil. Iago will frame Desdemona in order to control Othello’s
mind by influencing how Othello understands the meaning of her words and
actions.
QQQ
Act III, iii
This scene, in its entirety, is pivotal in Othello. In 475 lines Shakespeare
transforms the self-possessed, confident, and disciplined Othello into a dis-
traught prisoner, bound to Iago and tormented by a jealous rage. The scene
is constructed as a smooth and seamless progression of several encounters
f lowing one into the other. In it Shakespeare not only deepens the portrayal
of each of the major characters, but he also makes their characters the driving
force of the plot. Cassio’s mixture of pride and shame, Desdemona’s innocent
Othello 32
boldness, Othello’s fear that his social standing and self-regard are funda-
mentally inauthentic, Iago’s skill as a rhetorician who can insinuate himself
into his auditor’s consciousness through verbal manipulation, Emilia’s accep-
tance of her subjugation to her husband: All are depicted and employed as
the elements that move the action of the play forward.
At line 30, Cassio has just finished asking Desdemona if she will intercede
with Othello for him. Desdemona has assured him, with a determined spirit,
that she will. Emilia announces Othello’s entrance. Guilty about his misconduct
and ashamed of himself, Cassio says he will not stay. It is precisely the wrong
move. It is not what Othello did earlier in the play when Iago advised him, “You
were best go in,” as Brabantio and his men came in search of him (I, ii, 29).
Tere Othello responded, “Not I. I must be found,” and by that stand he asserted
his assurance of his virtue and pride. Unlike Cassio, Othello was sure of his
worth and aware of the service he had performed for the state.
Iago uses Cassio’s departure to begin his work of infecting Othello with
jealousy. Seeing him leave, Iago mutters, half inaudibly, “I like not that.” When
Othello asks him what he just said, Iago acts confused: “Nothing, my lord; or
if—I know not what,” which arouses Othello’s curiosity and suspicion. Tus,
when Othello asks, “Was not that Cassio parted from my wife?” his question
has an uneasiness it would not have had without Iago’s previous observation.
Iago’s response deepens Othello’s uneasiness. He repeats Othello’s question with
a question, “Cassio, my lord?” It’s a technique he continues to use throughout the
scene, as if he were holding something back for Othello’s own good. Asserting
something by denying it, he says, “I cannot think it / Tat he would steal away
so guilty-like / Seeing you coming.”
With these few words Iago frames the way Othello hears whatever
Desdemona says to him. She, of course, begins to plead Cassio’s cause. Not yet
entirely subverted by Iago, Othello hears her but delays yielding immediately to
her request. In consequence, she presses harder.
At line 93, after Desdemona has pleaded her case for Cassio and then departed,
Iago begins his work on Othello in earnest, asking if Cassio, as Desdemona has
just said, had acted as a go-between for the couple. He insinuates that there
is something disturbing in this, that there was a troubling intimacy, perhaps,
between them. Troughout, he uses the same technique of interrupting himself
and of repeating Othello’s words, as if preventing himself from saying things
that might hurt Othello and yet he seems duty-bound to reveal. His aim is to
make Othello unsure of himself.
Implicitly contrasting Cassio and Othello and speculating about Desdemona’s
character, Iago uses the same arguments against the possibility of Desdemona’s
loving Othello (i.e., for Desdemona to marry him, it would go against nature,
for she must find his blackness appalling and his age unsatisfying) that her
father had previously used and Othello had so well withstood. Iago’s genius is
Key Passages in Othello 33
to undermine Othello’s self-regard so subtly that these arguments now trouble
him. Iago insinuates rather than declares things; he does not tell Othello to be
jealous but rather to beware of being jealous. By leading Othello to deny that he
is jealous, Iago forces Othello to entertain the possibility that he is jealous.
Iago’s coup de grace is to urge Othello to put off restoring Cassio’s office. He
shrewdly admits Cassio deserves reinstatement, but he suggests the delay will
give Othello the opportunity to measure how ardently Desdemona intercedes
for him. Once Iago leaves him alone, Othello, in a painful soliloquy, worries
over the things Iago has said as if they were his own thoughts, mulling about
his blackness, regretting having married, and vowing to cast Desdemona aside
despite his great love for her should she prove false.
As he is plagued by these thoughts, Desdemona returns. Seeing her, he
cannot believe that she is dishonest. Nevertheless, his ordeal has weakened
him, and when he tells her his head aches—bitterly implying that he feels
the horns of a cuckold, a betrayed husband—she offers to bind it with her
handkerchief. He stops her, probably pushing her hand away from his head,
and she drops the handkerchief. Focused on him, she does not even notice
she has dropped it. Tey exit together, leaving Emilia, who had accompanied
Desdemona, alone onstage. Emilia sees the handkerchief, picks it up, and
notes that it is the one Iago had been asking her to steal from Desdemona.
She says she will have the handkerchief copied, give the copy to Iago, and
return the original to Desdemona. But when Iago teases her at line 297, she
teases him back by saying she has something he wants. When she dangles the
handkerchief in front of him, he grabs it from her and sends her away, ordering
her to forget about the handkerchief.
When Othello reenters at line 327, tormenting himself with jealous fears,
Iago notes with satisfaction how he has destroyed Othello’s peace of mind. “Not
poppy nor mandragora / Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world / Shall ever
medicine thee to that sweet sleep / Which thou owedst yesterday,” he says to
himself, his words aimed at Othello. He continues to work upon Othello, telling
him that he has slept beside Cassio lately and that in his sleep Cassio had called
Desdemona’s name. In addition, he says he has seen Cassio using Desdemona’s
handkerchief to wipe his beard. Othello is inflamed with jealous rage and longs
to avenge himself.
Te scene ends with Othello making Iago his lieutenant and Iago vowing his
loyalty to Othello: “I am your own for ever.”
QQQ
Act IV, i, 264–283
Lodovico: Is this the noble Moor whom our full senate
Call all in all sufficient? Is this the nature
Othello 34
Whom passion could not shake? whose solid virtue
Te shot of accident, nor dart of chance,
Could neither graze nor pierce?
Iago: He is much changed.
Lodovico: Are his wits safe? Is he not light of brain?
Iago: He’s that he is: I may not breathe my censure
What he might be: if what he might he is not,
I would to heaven he were!
Lodovico: What, strike his wife!
Iago: ’Faith, that was not so well; yet would I knew
Tat stroke would prove the worst!
Lodovico: Is it his use?
Or did the letters work upon his blood,
And new-create this fault?
Iago: Alas, alas!
It is not honesty in me to speak
What I have seen and known. You shall observe him,
And his own courses will denote him so
Tat I may save my speech: do but go after,
And mark how he continues.
Lodovico, the emissary sent by the Venetian senate to recall Othello, has just
seen unbelievable things. Othello, in a confused passion, has struck Desdemona
and spoken of her in sexually abusive language. Lodovico’s astonishment
reminds the audience of what Othello was, a man “whose solid virtue / The
shot of accident nor dart of chance / Could neither graze nor pierce.” The
irony is that he is speaking of the change in Othello to Iago, the engineer of
that change. When he asks if Othello’s “wits” are “safe” and “Is he not light
of brain?” Iago responds with the same rhetorical trick he used on Othello,
presenting himself as reluctant to speak a truth that might reflect badly on
the person of whom he speaks, only overcoming his reluctance for the sake
of his interlocutor. Additionally, he strengthens his own position by saying to
Lodovico, essentially, not to take his word for it but to see the truth for himself.
Iago is masterful at manipulating appearances and making what is seen appear
to corroborate his own words.
QQQ
Act IV, ii, 46–63
Had it pleased heaven
To try me with affliction; had they rain’d
All kinds of sores and shames on my bare head.
Key Passages in Othello 35
Steep’d me in poverty to the very lips,
Given to captivity me and my utmost hopes,
I should have found in some place of my soul
A drop of patience: but, alas, to make me
A fixed figure for the time of scorn
To point his slow unmoving finger at!
Yet could I bear that too; well, very well:
But there, where I have garner’d up my heart,
Where either I must live, or bear no life;
Te fountain from the which my current runs,
Or else dries up; to be discarded thence!
Or keep it as a cistern for foul toads
To knot and gender in! Turn thy complexion there,
Patience, thou young and rose-lipp’d cherubin,—
Ay, there, look grim as hell!
In the midst of a scene in which he discharges his rage, branding Desdemona
a whore, and is unable to accept her avowal of faithfulness and obedience,
Othello focuses these lines upon himself, revealing what it is about her pre-
sumed infidelity that so undermines him. He is a soldier and as such capable
of confronting adversity with heroism, which can be defined by his behavior
rather than by its outcome. Affliction, poverty, captivity—these he could have
met with patience. What is intolerable is the shame at being recognized as a
fool who has given his heart unwisely. Outside affliction would not undermine
how he appeared, but his own participation in his affliction does. The irony is
that Othello is just such a dupe, not of Desdemona but of Iago, surrendering his
heart foolishly to him, not to Desdemona.
QQQ
Act IV, iii, 103–104
Good night, good night: Heaven me such uses send,
Not to pick bad from bad, but by bad mend!
The last scene of Act IV of Othello offers an apparently tranquil interlude
following Desdemona’s public humiliation and preceding her murder. Yet it
is not, actually, particularly tranquil in itself. Desdemona cannot keep her
head from drooping and from remembering a servant girl from her child-
hood, a girl who was betrayed by her lover and died of it. She sings “Willow,”
the melancholy song of the girl’s betrayal. When she and Emilia discuss the
disparity between men and women, Emilia eloquently lists women’s griev-
ances and supports a kind of war between the sexes to assert equality for
Othello 36
women. But Desdemona concludes from all the ills enumerated in the scene
that she wishes “Heaven me such uses send, / Not to pick bad from bad,
but by bad mend!” She would be something like a gardener-magician turn-
ing weeds to flowers, evil to good. She does not fail entirely in Othello,
however, for of the two principles, evil did not ever subvert good. Despite
being murdered, Desdemona remained faithful, even in death. While evil
triumphed in action, good triumphed in principle, its spirit incarnated in
Desdemona.
QQQ
Act V, ii, 1–3
It is the cause, it is the cause, my soul,—
Let me not name it to you, you chaste stars!—
It is the cause.
Othello utters these lines upon entering the bedchamber and finding Desdemona
asleep, with a burning candle by the bed. The vagueness of these three lines—in
which “it” has no reference, “cause” no specificity—gives them a deep emotional
resonance and makes them the likely mantra of a spinning and tormented mind.
What Othello probably means is that Desdemona’s infidelity (and not his jeal-
ousy) is the cause of her murder, that this death is a sacrifice and not a revenge
killing.
QQQ
Act V, ii, 6
Yet she must die, else she’ll betray more men.
This is a strange thing for Othello to say, for it makes it seem like he is killing
her in order to prevent other men (“more men”) from having to suffer betrayal
by her as he has. It shows how removed from rationality he has become and how
lost in a tangle of words.
QQQ
Act V, ii, 40–84
Othello: Tink on thy sins.
Desdemona: Tey are loves I bear to you.
Othello: Ay, and for that thou diest.
Desdemona: Tat death’s unnatural that kills for loving.
Alas, why gnaw you so your nether lip?
Key Passages in Othello 37
Some bloody passion shakes your very frame:
Tese are portents; but yet I hope, I hope,
Tey do not point on me.
Othello: Peace, and be still!
Desdemona: I will so. What’s the matter?
Othello: Tat handkerchief which I so loved and gave thee
Tou gavest to Cassio.
Desdemona: No, by my life and soul!
Send for the man, and ask him.
Othello: Sweet soul, take heed,
Take heed of perjury; thou art on thy deathbed.
Desdemona: Ay, but not yet to die.
Othello: Yes, presently:
Terefore confess thee freely of thy sin;
For to deny each article with oath
Cannot remove nor choke the strong conception
Tat I do groan withal. Tou art to die.
Desdemona: Ten Lord have mercy on me!
Othello: I say, amen.
Desdemona: And have you mercy too! I never did
Offend you in my life; never loved Cassio
But with such general warranty of heaven
As I might love: I never gave him token.
Othello: By heaven, I saw my handkerchief in’s hand.
O perjured woman! thou dost stone my heart,
And makest me call what I intend to do
A murder, which I thought a sacrifice:
I saw the handkerchief.
Desdemona: He found it then;
I never gave it him: send for him hither;
Let him confess a truth.
Othello: He hath confess’d.
Desdemona: What, my lord?
Othello: Tat he hath used thee.
Desdemona: How? unlawfully?
Othello: Ay.
Desdemona: He will not say so.
Othello: No, his mouth is stopp’d;
Honest Iago hath ta’en order for’t.
Desdemona: O! my fear interprets: what, is he dead?
Othello: Had all his hairs been lives, my great revenge
Had stomach for them all.
Othello 38
Desdemona: Alas! he is betray’d and I undone.
Othello: Out, strumpet! weep’st thou for him to my face?
Desdemona: O, banish me, my lord, but kill me not!
Othello: Down, strumpet!
Desdemona: Kill me to-morrow: let me live to-night!
Othello: Nay, if you strive—
Desdemona: But half an hour!
Othello: Being done, there is no pause.
Desdemona: But while I say one prayer!
Othello: It is too late.
Beginning at Othello’s command to Desdemona, “Think on thy sins,” is this
scene of frustrated exhilaration. Finally confronted with what was bothering
Othello, Desdemona openly refutes his fears, but he is incapable of hearing
her clearly. The passionate exchanges in their conversation as she begs and he
repulses grow shorter and ever more intense. Rage overcomes him and he ulti-
mately suffocates her.
QQQ
Act V, ii, 177–181
Emilia: But did you ever tell him she was false?
Iago: I did.
Emilia: You told a lie, an odious, damned lie;
Upon my soul, a lie, a wicked lie!
She false with Cassio!—did you say with Cassio?
Emilia brings a burst of true words to lay the false ones that have polluted the
speakers of the play. Her repetition of the word “lie,” repeatedly throwing it in
Iago’s face, is exhilarating. The once silent and obedient Emilia, who is hardly
noticed earlier in the play, is replaced by this searingly honest character.
QQQ
Act V, ii, 257–279
Behold, I have a weapon;
A better never did itself sustain
Upon a soldier’s thigh: I have seen the day,
Tat, with this little arm and this good sword,
I have made my way through more impediments
Tan twenty times your stop: but, O vain boast!
Who can control his fate? ’Tis not so now.
Key Passages in Othello 39
Be not afraid, though you do see me weapon’d;
Here is my journey’s end, here is my butt,
And very sea-mark of my utmost sail.
Do you go back dismay’d? ’Tis a lost fear;
Man but a rush against Othello’s breast,
And he retires. Where should Othello go?
Now, how dost thou look now? O ill-starr’d wench!
Pale as thy smock! When we shall meet at compt,
Tis look of thine will hurl my soul from heaven,
And fiends will snatch at it. Cold, cold, my girl!
Even like thy chastity. O cursed slave!
Whip me, ye devils,
From the possession of this heavenly sight!
Blow me about in winds! Roast me in sulphur!
Wash me in steep-down gulfs of liquid fire!
O Desdemona! Desdemona! Dead! Oh! Oh!
Othello’s final speeches in the play reveal the depths of his torment, but they
delight as much as they pain because of the overwhelming magnificence of their
poetry. Lines like “I have made my way through more impediments / Than
twenty times your stop” and “Be not afraid though you do see me weapon’d; /
Here is my journey’s end” and “Man but a rush against Othello’s breast, / And
he retires” and “Where should Othello go? / Now, how dost thou look now. O
ill-starr’d wench! / Pale as thy smock!” are crowded closely together, each fol-
lowing the next in quick succession. No matter that he is mistaken in his last
imaging of her: Desdemona would plead for him with a greater intensity than
she did for Cassio.
QQQ
Act V, ii, 334–352
Soft you; a word or two before you go.
I have done the state some service, and they know’t.
No more of that. I pray you, in your letters,
When you shall these unlucky deeds relate,
Speak of me as I am; nothing extenuate,
Nor set down aught in malice: then must you speak
Of one that loved not wisely but too well;
Of one not easily jealous, but being wrought
Perplex’d in the extreme; of one whose hand,
Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away
Richer than all his tribe; of one whose subdued eyes,
Othello 40
Albeit unused to the melting mood,
Drop tears as fast as the Arabian trees
Teir medicinal gum. Set you down this;
And say besides, that in Aleppo once,
Where a malignant and a turban’d Turk
Beat a Venetian and traduced the state,
I took by the throat the circumcised dog,
And smote him, thus.
In his last speech, his death oration, Othello starts by seeking to justify himself
and save his reputation. He quickly comes to revile himself, however, for he
“threw a pearl away / Richer than all his tribe.” It is, then, in a combination of
pride and self-loathing that Othello speaks his death lines, which conclude with
him stabbing himself.
Othello’s dying words, exceptional and expressive as they are as poetry, are
also significant and revealing for what they do not say. Othello is concerned with
his honor and with his own stupidity in allowing himself to be gulled. But he
has not grasped any more fully now the independent existence of Desdemona as
her own person than he did when he told the Venetian senate in Act I that “She
loved me for the dangers I had passed, / And I loved her that she did pity them.”
In short, he loved her love of him. To him, the story of Desdemona’s death is the
story of his tragic beguilement rather than the story of her fatal marriage.
QQQ
41
LIST OF CHARACTERS IN
OTHELLO
q
Othello is the head of the Venetian military forces. He is not a Venetian,
however, but a Moor—a black man, Arab rather than Christian. He is a proud,
strong, experienced, and disciplined soldier who is dispatched to Cypress, a
Venetian stronghold, by the Venetian senate when the island falls under attack
by a Turkish fleet.
Desdemona is a beautiful young Venetian woman who encourages Othello’s
love and marries him without her father’s knowledge. She accompanies him to
Cypress.
Brabantio is Desdemona’s father. He is broken by her marriage.
Iago is Othello’s ensign. Embittered when he is passed over by Othello for a
promotion, he plots to gain Othello’s confidence and, by causing him to become
insecure about Desdemona’s love, to destroy him.
Emilia is Iago’s wife and a lady-in-waiting to Desdemona. She seems at first to
be obedient to Iago, but upon discovering the extent of his villainy, she rebels.
Michael Cassio is the man Othello promotes, instead of Iago, to be his lieuten-
ant. He is handsome, debonair, and courteous, but rather self-regarding, and he
has trouble holding his liquor. Iago convinces Othello that Desdemona is really
in love with Cassio.
Roderigo is a fop in love with Desdemona. Iago, promising to help him win
Desdemona away from Othello, uses him in his plot against Othello and
Cassio.
Bianca is a prostitute who is in love with Cassio.
Othello 42
The Duke of Venice takes Othello’s side when Brabantio accuses him of win-
ning Desdemona through charms and drugs. He sends him to Cypress as leader
of his military forces.
Montano is the governor of Cypress.
Lodovico is a Venetian nobleman. The senate sends him to Cypress as a mes-
senger, to recall Othello from his post.
The clown appears briefly at the beginning of the third act, mocking the musi-
cians whom Cassio has hired to serenade Othello as he wakes. The clown then
mocks Cassio himself for his gentlemanly flourishes and courtly speech.
43
CRITICISM
THROUGH THE AGES
q
45
OTHELLO
IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY
q
The first recorded performance of Othello was on November 1, 1604, in the
Banqueting House at Whitehall before King James I. Scholars believe that
Othello was written no earlier than 1604, because it seems that Shakespeare
took the matter of the Turkish invasion of Cypress, which is the cause of the
midnight convocation of the Venetian senate in the first act of Othello, from
Richard Knolles’s History of the Turks, published at the end of 1603. The under-
lying story of Othello can be found in the Italian collection of tales called the
Hecatommithi, by Giambattista Cinzio Giraldi, published in 1565. Shakespeare
added the figures of Roderigo, Desdemona’s hapless Venetian suitor and Iago’s
gull; Brabantio, Desdemona’s father; and Bianca, Cassio’s mistress. Richard
Burbage, a partner in Shakespeare’s acting company, played the role of Othello.
The force of his performance, in addition to a statement of the plot, is indicated
by these lines from a eulogy after Burbage’s death in 1619:
. . . But let me not forget one chiefest part
Wherein beyond the rest, he moved the heart,
Te grieved Moor, made jealous by a slave,
Who sent his wife to fill a timeless grave.
An extant letter of 1610, written in Latin, offers a review of a performance
given by Shakespeare’s company in Oxford that year. Te players, it says, “drew
tears not only by their speech, but also by their action. Indeed Desdemona,
though always excellent, moved us especially in her death when, as she lay on her
bed, her face itself implored the pity of the audience” (Marvin Rosenberg, Te
Masks of Othello, 5). Te writer’s tone suggests, too, that the story and characters
of the play were already familiar by 1610. In fact, Othello has been from the first
one of Shakespeare’s most popular and frequently performed plays.
Othello 46
Te play was first published in 1622 in quarto format. Another version of
some 160 lines more—and with various expletives, such as “zounds” (by God’s
wounds) and “’sblood” (by God’s blood), expurgated in accordance with a
parliamentary act of 1606 forbidding the use of profane references to God—was
printed in the first Folio edition of Shakespeare’s plays in 1623.
On September 2, 1642, by order of the Long Parliament, all the theaters in
London were shut down by the Puritan-dominated government. Othello was
one of the first plays presented when the theaters reopened in 1660 after the
restoration of the monarchy with the return of Charles II from France. Margaret
Hughes, who played Desdemona, was the first woman to appear upon the
English stage. Until then, boys had played women’s parts. Te innovation was
significant enough for a prologue attached to Othello to proclaim:
Te Woman plays to day: mistake me not;
No man in gown, or Page in petty-coat.
(Rosenberg 18)
In an entry in 1666, the famous London diarist Samuel Pepys mentions
reading a copy of the play, which he liked (though not as much as the now-
forgotten play Te Adventures of Five Houres).
Te first significant critical attention given to Othello was by Tomas Rymer
in his 1693 study A Short View of Tragedy. It is a mocking attack upon the play,
calling it “a bloody farce” and asserting that it “may be a warning to all good
Wives, that they look well to their Linnen.” Rymer’s essay has stimulated a
great deal of opposition through the centuries, as it did even in his own time.
Included here is the most important contemporary response to his attack on
Othello, written by the critic Charles Gildon.
Rymer’s book served to be the spur for others in turn to write about
Shakespeare. It was also important in that it applied the authority of the
Aristotelian principle of “the unities,” of time, place, and action, which so
significantly influenced the critical standards of the eighteenth century.
1666—Samuel Pepys. The Diary of Samuel Pepys
Samuel Pepys (1633–1703), an English naval administrator and mem-
ber of Parliament, is most famous for his diary, which is considered an
invaluable primary source about daily life in the Restoration period.
Up, and to Deptford by water, reading Othello, Moore of Venice, which I
ever heretofore esteemed a mighty good play, but having so lately read
Othello in the Seventeenth Century 47
Te Adventures of Five Houres (by Samuel Tuke), it seems a mean thing.
(August 20, 1666)
QQQ
1693—Thomas Rymer.
From A Short View of Tragedy
Thomas Rymer (1641–1713) was an early English critic who wrote The
Tragedies of the Last Age (1678) and A Short View of Tragedy (1693). Here
Rymer condemns Othello for many reasons, including its supposedly
implausible characters.
From all the Tragedies acted on our English Stage, Othello is said to bear the
Bell away. Te Subject is more of a piece, and there is indeed something like,
there is, as it were, some phantom of a Fable. Te Fable is always accounted the
Soul of Tragedy. And it is the Fable which is properly the Poets part. Because the
other three parts of Tragedy, to wit, the Characters are taken from the Moral
Philosopher; the thoughts or sence, from them that teach Rhetorick: And the last
part, which is the expression, we learn from the Grammarians.
Tis Fable is drawn from a Novel, compos’d in Italian by Giraldi Cinthio,
who also was a Writer of Tragedies. And to that use employ’d such of his Tales,
as he judged proper for the Stage. But with this of the Moor, he meddl’d no
farther.
Shakespear alters it from the Original in several particulars, but always,
unfortunately, for the worse. He bestows a name on his Moor; and styles him the
Moor of Venice: a Note of pre-eminence, which neither History nor Heraldry can
allow him. Cinthio, who knew him best, and whose creature he was, calls him
simply a Moor. We say the Piper of Strasburgh; the Jew of Florence; And, if you
please, the Pindar of Wakefield: all upon Record, and memorable in their Places.
But we see no such Cause for the Moors preferment to that dignity. And it is an
affront to all Chroniclers, and Antiquaries, to top upon ’urn a Moor, with that
mark of renown, who yet had never fain within the Sphere of their Cognisance.
Ten is the Moors Wife, from a simple Citizen, in Cinthio, dress’d up with her
Top knots, and rais’d to be Desdemona, a Senators Daughter. All this is very strange;
And therefore pleases such as reflect not on the improbability. Tis match might
well be without the Parents Consent. Old Horace long ago forbad the Banes.
Sed non ut placidis Coeant immitia, non ut Serpentes avibus
geminentur, tigribus agni.
Othello 48
The Fable
Othello, a Blackmoor Captain, by talking of his Prowess and Feats of War, makes
Desdemona a Senators Daughter to be in love with him; and to be married to him,
without her Parents knowledge; And having preferred Cassio, to be his Lieutenant,
(a place which his Ensign Jago sued for) Jago in revenge, works the Moor into a
jealousy that Cassio Cuckolds him: which he effects by stealing and conveying a certain
Handkerchief, which had, at the Wedding, been by the Moor presented to his Bride.
Hereupon, Othello and Jago plot the Deaths of Desdemona and Cassio, Othello
Murders her, and soon after is convinced of her Innocence. And as he is about to be
carried to Prison, in order to be punish’d for the Murder, He kills himself.
What ever rubs or difficulty may stick on the Bark, the Moral, sure, of this
Fable is very instructive.
1. First, Tis may be a caution to all Maidens of Quality how, without their
Parents consent, they run away with Blackamoors.
Di non si accompagnare con huomo, cui la natura & il cielo, & il modo della vita,
disgiunge da noi. Cinthio.
Secondly, Tis may be a warning to all good Wives, that they look well to
their Linnen.
Tirdly, Tis may be a lesson to Husbands, that before their Jealousie be
Tragical, the proofs may be Mathematical.
Cinthio affirms that She was not overcome by a Womanish Appetite, but by the
Vertue of the Moor. It must be a good-natur’d Reader that takes Cinthio’s word in
this case, tho’ in a Novel. Shakespear, who is accountable both to the Eyes, and to
the Ears, And to convince the very heart of an Audience, shews that Desdemona
was won, by hearing Othello talk,
Othello: I spake of most disastrous chances,
of Moving accidents, by flood and field;
of hair-breadth scapes i’ th’ imminent deadly breach;
of being taken by the insolent foe;
and sold to slavery: of my redemption thence;
and portents in my Travels History:
wherein of Antars vast, and Desarts idle,
rough Quarries, Rocks, and Hills, whose heads touch Heaven,
It was my hint to speak, such was my process:
and of the Cannibals that each others eat:
the Anthropophagi, and men whose heads
do grow beneath their shoulders—
Tis was the Charm, this was the philtre, the love-powder that took
the Daughter of this Noble Venetian. Tis was sufficient to make the Black-
Othello in the Seventeenth Century 49
amoor White, and reconcile all, tho’ there had been a Cloven-foot into
the bargain.
A meaner woman might be as soon taken by Aqua Tetrachymagogon.
Nodes, Cataracts, Tumours, Chilblains, Carnosity, Shan-kers, or any Cant in the
Bill of an High-German Doctor is as good fustian Circumstance, and as likely
to charm a Senators Daughter. But, it seems, the noble Venetians have an other
sence of things. Te Doge himself tells us;
Doge: I think this Tale wou’d win my Daughter too.
Horace tells us,
Intererit Multum—
Colchus an Assyrius, Tebis nutritus, an Argis.
Shakespear in this Play calls ’em the supersubtle Venetians. Yet examine
throughout the Tragedy there is nothing in the noble Desdemona, that is not
below any Countrey Chamber-maid with us.
And the account he gives of their Noblemen and Senate, can only be
calculated for the latitude of Gotham.
Te Character of that State is to employ strangers in their Wars; But shall
a Poet thence fancy that they will set a Negro to be their General; or trust a
Moor to defend them against the Turk? With us a Black-amoor might rise to
be a Trumpeter; but Shakespear would not have him less than a Lieutenant-
General. With us a Moor might marry some little drab, or Small-coal Wench:
Shakespear, would provide him the Daughter and Heir of some great Lord, or
Privy-Councellor: And all the Town should reckon it a very suitable match: Yet
the English are not bred up with that hatred and aversion to the Moors, as are
the Venetians, who suffer by a perpetual Hostility from them,
Littora littoribus contraria—
Nothing is more odious in Nature than an improbable lye; And, certainly,
never was any Play fraught, like this of Othello, with improbabilities.
Te Characters or Manners, which are the second part in a Tragedy, are not
less unnatural and improper, than the Fable was improbable and absurd.
Othello is made a Venetian General. We see nothing done by him, nor related
concerning him, that comports with the condition of a General, or, indeed, of
a Man, unless the killing himself, to avoid a death the Law was about to inflict
upon him. When his Jealousy had wrought him up to a resolution of ’s taking
revenge for the suppos’d injury, He sets Jago to the fighting part, to kill Cassio;
Othello 50
And chuses himself to murder the silly Woman his Wife, that was like to make
no resistance.
His Love and his Jealousie are no part of a Souldiers Character, unless for
Comedy.
But what is most intolerable is Jago. He is no Black-amoor Souldier, so we
may be sure he should be like other Souldiers of our acquaintance; yet never in
Tragedy, nor in Comedy, nor in Nature was a Souldier with his Character; take
it in the Authors own words;
Emilia. some Eternal Villain,
Some busie, and insinuating Rogue,
Some cogging, couzening Slave, to get some Office.
Horace Describes a Souldier otherwise:
Impiger, iracundus, inexorabilis, acer.
Shakespear knew his Character of Jago was inconsistent. In this very Play he
pronounces,
If thou dost deliver more or less than Truth,
Tou art no Souldier.
Tis he knew, but to entertain the Audience with something new and
surprising, against common sense, and Nature, he would pass upon us a close,
dissembling, false, insinuating rascal, instead of an open-hearted, frank, plain-
dealing Souldier, a character constantly worn by them for some thousands of
years in the World.
Tiberius Caesar
1
had a Poet Arraign’d for his Life: because Agamemnon was
brought on the Stage by him, with a character unbecoming a Souldier.
Our Ensigns and Subalterns, when disgusted by the Captain, throw up their
Commissions, bluster, and are bare-fac’d. Jago, I hope, is not brought on the
Stage, in a Red Coat. I know not what Livery the Venetians wear: but am sure
they hold not these conditions to be alia soldatesca.
Non sia egli per fare la vendetta con insidie, ma con
la spada in mano. (Cinthio.)
Nor is our Poet more discreet in his Desdemona, He had chosen a Souldier for
his Knave: And a Venetian Lady is to be the Fool.
Othello in the Seventeenth Century 51
Tis Senators Daughter runs away to (a Carriers Inn) the Sagittary, with a
Black-amoor: is no sooner wedded to him, but the very night she Beds him, is
importuning and teizing him for a young smock-fac’d Lieutenant, Cassio. And
tho’ she perceives the Moor Jealous of Cassio, yet will she not forbear, but still
rings Cassio, Cassio in both his Ears.
Roderigo is the Cully of Jago, brought in to be murder’d by Jago, that Jago’s
hands might be the more in Blood, and be yet the more abominable Villain: who
without that was too wicked on all Conscience; And had more to answer for,
than any Tragedy, or Furies could inflict upon him. So there can be nothing in
the characters, either for the profit, or to delight an Audience.
Te third thing to be consider’d is the Toughts. But from such Characters, we
need not expect many that are either true, or fine, or noble.
And without these, that is, without sense or meaning, the fourth part of
Tragedy, which is the expression can hardly deserve to be treated on distinctly. Te
verse rumbling in our Ears are of good use to help off the action.
In the Neighing of an Horse, or in the growling of a Mastiff, there is a
meaning, there is as lively expression, and, may I say, more humanity, than many
times in the Tragical flights of Shakespear.
Step then amongst the Scenes to observe the Conduct in this Tragedy.
Te first we see are Jago and Roderigo, by Night in the Streets of Venice. After
growling a long time together, they resolve to tell Brabantio that his Daughter
is run away with the Black-a-moor. Jago and Roderigo were not of quality to be
familiar with Brabantio, nor had any provocation from him, to deserve a rude
thing at their hands. Brabantio was a Noble Venetian one of the Sovereign Lords,
and principal persons in the Government, Peer to the most Serene Doge, one
attended with more state, ceremony and punctillio, than any English Duke, or
Nobleman in the Government will pretend to. Tis misfortune in his Daughter
is so prodigious, so tender a point, as might puzzle the finest Wit of the most
supersubtle Venetian to touch upon it, or break the discovery to her Father. See
then how delicately Shakespear minces the matter:
Rod.: What ho, Brabantio, Signior Brabantio, ho.
Jago: Awake, what ho, Brabantio,
Tieves, thieves, thieves:
Look to your House, your Daughter, and your Bags
Tieves, thieves.
(Brabantio at a Window.)
Bra.: What is the reason of this terrible summons?
What is the matter there?
Rod.: Signior, is all your Family within?
Jago: Are your Doors lockt?
Othello 52
Bra.: Why, wherefore ask you this?
Jago: Sir, you are robb’d, for shame put on your Gown,
Your Heart is burst, you have lost half your Soul,
Even now, very now, an old black Ram
Is tupping your white Ewe: arise, arise,
Awake the snorting Citizens with the Bell,
Or else the Devil will make a Grandsire of you, arise I say.
Jago: Sir, you are one of those that will not serve God, if the Devil bid
you; because we come to do you service, you think us Ruffians, you’le
have your Daughter covered with a Barbary Stallion. You’le have your
Nephews neigh to you; you’le have Coursers for Cousins, and Gennets
for Germans.
Bra.: What prophane wretch art thou?
Jago: I am one, Sir, that come to tell you, your Daughter and the Moor,
are now making the Beast with two backs.
In former days there wont to be kept at the Courts of Princes some body in
a Fools Coat, that in pure simplicity might let slip something, which made way
for the ill news, and blunted the shock, which otherwise might have come too
violent upon the party.
Aristophanes puts Nicias and Demosthenes into the disguise of Servants, that
they might, without indecency, be Drunk; And Drunk he must make them that
they might without reserve lay open the Arcana of State; And the Knavery of
their Ministers.
After King Francis had been taken Prisoner at Pavia, Rabelais tells of a
Drunken bout between Gargantua and Fryer John; where the valiant Fryer,
bragging over his Cups, amongst his other flights, says he, Had I liv’d in the days
of Jesus Christ, I would ha guarded Mount Olivet that the Jews should never ha’ tane
him. Te Devil fetch me, if I would not have ham string’d those Mr. Apostles, that after
their good Supper, ran away so scurvily and left their Master to shift for himself. I hate
a Man should run away, when he should play at sharps. Pox on’t, that I shou’d not be
King of France for an hundred years or two. I wou’d curtail all our French Dogs that
ran away at Pavia.
Tis is address, this is truly Satyr, where the preparation is such, that the thing
principally design’d, falls in, as it only were of course.
But Shakespear shews us another sort of address, his manners and good
breeding must not be like the rest of the Civil World. Brabantio was not in
Masquerade, was not incognito; Jago well knew his rank and dignity.
Jago: Te Magnifico is much beloved,
And hath in his effect, a voice potential
As double as the Duke—
Othello in the Seventeenth Century 53
But besides the Manners to a Magnifico, humanity cannot bear that an old
Gentleman in his misfortune should be insulted over with such a rabble of
Skoundrel language, when no cause or provocation. Yet thus it is on our Stage,
this is our School of good manners, and the Speculum Vitae.
But our Magnif ico is here in the dark, nor are yet his Robes on: attend
him to the Senate house, and there see the difference, see the effects of
Purple.
So, by and by, we find the Duke of Venice with his Senators in Councel, at
Midnight, upon advice that the Turks, or Ottamites, or both together, were
ready in transport Ships, put to Sea, in order to make a Descent upon Cyprus.
Tis is the posture, when we see Brabantio, and Othello join them. By their
Conduct and manner of talk, a body must strain hard to fancy the Scene at
Venice; And not rather in some of our Cinq-ports, where the Baily and his
Fisher-men are knocking their heads together on account of some Whale;
or some terrible broil upon the Coast. But to shew them true Venetians, the
Maritime affairs stick not long on their hand; the publick may sink or swim.
Tey will sit up all night to hear a Doctors Commons, Matrimonial, Cause.
And have the Merits of the Cause at large laid open to ’em, that they may
decide it before they Stir. What can be pleaded to keep awake their attention
so wonderfully?
Never, sure, was form of pleading so tedious and so heavy, as this whole Scene,
and midnight entertainment. Take his own words: says the Respondent.
Oth.: Most potent, grave, and reverend Signiors,
My very noble, and approv’d good Masters:
Tat I have tane away this old mans Daughter;
It is most true: true, I have Married her,
Te very front and head of my offending,
Hath this extent, no more: rude I am in my speech.
And little blest with the set phrase of peace,
For since these Arms of mine had seven years pith,
Till now some nine Moons wasted, they have us’d
Teir dearest action in the Tented Field:
And little of this great World can I speak,
More than pertains to Broils and Battail,
And therefore little shall I grace my Cause,
In speaking of my self; yet by your gracious patience
I would a round unravish’d Tale deliver,
Of my whole course of love, what drugs, what charms
What Conjuration, and what mighty Magick,
(for such proceedings am I charg’d withal)
I won his Daughter.
Othello 54
All this is but Preamble, to tell the Court that He wants words. Tis was the
Eloquence which kept them up all Night, and drew their attention, in the midst
of their alarms.
One might rather think the novelty, and strangeness of the case prevail’d
upon them: no, the Senators do not reckon it strange at all. Instead of starting
at the Prodigy, every one is familiar with Desdemona, as he were her own natural
Father, rejoice in her good fortune, and wish their own several Daughters as
hopefully married. Should the Poet have provided such a Husband for an only
Daughter of any noble Peer in England, the Black-amoor must have chang’d his
Skin, to look our House of Lords in the Face.
Aeschylus is noted in Aristophanes for letting Niobe be two or three Acts on
the Stage, before she speaks. Our Noble Venetian, sure, is in the other more
unnatural extreme. His words flow in abundance; no Butter-Quean can be more
lavish. Nay: he is for talking of State-Affairs too, above any body:
Bra.: Please it your Grace, on to the State Affairs—
Yet is this Brabantio sensible of his affliction; before the end of the Play his
Heart breaks, he dies.
Gra.: Poor Desdemona, I am glad thy Father’s dead,
Ty match was mortal to him, and pure grief
Shore his old thread in twain—
A third part in a Tragedy is the Toughts: from Venetians, Noblemen, and
Senators, we may expect fine Toughts. Here is a tryal of skill: for a parting blow,
the Duke, and Brabantio Cap sentences. Where then shall we seek for the thoughts,
if we let slip this occasion? says the Duke:
Duke: Let me speak like your self and lay a Sentence,
Which like a greese or step, may help these lovers
Into your favour.
When remedies are past the grief is ended,
By seeing the worst which late on hopes depended,
To mourn a mischief that is past and gone,
Is the next way to draw more mischief on;
What cannot be preserv’d when Fortune takes,
Patience her injury a Mocker makes.
Te rob’d that smiles, steals something from a Tief,
He robs himself, that spends an hopeless grief.
Bra.: So let the Turk of Cyprus us beguile
We lose it not so long as we can smile;
Othello in the Seventeenth Century 55
He bears the sentence well, that nothing bears
But the free comfort which from thence he hears,
But he bears both the sentence and the sorrow,
Tat to pay grief must of poor patience borrow:
Tese Sentences to Sugar, or to Gall,
Being strong on both sides are equivocal.
But words are words, I never yet did hear,
Tat the bruis’d Heart was pierced through the Ear.
Beseech you now to the affairs of State.
How far wou’d the Queen of Sheba have travell’d to hear the Wisdom of our
Noble Venetians? or is not our Brentford a Venetian Colony, for methinks their
talk is the very same?
What says Prince Volscius?
Volscius: What shall I do, what conduct shall I find
To lead me through this twy light of my mind?
What says Amaryllis?
Ama.: I hope its slow beginning will portend
A forward exit to all future end.
What says Prince Pretty-man?
Pre.: Was ever Son yet brought to this distress,
To be, for being a Son, made Fatherless?
Ah, you just gods, rob me not of a Father,
Te being of a Son take from me rather.
Panurge, sadly perplexed, and trying all the means in the World, to be well
advised, in that knotty point whether he should Marry, or no; Amongst the rest,
consults Raminigrobis, an old Poet; as one belonging to Apollo; And from whom
he might expect something like an Oracle. And he was not disappointed. From
Raminigrobis he had this Answer:
Prenez la, ne la prenez pas.
Si vous la prenez, c’est bien fait.
Si ne la prenez, en effet
Ce sera ouvre par compas.
Gallopez, mais allez le pas.
Recullez, entrés y de fait.
Othello 56
Prenez la, ne.
Take, or not take her, off or on:
Handy dandy is your Lot.
When her name you write, you blot.
’Tis undone, when all is done,
Ended, ere it is begun.
Never Gallop whilst you Trot.
Set not forward, when you run,
Nor be single, tho’ alone,
Take, or not take her, off, or on.

What provocation, or cause of malice our Poet might have to Libel the
most Serene Republick, I cannot tell: but certainly, there can be no wit in this
representation.
For the Second Act, our Poet having dispatcht his affairs at Venice, shews the
Action next (I know not how many leagues off) in the Island of Cyprus. Te
Audience must be there too: And yet our Bays had it never in his head, to make
any provision of Transport Ships for them.
In the days that the Old Testament was Acted in Clerkenwell, by the Parish
Clerks of London, the Israelites might pass through the Red sea: but alass, at this
time, we have no Moses to bid the Waters make way, and to Usher us along. Well,
the absurdities of this kind break no Bones. Tey may make Fools of us; but do
not hurt our Morals.
Come a-shoar then, and observe the Countenance of the People, after the
dreadful Storm, and their apprehensions from an Invasion by the Ottomites,
their succour and friends scatter’d and tost, no body knew whither. Te
first that came to Land was Cassio, his first Salutation to the Governour,
Montanio, is:
Cas.: Tanks to the valiant of this Isle:
Tat so approve the Moor, and let the Heavens
Give him defence against their Elements,
For I have lost him on the dangerous Sea.
To him the Governour speaks, indeed, like a Man in his wits.
Mont.: Is he well Shipt?
Te Lieutenant answers thus.
Cas.: His Bark is stoutly Tymber’d, and his Pilot
Of very expert, and approv’d allowance,
Othello in the Seventeenth Century 57
Terefore my hopes (not surfeited to death)
Stand in bold care.
Te Governours first question was very proper; his next question, in this
posture of affairs, is:
Mont.: But, good Lieutenant, is our general Wiv’d?
A question so remote, so impertinent and absurd, so odd and surprising never
entered Bayes’s Pericranium. Only the answer may Tally with it.
Cas.: Most fortunately, he hath atcheiv’d a Maid,
Tat Parragons description, and wild fame:
One that excels the quirks of blasoning Pens:
And in the essential vesture of Creation,
Does bear an excellency—
Tey who like this Authors writing will not be offended to find so much
repeated from him. I pretend not here to tax either the Sense, or the Language;
those Circumstances had their proper place in the Venetian Senate. What I now
cite is to shew how probable, how natural, how reasonable the Conduct is, all
along.
I thought it enough that Cassio should be acquainted with a Virgin of that
rank and consideration in Venice, as Desdemona. I wondred that in the Senate-
house every one should know her so familiarly: yet, here also at Cyprus, every
body is in a rapture at the name of Desdemona: except only Montanio who must
be ignorant; that Cassio, who has an excellent cut in shaping an Answer, may
give him the satisfaction:
Mont.: What is she?
Cas.: She that I spoke of: our Captains Captain,
Left in the Conduct of the bold Jago,
Whose footing here anticipates our thoughts
A Sennets speed: great Jove Othello guard,
And swell his Sail with thine own powerful breath,
Tat he may bless this Bay with his Tall Ship,
And swiftly come to Desdemona’s Arms,
Give renewed fire to our extincted Spirits,
And bring all Cyprus comfort:
(Enter Desdemona, &c.)
O behold,
Te riches of the Ship is come on shoar.
Othello 58
Ye men of Cyprus, let her have your Knees:
Hail to the Lady: and the Grace of Heaven
Before, behind thee, and on every hand.
Enwheel the round—
In the name of phrenzy, what means this Souldier? or would he talk thus, if
he meant any thing at all? Who can say Shakespear is to blame in his Character of
a Souldier? Has he not here done him reason? When cou’d our Tramontains talk
at this rate? but our Jarsey and Garnsey Captains must not speak so fine things,
nor compare with the Mediterranean, or Garrisons in Rhodes and Cyprus.
Te next thing our Officer does, is to salute Jago’s Wife, with this Conge to
the Husband,
Cas.: Good Ancient, you are welcome, welcome Mistriss,
Let it not Gall your Patience, good Jago,
Tat I extend my Manners, ’tis my Breeding,
Tat gives me this bold shew of Curtesy.
Jago: Sir, would she give you so much of her lips,
As of her tongue she has bestow’d on me,
You’d have enough.
Desd. Alass! she has no speech.
Now follows a long rabble of Jack-pudden farce betwixt Jago and Desdemona,
that runs on with all the little plays, jingle, and trash below the patience of any
Countrey Kitchin-maid with her Sweet-heart. Te Venetian Donna is hard put
to’t for pastime! And this is all, when they are newly got on shoar, from a dismal
Tempest, and when every moment she might expect to hear her Lord (as she
calls him) that she runs so mad after, is arriv’d or lost. And moreover.
In a Town of War,
the peoples Hearts brimful of fear.
Never in the World had any Pagan Poet his Brains tum’d at this Monstrous
rate. But the ground of all this Bedlam-Buffoonry we saw, in the case of the
French Strolers, the Company for Acting Christs Passion, or the Old Testament,
were Carpenters, Coblers, and illiterate fellows; who found that the Drolls, and
Fooleries interlarded by them, brought in the rabble, and lengthened their time,
so they got Money by the bargain.
Our Shakespear, doubtless, was a great Master in this craft. Tese Carpenters
and Coblers were the guides he followed. And it is then no wonder that we find
so much farce and Apochryphal Matter in his Tragedies. Tereby un-hallowing
the Teatre, profaning the name of Tragedy; And instead of representing Men
Othello in the Seventeenth Century 59
and Manners, turning all Morality, good sence, and humanity into mockery
and derision.
But pass we to something of a more serious air and Complexion. Othello and
his Bride are the first Night, no sooner warm in Bed together, but a Drunken
Quarrel happening in the Garison, two Souldiers Fight; And the General rises
to part the Fray: He swears.
Oth.: Now by Heaven,
My blood begins my safer guides to rule,
And passion, having my best judgment cool’d,
Assays to lead the way: if once I stir,
Or do but lift this arm, the best of you
Shall sink in my rebuke: give me to know
How this foul rout began; who set it on,
And he that is approv’d in this offence,
To’ he had rwin’d with me both at a birth,
Should lose me: what, in a Town of War,
Yet wild, the peoples Hearts brimful of fear,
To manage private, and domestick quarrels,
In Night, and on the Court, and guard of safety,
Tis Monstrous, Jago, who began?
In the days of yore, Souldiers did not swear in this fashion. What should a
Souldier say farther, when he swears, unless he blaspheme? action shou’d speak
the rest. What follows must be ex oregladii; He is to rap out an Oath, not With-
draw and Spin it out: by the style one might judge that Shakespears Souldiers
were never bred in a Camp, but rather had belong’d to some Affidavit-Office.
Consider also throughout this whole Scene, how the Moorish General proceeds
in examining into this Rout; No Justice Clod-pate could go on with more Phlegm
and deliberation. Te very first night that he lyes with the Divine Desdemona to be
thus interrupted, might provoke a Mans Christian Patience to swear in another
style. But a Negro General is a Man of strange Mettle. Only his Venetian Bride
is a match for him. She understands that the Souldiers in the Garison are by th’
ears together: And presently she at midnight, is in amongst them.
Desd.: What’s the matter there?
Othel.: All’s well now Sweeting—
Come away to Bed—
In the beginning of this second Act, before they had lain together, Desdemona
was said to be, our Captains Captain; Now they are no sooner in Bed together,
but Jago is advising Cassio in these words.
Othello 60
Jago: Our Generals Wife is now the General, I may say so in this
respect, for that he hath devoted, and given up himself to the
contemplation, mark, and devotement of her parts and graces. Confess
your self freely to her, importune her; she’ll help to put you in your
place again: she is so free, so kind, so apt, so blessed a disposition,
that she holds it a vice in her goodness, not to do more than she is
requested. Tis broken joint between you and her Husband, intreat her
to splinter—
And he says afterwards.
Jago: Tis most easie
Te inclining Desdemona to subdue,
In any honest suit. She’s fram’d as fruitful,
As the free Elements: And then for her
To win the Moor, were’t to renounce his Baptism,
All seals and symbols of redeemed sin,
His soul is so enfetter’d to her love,
Tat she may make, unmake, do what she list:
Even as her appetite shall play the God
With his weak function—
Tis kind of discourse implies an experience and long conversation, the
Honey-Moon over, and a Marriage of some standing. Would any man, in
his wits, talk thus of a Bridegroom and Bride the first night of their coming
together?
Yet this is necessary for our Poet; it would not otherwise serve his turn. Tis
is the source, the foundation of his Plot; hence is the spring and occasion for all
the Jealousie and bluster that ensues.
Nor are we in better circumstances for Roderigo. Te last thing said by him
in the former Act was,
Rod.: I’ll go sell all my Land.
A fair Estate is sold to put money in his Purse, for this adventure. And lo here,
the next day.
Rod.: I do follow here in the Chace, not like a Hound that hunts, but
one that fills up the cry: My Money is almost spent. I have been tonight
exceedingly well cudgell’d, I think the issue will be, I shall have so much
experience for my pains, and so no Money at all, and with a little more
wit return to Venice.
Othello in the Seventeenth Century 61
Te Venetian squire had a good riddance for his Acres. Te Poet allows him
just time to be once drunk, a very conscionable reckoning!
In this Second Act, the face of affairs could in truth be no other, than
in a Town of War,
Yet wild, the peoples Hearts brim-ful of fear.
But nothing either in this Act, or in the rest that follow, shew any colour or
complexion, any resemblance or proportion to that face and posture it ought to
bear. Should a Painter draw any one Scene of this Play, and write over it, Tis is a
Town of War; would any body believe that the Man were in his senses? would not
a Goose, or Dromedary for it, be a name as just and suitable? And what in Painting
would be absurd, can never pass upon the World of Poetry.
Cassio having escaped the Storm comes on shoar at Cyprus, that night gets
Drunk, Fights, is turn’d out from his Command, grows sober again, takes advice
how to be restor’d, is all Repentance and Mortification: yet before he sleeps, is
in the Morning at his Generals door with a noise of Fiddles, and a Droll to
introduce him to a little Mouth-speech with the Bride.
Cassio: Give me advantage of some brief discourse
With Desdemona alone.
Em.: Pray you come in,
I will bestow you, where you shall have time
To speak your bosom freely.
So, they are put together: And when he had gone on a good while speaking
his bosom, Desdemona answers him.
Desd.: Do not doubt that, before Emilia here,
I give thee warrant of thy place; assure thee,
If I do vow a friendship, I’ll perform it,
To the last article—
Ten after a ribble rabble of fulsome impertinence, She is at her Husband
slap dash:
Desd.: Good love, call him back.
Othel.: Not now, sweet Desdemona, some other time.
Desd.: But shall’t shortly?
Othel: Te sooner, sweet, for you.
Desd.: Shall’t be to-night at Supper?
Othel: No, not tonight.
Othello 62
Desd.: To-morrow Dinner then?
Othel. I shall not dine at home,
I meet the Captains at the Citadel.
Desd.: Why then to morrow night, or Tuesday morn,
Or night, or Wednesday morn?
After forty lines more, at this rate, they part, and then comes the wonderful
Scene, where Jago by shrugs, half words, and ambiguous reflections, works Othello
up to be Jealous. One might think, after what we have seen, that there needs
no great cunning, no great poetry and address to make the Moor Jealous. Such
impatience, such a rout for a handsome young fellow, the very morning after her
Marriage must make him either to be jealous, or to take her for a Changeling,
below his Jealousie. After this Scene, it might strain the Poets skill to reconcile
the couple, and allay the Jealousie. Jago now can only actum agere, and vex the
audience with a nauseous repetition.
Whence comes it then, that this is the top scene, the Scene that raises Othello
above all other Tragedies on our Teatres? It is purely from the Action; from the
Mops and the Mows, the Grimace, the Grins and Gesticulation. Such scenes as
this have made all the World run after Harlequin and Scaramuccio.
Te several degrees of Action were amongst the Ancients distinguish’d by the
Cothurnus, the Soccus, and by the Planipes.
Had this scene been represented at old Rome, Othello and Jago must have
quitted their Buskins; Tey must have played bare-foot: the spectators would not
have been content without seeing their Podometry; And the Jealousie work at
the very Toes of ’em. Words, be they Spanish, or Polish, or any inarticulate sound,
have the same effect, they can only serve to distinguish, and, as it were, beat time
to the Action. But here we see a known Language does wofully encumber, and
clog the operation: as either forc’d, or heavy, or trifling, or incoherent, or improper,
or most what improbable. When no words interpose to spoil the conceipt, every
one interprets as he likes best. So in that memorable dispute betwixt Panurge
and our English Philosopher in Rabelais, perform’d without a word speaking;
Te Teologians, Physicians, and Surgeons, made one inference; the Lawyers,
Civilians, and Canonists, drew another conclusion more to their mind.
Othello the night of his arrival at Cyprus, is to consummate with Desdemona,
they go to Bed. Both are rais’d and run into the Town amidst the Souldiers that
were a fighting: then go to Bed again, that morning he sees Cassio with her; She
importunes him to restore Cassio. Othello shews nothing of the Souldiers Mettle:
but like a tedious, drawling, tame Goose, is gaping after any paultrey insinuation,
labouring to be jealous; And catching at every blown surmize.
Jago: My Lord, I see you are moved.
Oth.: No, not much moved.
Othello in the Seventeenth Century 63
Do not think but Desdemona is honest.
Jago: Long live she so, and long live you to think so.
Oth.: And yet how Nature erring from it self,
Jago: I, Tere’s the point: as to be bold with you,
Not to affect many proposed Matches
Of her own clime, complexion, and degree,
Wherein we see, in all things. Nature tends,
Fye, we may smell in such a will most rank,
Foul disproportion, thoughts unnatural—
Te Poet here is certainly in the right, and by consequence the foundation
of the Play must be concluded to be Monstrous; And the constitution, all over,
to be
most rank,
Foul disproportion, thoughts unnatural.
Which instead of moving pity, or any passion Tragical and Reasonable,
can produce nothing but horror and aversion, and what is odious and grievous
to an Audience. After this fair Mornings work, the Bride enters, drops a
Cursey.
Desd.: How now, my dear Othello,
Your Dinner, and the generous Islanders
By you invited, do attend your presence.
Oth.: I am to blame.
Desd.: Why is your speech so faint? Are you not well.
Oth.: I have a pain upon my Fore-head, dear.
Michael Cassio came not from Venice in the Ship with Desdemona, nor till this
Morning could be suspected of an opportunity with her. And ’tis now but Dinner
time; yet the Moor complains of his Fore-head. He might have set a Guard on
Cassio, or have lockt up Desdemona, or have observ’d their carriage a day or two
longer. He is on other occasions phlegmatick enough: this is very hasty. But after
Dinner we have a wonderful flight:
Othel.: What sense had I of her stoln hours of lust?
I saw’t not, thought it not, it harm’d not me:
I slept the next night well, was free and merry,
I found not Cassio’s kisses on her lips—
A little after this, says he,
Othello 64
Oth.: Give me a living reason that she’s disloyal.
Jago: I lay with Cassio lately,
And being troubled with a raging Tooth, I could not sleep;
Tere are a kind of men so loose of Soul,
Tat in their sleeps will mutter their affairs,
One of this kind is Cassio:
In sleep I heard him say: sweet Desdemona,
Let us be wary, let us hide our loves:
And then, Sir, wou’d he gripe, and wring my hand,
Cry out, sweet Creature; and then kiss me hard,
As if he pluckt up kisses by the roots,
Tat grew upon my Lips, then laid his Leg
Over my Tigh, and sigh’d, and kiss’d, and then
Cry’d, cursed fate, that gave thee to the Moor.
By the Rapture of Othello, one might think that he raves, is not of sound
Memory, forgets that he has not yet been two nights in the Matrimonial Bed
with his Desdemona. But we find Jago, who should have a better memory, forging
his lies after the very same Model. Te very night of their Marriage at Venice, the
Moor, and also Cassio, were sent away to Cyprus. In the Second Act, Othello and
his Bride go the first time to Bed; Te Tird Act opens the next morning. Te
parties have been in view to this moment. We saw the opportunity which was
given for Cassio to speak his bosom to her; once, indeed, might go a great way with
a Venetian. But once, will not do the Poets business; Te Audience must suppose
a great many bouts, to make the plot operate. Tey must deny their senses, to
reconcile it to common sense: or make it any way consistent, and hang together.
Nor, for the most part, are the single thoughts more consistent, than is the
economy: Te Indians do as they ought in painting the Devil White: but says
Othello:
Oth.: Her name that was as fresh
As Dion’s Visage, is now begrim’d and black,
As mine own face—
Tere is not a Monky but understands Nature better; not a Pug in Barbary
that has not a truer taste of things.
Othel.: O now for ever
Farewel the tranquil mind, farewel content;
Farewel the plumed troop, and the big Wars,
Tat make Ambition Vertue: O farewel,
Farewel the neighing Steed, and the shrill Trump,
Othello in the Seventeenth Century 65
Te spirit stirring Drum, th’ ear-piercing Fief,
Te royal Banner, and all quality,
Pride, Pomp, and Circumstance of glorious War,
And O ye Mortal Engines, whose wide throats
T’ immortal Joves great clamours counterfeit,
Farewel, Othello’s occupation’s gone.
Tese lines are recited here, not for any thing Poetical in them, besides the
sound, that pleases. Yet this sort of imagery and amplification is extreamly taking,
where it is just and natural. As in Gorboduck, when a young Princess on whose fancy
the personal gallantry of the Kings Son then slain, had made a strong impression,
thus, out of the abundance of her imagination, pours forth her grief:
Marcella: Ah noble Prince! how oft have I beheld
Tee mounted on thy fierce, and trampling Steed,
Shining in Armour bright before the Tilt,
Wearing thy Mistress sleeve ty’d on thy helm.
Ten charge thy staff, to please thy Ladies Eye,
Tat bow’d the head piece of thy friendly Foe?
How oft in arms, on Horse to bend the Mace,
How oft in arms, on foot, to break the Spear;
Which never now these Eyes may see agen?
Notwithstanding that this Scene had proceeded with fury and bluster
sufficient to make the whole Isle ring of his Jealousy, yet is Desdemona diverting
her self with a paultry buffoon and only solicitous in quest of Cassio.
Desd.: Seek him, bid him come hither, tell him—
Where shou’d I lose that Handkerchief, Emilia?
Believe me I had rather lose my Purse,
Full of Crusado’s: And but my noble Moor
Is true of mind, and made of no such baseness,
As Jealous Creatures are; it were enough
To put him to ill thinking.
Em.: Is he not Jealous?
Desd.: Who he? I think the Sun, where he was born,
Drew all such humours from him.
By this manner of speech one wou’d gather the couple had been yoak’d
together a competent while, what might she say more, had they cohabited, and
had been Man and Wife seven years?
She spies the Moor.
Othello 66
Desd.: I will not leave him now,
Till Cassio is recall’d.
I have sent to bid Cassio come speak with you.
Othel: Lend me thy Handkerchief.
Desd.: Tis is a trick to put me from my suit.
I pray let Cassio be receiv’d agen.
Em.: Is not this man Jealous?
’tis not a year or two shews us a man—
As if for the first year or two, Othello had not been jealous? Te third Act begins
in the morning, at noon she drops the Handkerchief, after dinner she misses it,
and then follows all this outrage and horrible clutter about it. If we believe a small
Damosel in the last Scene of this Act, this day is effectually seven days.
Bianca: What keep a week away! seven days,
seven nights,
Eightscore eight hours, and lovers absent hours,
More tedious than the Dial eightscore times.
O weary reckoning!
Our Poet is at this plunge, that whether this Act contains the compass of
one day, of seven days, or of seven years, or of all together, the repugnance and
absurdity would be the same. For Othello, all the while, has nothing to say or to
do, but what loudly proclaim him jealous: her friend and confident Emilia again
and again rounds her in the Ear that the Man is Jealous: yet this Venetian dame
is neither to see, nor to hear; nor to have any sense or understanding, nor to strike
any other note but Cassio, Cassio.
Te Scotchman hearing trut Scot, trut Scot, when he saw it came from a Bird,
checkt his Choler, and put up his Swerd again, with a Braad O God, G. Ifthaa’dst
ben a Maan, as th’ art ane Green Geuse, I sud ha stuck tha’ to thin heart. Desdemona
and that Parrot might pass for Birds of a Feather; and if Sauney had not been
more generous than Othello, but continued to insult the poor Creature after this
beastly example, he would have given our Poet as good stuff to work upon: And
his Tragedy of the Green Geuse, might have deserv’d a better audience, than this of
Desdemona, or Te Moor of Venice.
Act IV
Enter Jago and Othello
Jago: Will you think so?
Othel: Tink so, Jago.
Othello in the Seventeenth Century 67
Jago: What, to kiss in private?
Othel: An unauthorised kiss.
Jago: Or to be naked with her friend a-bed,
An hour or more, not meaning any harm?
Othel.: Naked a-bed, Jago, and not mean harm?—
At this gross rate of trifling, our General and his Auncient March on most
heroically; till the Jealous Booby has his Brains turn’d; and falls in a Trance.
Would any imagine this to be the Language of Venetians, of Souldiers, and
mighty Captains? no Bartholomew Droll cou’d subsist upon such trash. But lo, a
Stratagem never presented in Tragedy.
Jago: Stand you a while a part—
Incave your self;
And mark the Jeers, the Gibes, and notable scorns,
Tat dwell in every region of his face,
For I will make him tell the tale a new,
Where, how, how oft, how long ago, and when
He has, and is again to Cope your Wife:
I say, but mark his gesture—
With this device Othello withdraws. Says Jago aside.
Jago: Now will I question Cassio of Bianca,
A Huswife—
Tat doats on Cassio—
He when he hears of her cannot refrain
From the excess of Laughter—
As he shall smile, Othello shall go mad,
And his unbookish jealousy must conster
Poor Cassio’s smiles, gesture, and light behaviour
Quite in the wrong—
So to work they go: And Othello is as wise a commentator, and makes his
applications pat, as heart cou’d wish—but I wou’d not expect to find this Scene
acted nearer than in Southwark Fair. But the Hankerchief is brought in at last, to
stop all holes, and close the evidence. So now being satisfied with the proof, they
come to a resolution, that the offenders shall be murdered.
Othel: But yet the pity of it, Jago, ah the pity.
Jago: If you be so fond over her iniquity give her
Othello 68
Patent to offend. For if it touches not you, it comes near no Body.
Do it not with poison, strangle her in her Bed; Even the Bed she has
contaminated.
Oth.: Good, good, the Justice of it pleases, very good.
Jago: And for Cassio, let me be his undertaker—
Jago had some pretence to be discontent with Othello and Cassio: And what
passed hitherto, was the operation of revenge. Desdemona had never done him
harm, always kind to him, and to his Wife; was his Country-woman, a Dame
of quality: for him to abet her Murder, shews nothing of a Souldier, nothing
of a Man, nothing of Nature in it. Te Ordinary of Newgate never had the
like Monster to pass under his examination. Can it be any diversion to see a
Rogue beyond what the Devil ever finish’d? Or wou’d it be any instruction to
an Audience? Jago cou’d desire no better than to set Cassio and Othello, his two
Enemies, by the Ears together; so he might have been reveng’d on them both
at once: And chusing for his own share, the Murder of Desdemona, he had the
opportunity to play booty, and save the poor harmless wretch. But the Poet
must do every thing by contraries: to surprize the Audience still with something
horrible and prodigious, beyond any human imagination. At this rate he must
out-do the Devil, to be a Poet in the rank with Shakespear.
Soon after this, arrives from Venice, Ludovico, a noble Cousin of Desdemona,
presently she is at him also, on the behalf of Cassio.
Desd.: Cousin there’s fallen between him and my
Lord An unkind breach, but you shall make all well.
Lud.: Is there division ’twixt my Lord and Cassio.
Desd.: A most unhappy one, I wou’d do much
To attone them, for the love I bear to Cassio.
By this time, we are to believe the couple have been a week or two Married:
And Othello’s Jealousie that had rag’d so loudly, and had been so uneasie to
himself, must have reach’d her knowledge. Te Audience have all heard him more
plain with her, than was needful to a Venetian capacity: And yet she must still be
impertinent in her suit for Cassio, well, this Magnifico comes from the Doge, and
Senators, to displace Othello.
Lud.: Deputing Cassio in his Government.
Desd.: Trust me, I am glad on’t.
Oth.: Indeed.
Desd.: My Lord.
Oth.: I am glad to see you mad.
Desd.: How, sweet Othello.
Othello in the Seventeenth Century 69
Oth.: Devil.
Desd.: I have not deserved this.
Oth.. O Devil, Devil—
Out of my sight.
Desd.: I will not stay to offend you.
Lud.: Truly, an obedient Lady.
I do beseech your Lordship call her back.
Oth.: Mistress.
Desd.: My Lord.
Oth.: What would you with her sir?
Lud.: Who, I, my Lord?
Oth.: I, you did wish that I wou’d make her turn.
Sir, she can turn, and turn, and yet go on,
And turn agen, and she can weep, Sir, weep.
And she is obedient, as you say, obedient:
Very obedient—
Lud.: What strike your Wife?
Of what flesh and blood does our Poet make these noble Venetians? the men
without Gall; the Women without either Brains or Sense? A Senators Daughter
runs away with this Black-amoor; the Government employs this Moor to defend
them against the Turks, so resent not the Moors Marriage at present, but the
danger over, her Father gets the Moor Cashier’d, sends his Kinsman, Seignior
Ludovico, to Cyprus with the Commission for a new General; who, at his arrival,
finds the Moor calling the Lady his Kinswoman, Whore and Strumpet, and
kicking her: what says the Magnifico?
Lud.: My Lord this would not be believ’d in Venice,
To’ I shou’d swear I saw’t, ’tis very much;
Make her amends: she weeps.
Te Moor has no body to take his part, no body of his Colour: Ludovico has
the new Governour Cassio, and all his Countrymen Venetians about him. What
Poet wou’d give a villanous Black-amoor this Ascendant? What Tramontain
could fancy the Venetians so low, so despicable, or so patient? this outrage to an
injur’d Lady, the Divine Desdemona, might in a colder Climate have provoked
some body to be her Champion: but the Italians may well conclude we have a
strange Genius for Poetry. In the next Scene Othello is examining the supposed
Bawd; then follows another storm of horrour and outrage against the poor
Chicken, his Wife. Some Drayman or drunken Tinker might possibly treat his
drab at this sort of rate, and mean no harm by it: but for his excellency, a My
lord General, to Serenade a Senator’s Daughter with such a volly of scoundrel
Othello 70
filthy Language, is sure the most absurd Maggot that ever bred from any Poets
addle Brain.
And she is in the right, who tells us,
Emil.: A Begger in his Drink,
Cou’d not have laid such terms upon his Callet.
Tis is not to describe passion. Seneca had another notion in the Case:
Parvae loquuntur curae, ingentes stupent.
And so had the Painter, who drew Agamemnon with his Face covered. Yet
to make all worse, her Murder, and the manner of it, had before been resolv’d
upon and concerted. But nothing is to provoke a Venetian; she takes all in good
part; had the Scene lain in Russia, what cou’d we have expected more? With us a
Tinkers Trull wou’d be Nettled, wou’d repartee with more spirit, and not appear
so void of spleen.
Desd.: O good Jago,
What shall I do to win my Lord agen?
No Woman bred out of a Pig-stye, cou’d talk so meanly. After this,
she is call’d to Supper with Othello, Ludovico, &c. after that comes a filthy
sort of Pastoral Scene, where the Wedding Sheets, and Song of Willow, and
her Mothers Maid, poor Barbara, are not the least moving things in this
entertainment. But that we may not be kept too long in the dumps, nor the
melancholy Scenes lye too heavy, undigested on our Stomach, this Act gives us
for a farewell, the salsa, O picante, some quibbles, and smart touches, as Ovid
had Prophecied:
Est & in obscenos deflexa Tragoedia risus.
Te last Act begins with Jago and Roderigo; Who a little before had been upon
the huff:
Rod.: I say it is not very well: I will make my self known to Desdemona;
if she will return me my Jewels, I will give over my suit, and repent my
unlawful sollicitation, if not, assure your self, I’ll seek satisfaction of you.
Roderigo, a Noble Venetian had sought Desdemona in Marriage, is troubled to
find the Moor had got her from him, advises with Jago, who wheadles him to sell
his Estate, and go over the Sea to Cyprus, in expectation to Cuckold Othello, there
Othello in the Seventeenth Century 71
having cheated Roderigo of all his Money and Jewels, on pretence of presenting
them to Desdemona, our Gallant grows angry, and would have satisfaction from
Jago; who sets all right, by telling him Cassio is to be Governour, Othello is going
with Desdemona into Mauritania: to prevent this, you are to murder Cassio, and
then all may be well.
Jago: He goes into Mauritania, and takes with him the fair Desdemona,
unless his abode be lingred here by some accident, wherein none can be
so determinate, as the removing of Cassio.
Had Roderigo been one of the Banditi, he might not much stick at the
Murder. But why Roderigo should take this for payment, and risque his person
where the prospect of advantage is so very uncertain and remote, no body can
imagine. It had need be a super-subtle Venetian that this Plot will pass upon. Ten
after a little spurt of villany and Murder, we are brought to the most lamentable,
that ever appear’d on any Stage. A noble Venetian Lady is to be murdered by our
Poet; in sober sadness, purely for being a Fool. No Pagan Poet but wou’d have
found some Machine for her deliverance. Pegasus wou’d have strain’d hard to have
brought old Perseus on his back, time enough, to rescue this Andromeda from
so foul a Monster. Has our Christian Poetry no generosity, nor bowels? Ha, Sir
Lancelot! ha St. George! will no Ghost leave the shades for us in extremity, to save
a distressed Damosel?
But for our comfort, however felonious is the Heart, hear with what soft
language, he does approach her, with a Candle in his Hand:
Oth.: Put out the light and then put out the light;
If I quench thee, thou flaming Minister,
I can again thy former light restore—
Who would call him a Barbarian, Monster, Savage? Is this a Black-amoor?
Soles occidere & redire possunt—
Te very Soul and Quintessence of Sir George Etheridge.
One might think the General should not glory much in this action, but
make an hasty work on’t, and have turn’d his Eyes away from so unsouldierly
an Execution: yet is he all pause and deliberation; handles her as calmly: and
is as careful of her Souls health, as it had been her Father Confessor. Have you
prayed to Night, Desdemona? But the suspence is necessary, that he might
have a convenient while so to roul his Eyes, and so to gnaw his nether lip to the
spectators. Besides the greater cruelty—sub tarn lentis maxillis.
But hark, a most tragical thing laid to her charge.
Othello 72
Oth.: Tat Handkerchief, that I so lov’d, and gave thee,
Tou gav’st to Cassio.
Desd.: No by my Life and Soul;
Send for the man and ask him.
Oth.: By Heaven, I saw my Handkerchief in his hand—
—I saw the Handkerchief.
So much ado, so much stress, so much passion and repetition about an
Handkerchief! Why was not this call’d the Tragedy of the Handkerchief? What can
be more absurd than (as Quintilian expresses it) in parvis litibus has Tragoedias
movere? We have heard of Fortunatus his Purse, and of the Invisible Cloak, long
ago worn thread bare, and stow’d up in the Wardrobe of obsolete Romances: one
might think, that were a fitter place for this Handkerchief, than that it, at this
time of day, be worn on the Stage, to raise every where all this clutter and turmoil.
Had it been Desdemona’s Garter, the Sagacious Moor might have smelt a Rat: but
the Handkerchief is so remote a trifle, no Booby, on this side Mauritania, cou’d
make any consequence from it.
We may learn here, that a Woman never loses her Tongue, even tho’ after she
is stifl’d.
Desd.: O falsly, falsly murder’d.
Em.: Sweet Desdemona, O sweet Mistress, speak.
Desd.: A guiltless death I dye.
Em.: O who has done the deed?
Desd.: No body, I my self, farewel.
Commend me to my kind Lord, O farewel.
Tis Desdemona is a black swan; or an old Black-amoor is a bewitching
Bed-fellow. If this be Nature, it is a laschete below what the English Language
can express.
For Lardella, to make love, like an Humble Bee, was, in the Rehearsal, thought
a fancy odd enough.
But hark what follows:
Oth.: O heavy hour!
Methinks it shou’d be now a huge Eclipse
Of Sun and Moon, and that the affrighted globe
Shou’d yawn at Alteration.
Tis is wonderful. Here is Poetry to elevate and amuse. Here is sound All-
sufficient. It wou’d be uncivil to ask Flamstead, if the Sun and Moon can both
Othello in the Seventeenth Century 73
together be so hugely eclipsed, in any heavy hour whatsoever. Nor must the
Spectators consult Gresham Colledge, whether a body is naturally frighted till he
Yawn agen. Te Fortune of Greece is not concern’d with these Matters. Tese
are Physical circumstances a Poet may be ignorant in, with out any harm to the
publick. Tese slips have no influence on our Manners and good Life; which are
the Poets Province.
Rather may we ask here what unnatural crime Desdemona, or her Parents had
committed, to bring this Judgment down upon her; to Wed a Black-amoor, and
innocent to be thus cruelly murder’d by him. What instruction can we make out of
this Catastrophe? Or whither must our reflection lead us? Is not this to envenome
and sour our spirits, to make us repine and grumble at Providence; and the
government of the World? If this be our end, what boots it to be Vertuous?
Desdemona dropt the Handkerchief, and missed it that very day after her
Marriage; it might have been rumpl’d up with her Wedding sheets: And this
Night that she lay in her wedding sheets, the Fairey Napkin (whilst Othello was
stifling her) might have started up to disarm his fury, and stop his ungracious
mouth. Ten might she (in a Traunce for fear) have lain as dead. Ten might he,
believing her dead, touch’d with remorse, have honestly cut his own Troat, by the
good leave, and with the applause of all the Spectators. Who might thereupon
have gone home with a quiet mind, admiring the beauty of Providence; fairly and
truly represented on the Teatre.
Oth.: Why, how shou’d she be murdered?
Em.: Alas, who knows?
Oth.: You heard her say her self it was not I.
Em.. She did so, I must needs report a truth.
Oth.: She’s like a liar gone to burn in Hell.
Twas I that did it.
Em.: O, the more Angel she!
And you the blacker Devil.
Oth.: She turn’d to folly, and she was an Whore.
Em.: Tou dost belye her, and thou art a Devil.
Oth.: She was false as Water.
Em.: Tou art rash as Fire,
To say that she was false: O she was heavenly true.
In this kind of Dialogue they continue for forty lines farther, before she
bethinks her self, to cry Murder.
Em.: Help, help, O help,
Te Moor has kill’d my Mistress, murder, Murder.
Othello 74
But from this Scene to the end of the Play we meet with nothing but blood
and butchery, described much-what to the style of the last Speeches and Confessions
of the persons executed at Tyburn: with this difference, that there we have the fact,
and the due course of Justice, whereas our Poet against all Justice and Reason,
against all Law, Humanity and Nature, in a barbarous arbitrary way, executes and
makes havock of his subjects, Hab-nab, as they come to hand. Desdemona dropt
her Handkerchief; therefore she must be stifl’d. Othello, by law to be broken on
the Wheel, by the Poets cunning escapes with cutting his own Troat. Cassio,
for I know not what, comes off with a broken shin. ]ago murders his Benefactor
Roderigo, as this were poetical gratitude. Jago is not yet kill’d, because there never
yet was such a villain alive. Te Devil, if once he brings a man to be dipt in a
deadly sin, lets him alone, to take his course: and now when the Foul Fiend has
done with him, our wise Authors take the sinner into their poetical service; there
to accomplish him, and do the Devils drudgery.
Philosophy tells us it is a principle in the Nature of Man to be grateful.
History may tell us that John an Oaks, John a Stiles, or Jago were ungrateful;
Poetry is to follow Nature; Philosophy must be his guide: history and fact in
particular cases of John an Oaks, or John of Styles, are no warrant or direction
for a Poet. Terefore Aristotle is always telling us Poetry is spoudaioteron kai
philosophoteron, is more general and abstracted, is led more by the Philosophy,
the reason and nature of things, than History: which only records things higlety,
piglety, right or wrong as they happen. History might without any preamble or
difficulty, say that Jago was ungrateful. Philosophy then calls him unnatural; But
the Poet is not, without huge labour and preparation to expose the Monster;
and after shew the Divine Vengeance executed upon him. Te Poet is not to add
willful Murder to his ingratitude: he has not antidote enough for the Poison: his
Hell and Furies are not punishment sufficient for one single crime, of that bulk
and aggravation.
Em.: O thou dull Moor, that Handkerchief thou speakest on,
I found by Fortune, and did give my Husband:
For often with a solemn earnestness,
(More than indeed belong’d to such a trifle)
He beg’d of me to steal it.
Here we see the meanest woman in the Play takes this Handkerchief for a
trifle below her Husband to trouble his head about it. Yet we find, it entered into
our Poets head, to make a Tragedy of this Trifle.
Ten for the unraveling of the Plot, as they call it, never was old deputy
Recorder in a Country Town, with his spectacles in summoning up the evidence,
at such a puzzle: so blunder’d, and bedoultefied: as is our Poet, to have a good
riddance: And get the Catastrophe off his hands.
Othello in the Seventeenth Century 75
What can remain with the Audience to carry home with them from this sort
of Poetry, for their use and edification? how can it work, unless (instead of settling
the mind, and purging our passions) to delude our senses, disorder our thoughts,
addle our brain, pervert our affections, hair our imaginations, corrupt our
appetite, and fill our head with vanity, confusion, Tintamarre, and Jingle-jangle,
beyond what all the Parish Clarks of London, with their old Testament farces, and
interludes, in Richard the seconds time cou’d ever pretend to? Our only hopes,
for the good of their Souls, can be, that these people go to the Playhouse, as they
do to Church, to sit still, look on one another, make no reflection, nor mind the
Play, more than they would a Sermon.
Tere is in this Play, some burlesk, some humour, and ramble of Comical Wit,
some shew, and some Mimickry to divert the spectators: but the tragical part is,
plainly none other, than a Bloody Farce, without salt or savour.
NOTES
1. Sueton. in Tib.
2. Rehearsal..
QQQ
1694—Charles Gildon. “Some Ref lections on Mr. Rymer’s
Short View of Tragedy and an Attempt at a Vindication
of Shakespeare,” from “Remarks on the Plays of Shakespear”
Charles Gildon (1665–1724)—translator, biographer, essayist, play-
wright, and poet—wrote a series of notes and essays to accompany
Rowe’s edition of Shakespeare, providing the first extensive commentar-
ies of the plays. He counted among his literary enemies Alexander Pope
and Jonathan Swift.
To begin with the Fable (as our Critic has done) I must tell him he has as falsly
as ridiculously represented it, which I shall endeavour to put in a Juster light.
Othello a Noble Moor, or Negro, that had by long Services and brave Acts
establish’d himself in the Opinion of the Senate of , wins the Affections of
Desdemona, Daughter to Brabantio (one of the Senators), by the moving account
he gives of the imminent Dangers he had passed and hazards he had ventured
through, a belief of which his known Virtue confirmed; and unknown to her
Father Marries her, and carries her (with the leave of the Senate) with him to
Cyprus, his Province. He makes Cassio his Lieutenant, tho’ Iago had sollicited
it by his Friends for himself; which Refusal, joyn’d with a jealousie that Othello
had had to do with his Wife, makes him contrive the destruction of Cassio and
Othello 76
the Moor, to gratifie his Revenge and Ambition. But having no way to revenge
himself sufficiently on the Moor (from whom he suppos’d he had receiv’d a double
Wrong) proportionable to the injury but this, he draws him with a great deal of
Cunning into a Jealousie of his Wife, and that by a chain of Circumstances
contriv’d to that purpose, and urg’d with all the taking insinuations imaginable;
particularly by a Handkerchief he had convey’d to Cassio (which Iago’s Wife
stole from Desdemona) to convince the Moor his Wife was too familiar with him,
having parted with such a favour to him (which she had on her Marriage receiv’d
from Othello with the strictest charge of preserving, it being a Gift of his Mother,
of Curious Work and secret Virtue). Othello, by these means won to a belief of
his own Infamy, resolves the Murder of those he concluded guilty, viz. Cassio and
his Wife. Iago officiously undertakes the dispatching of Cassio, having got his
Commission already, but is disappointed of his design, employing one Roderigo
to that purpose, who had follow’d him from Venice in hopes by his means to enjoy
Desdemona, as Iago had promis’d him. But the Moor effectually puts his Revenge
in Execution on his Wife, which is no sooner done but he’s convinc’d of his Error,
and in remorse kills himself, whilst Iago, the Cause of all this Villany, having slain
his Wife for discovering it, is borne away to a more ignominious Punishment, as
more proportion’d to his Villanies.
Te Fable to be perfect must be Admirable and Probable, and as it approaches
those two ’tis more or less perfect in its kind. Admirable is what is uncommon and
extraordinary. Probable is what is agreeable to common Opinion. Tis must be
the Test of this Fable of Othello; but then we must not take it as given us by our
Drolling Critic (who very truely confesseth in his former Book—and in that he
is no Changeling—he must be merry out of Season, as he always is) but as I have
laid it down, else we shou’d do Shakespeare a great deal of Injustice.
I suppose none will deny that it is Admirable: that is, compos’d of Incidents
that happen not e’ery day. His Antagonist confesses as much; there is therefore
nothing but the Probability of it attaqu’d by him, which I question not either
wholly to prove, or at least to set it on the same bottom with the best of Sophocles,
that of his Oedipus.
First, to see whether he have sinn’d against Probability, let us consider what
our Caviller objects, all which may be reduced to two Points. First, that ’tis not
probable that the Senate of Venice (tho’ it usually employ Strangers) should
employ a Moor against the Turk; neither is it in the next place probable that
Desdemona shou’d be in Love with him. On this turns all the Accusation, this is
the very Head of his offending.
All the Reason he gives, or rather implies, for the first Improbability is that ’tis
not likely the State of Venice wou’d employ a Moor (taking him for a Mahometan)
against the Turk, because of the mutual Bond of Religion. He indeed says not
so, but takes it for granted that Othello must be rather for the Turkish interest
than the Venetian, because a Moor. But, I think (nor does he oppose it with any
Othello in the Seventeenth Century 77
reason), the Character of the Venetian State being to employ Strangers in their
Wars, it gives sufficient ground to our Poet to suppose a Moor employ’d by ’em
as well as a German; that is, a Christian Moor, as Othello is represented by our
Poet, for from such a Moor there cou’d be no just fear of treachery in favour of
the Mahometans. He tells us—
I fetch my Life and Being from Men of Royal Siege.
Supposing him therefore the Son or Nephew of the Emperor of Monomotopa,
Aethiopia or Congo, forc’d to leave his Country for Religion (or any other
occasion), coming to Europe by the convenience of the Portugueze Ships, might
after several Fortunes serve first as a Voluntier till he had signaliz’d himself and
prov’d himself worthy of Command; part of this may very reasonably be drawn
from what the Poet makes him say. Now upon this Supposition it appears
more rational and probable the Venetians shou’d employ a Stranger who wholly
depended on themselves, and whose Country was too remote to influence him
to their prejudice, than other Strangers whose Princes may in some measure
direct their Actions for their own Advantage. But that Othello is suppos’d to be a
Christian is evident from the Second Act, and from these words of Iago:
—And then for her
To Win the Moor, were’t to renounce his Baptism, &c.
Why therefore an African Christian may not by the Venetians be suppos’d to be as
zealous against the Turks as an European Christian, I cannot imagine. So that this
Bustle of Littora littoribus Contraria, &c. is only an inconsiderate Amusement to
shew how little the Gentleman was troubled with thought when he wrote it.
No more to the purpose is that Heat he expresses against Shakespeare’s giving
a Name to his Moor, though Cinthio did not, though History did not warrant it.
For this can be no more objected to our Poet, than the perverting the Character
of Dido, and confounding the Chronology to bring her to the time of Aeneas,
is to Virgil; the first as ’tis not mention’d in History, so it does not contradict it;
but the last is a plain opposition to express History and Chronology. If Virgil be
allow’d his Reason for doing that, Shakespeare is not to seek for one for what he
has done. ’Twas necessary to give his Moor a place of some Figure in the World to
give him the greater Authority and to make his Actions the more Considerable,
and what place more likely to fix on than Venice, where Strangers are admitted to
the highest Commands in Military Affairs?
’Tis granted, a Negro here does seldom rise above a Trumpeter, nor often
perhaps higher at Venice. But then that proceeds from the Vice of Mankind,
which is the Poet’s Duty, as he informs us, to correct, and to represent things as
they should be, not as they are. Now ’tis certain, there is no reason in the nature
Othello 78
of things why a Negro of equal Birth and Merit should not be on an equal bottom
with a German, Hollander, French-man, &c. Te Poet, therefore, ought to show
justice to Nations as well as Persons, and set them to rights, which the common
course of things confounds. Te same reason stands in force for this as for
punishing the Wicked and making the Virtuous fortunate, which as Rapin and
all the Critics agree, the Poet ought to do though it generally happens otherways.
Te Poet has therefore well chosen a polite People to cast off this customary
Barbarity of confining Nations, without regard to their Virtue and Merits, to
slavery and contempt for the meer Accident of their Complexion.
I hope I have brought by this time as convincing proofs for the probability in
this particular as Mr. Rymer has against it, if I have not wholly gain’d my Point.
Now therefore I shall proceed to the probability of Desdemona’s Love for the
Moor, which I think is something more evident against him.
Whatever he aims at in his inconsistent Ramble against this may be reduc’d
to the Person and the Manner. Against the Person he quotes you two Verses out
of Horace that have no more reference to this than—in the Beginning God made
the Heaven and the Earth has to the proof of the Jus Divinum of lay Bishops. Te
Verses are these:
Sed non ut placidis coeant immitia, non ut
Serpentes avibus geminentur, tigribus agni.
Unless he can prove that the Colour of a Man alters his Species and turns him
into a Beast or Devil ’tis such a vulgar Error, so criminal a fondness of our Selves,
to allow nothing of Humanity to any but our own Acquaintance of the fairer hew
that I wonder a Man that pretends to be at all remov’d from the very Dreggs of
the thoughtless Mob should espouse it in so public a manner! A Critic, too, who
puts the Poet in mind of correcting the common corruptions of Custom. Any
Man that has convers’d with the best Travels, or read any thing of the History
of those parts on the continent of Africa discover’d by the Portugueze, must be
so far from robbing the Negroes of some Countrys there of Humanity that they
must grant them not only greater Heroes, nicer observers of Honour and all the
Moral Virtues that distinguish’d the old Romans, but also much better Christians
(where Christianity is profess’d) than we of Europe generally are. Tey move by
a nobler Principle, more open, free and generous, and not such slaves to sordid
Interest.
After all this, Othello being of Royal Blood, and a Christian, where is the
disparity of the Match? If either side is advanc’d, ’tis Desdemona. And why must
this Prince, though a Christian and of known and experienc’d Virtue, Courage, and
Conduct, be made such a Monster that the Venetian Lady can’t love him without
perverting Nature? Experience tells us that there’s nothing more common than
Matches of this kind where the Whites and Blacks cohabit, as in both the Indies.
Othello in the Seventeenth Century 79
And Even here at home Ladys that have not wanted white Adorers have indulg’d
their Amorous Dalliances with their Sable Lovers, without any of Othello’s
Qualifications, which is proof enough that Nature and Custom have not put
any such unpassable bar betwixt Creatures of the same kind because of different
colors; which I hope will remove the improbability of the Person, especially when
the powerful Auxilarys of extraordinary Merit and Vertues come to plead with
a generous Mind.
Te probability of the Person being thus confirmed, I shall now consider
that of the Manner of his obtaining her Love. To this end we must still keep
in mind the known and experienc’d Virtue of the Moor, which gave Credit and
Authority to what he said; and then we may easily suppose the story of his
Fortunes and Dangers would make an impression of Pity and admiration, at
least on the bosom of a Woman of a noble and generous Nature. No Man of any
generous Principle but must be touch’d at suff’ring Virtue, and value the noble
sufferer whose Courage and Bravery bears him through uncommon Trials and
extraordinary Dangers. Nor would it have less force on a Woman of any principle
of Honour and tenderness. She must be mov’d and pleas’d with the Narration,
she must admire his constant Virtue; and Admiration is the first step to Love,
which will easily gain upon those who have once entertain’d it.
Dido in Virgil was won by the Trojan stranger she never saw before by the
relation of his fortunes and Escapes; and some particulars of the Narration of
Aeneas carry full as ridiculous and absurd a Face as any thing Othello says; the
most trifling of which is,
And of the Cannibals that each other eat,
Te Anthropophagi, and Men whose Heads
Do grow beneath their Shoulders.
for all the rest is admirably fine, though our wonderful Critic can’t relish it. Tere
is a moving Beauty in each Line, the words are well chosen, and the Image they
give great and Poetical; what an Image does Desarts  give? Tat very Epithet
is a perfect Hypotyposis, and seems to place me in the midst of one where all
the active hurry of the World is lost; but all that I can say will not reach the
excellence of that Epithet, so many properties of such a place meet in it. But as
for the Cannibals, &c. and the Men whose Heads grow beneath their Shoulders, I
have heard it condemn’d by Men whose tast I generally approve; yet must they
give me leave to dissent from them here and permit me either wholly to justifie
Shakespeare, even here, or at least to put him on an equal bottom with Virgil in
his most beautiful part. For the fault lyes either in the Improbability of those
things, or their Impertinence to the business in Hand. First, Probability we know
is built on common Opinion; but ’tis certain the Cannibals have been generally
believed, and that with very good grounds of Truth; so that there can be no
Othello 80
doubt of the probability of that. Next for the Men whose Heads grow beneath
their Shoulders: though that is not establish’d on so good a Foundation as Truth
yet the general Traditionary belief of it in those days is sufficient to give it a
poetical probability. As this was not Improbable, so neither was it Impertinent,
for ’tis certain that whatever contributed to the raising her Idea of his Dangers
and Escapes must conduce to his aim. But to fall into the Hands of those whom
not only the fury of War but that of Custom makes Cruel, heightens the danger
and by consequence the Concern, especially in a young Lady possess’d with the
legend of the Nursery, whence she must have amazing Ideas of the Danger of
the brave Moor from them.
But at worst, Shakespeare is on as good a bottom as Virgil in this particular.
Te Narrative of Aeneas that won the Heart of Dido has many things full as
trifling and absurd as this, if not far more! . . .
. . . Te Absurdities in Homer are much more numerous than those in Virgil
(I mean those that must pass for such if this in Shakespeare is so), but because
they relate not to this particular I shall say nothing of them here. All these I have
remark’d in the Narration of Aeneas hinder’d not but that it won the Heart of
Dido, though firmly bent against a second Amour ( . . . ) especially one that was
not like to be so very Honorable. Desdemona had no such tye to steel her Heart
against Othello’s Tongue, no reason to curb that Passion she ne’er felt before when
the prevailing Virtue of the Moor attaqu’d her Heart; well may we therefore
believe Desdemona shou’d yield to the same force that conquer’d Dido, with all
her Resolutions and Engagements to the memory of Sychaeus [Dido’s deceased
husband] . . . . Cou’d Aeneas’s Story, not one jot more moving or probable, make
a meer stranger pass for a God with the Carthaginian Queen at first hearing;
and must it be incredible that the same shall not make Othello pass for so much
as a Man? Te Parallel is so exact that I am apt to think Shakespeare took the
Copy from Virgil. Nor can it justly be urg’d that these things were believ’d by
the Romans, since they were so far from believing these trifles that Seneca in his
Epistles laughs at those Fables that constituted their Hell, which was of much
greater consequence. But supposing they were believ’d, the same will hold good
for Shakespeare in this particular I vindicate him in: for ’tis built on as vulgar and
general a tradition as these Fables of old were, so that the advantage is equal
betwixt these two great Poets in this particular.
By this time, I hope, our Drolling Caviller will grant it no such monstrous
absurdity for the Doge to say:
I think this Tale wou’d win my Daughter too.
since without doubt that short summing-up of what was only the subject of his
tale to Desdemona, with only the supposition of the particulars, must move any
generous Brest.
Othello in the Seventeenth Century 81
But should all I have said fail of clearing the Probability of the Fable from Mr.
Rymer’s Objections, yet ought not that to rob Shakespeare of his due Character
of being a Poet, and a great Genius: unless he will for the same reason deny those
prerogatives to Homer and Sophocles . . . .
. . . Te whole Fable of Oedipus, tho’ so much admir’d, is so very singular and
improbable that ’tis scarce possible it ever cou’d have happen’d. On the other
hand, the fatal Jealousie of Othello and the Revenge of Iago are the natural
Consequences of our ungovern’d Passions, which by a prospect of such Tragical
effects of their being indulg’d may be the better regulated and govern’d by us. So
that tho’ Othello ends not so formally with a moral Sentence as Oedipus does yet
it sets out one of much greater Value. If it be a fault in Shakespeare that it end
not with such a sentence, Sophocles is guilty of no less in his Philoctetes, which not
only concludes without any Moral but is also incapable of being reduc’d to any,
at least of any moment. Whereas the Morals of Hamlet, Macbeth, and most of
Shakespeare’s Plays prove a lesson of mightier consequence than any in Sophocles
except the Electra, viz. that Usurpation, tho’ it thrive a while, will at last be
punish’d, &c. . . .
. . . What I have said in the beginning of my Vindication of Shakespeare
must here be recollected on Iago’s behalf; besides which I have some other
considerations to offer, which I hope will lighten the insupportable load of
Contempt and Ridicule cast on him by our Caviller . . . .
. . . We are not only to respect the profession of the Man in our Judgment
of the Character but we must also have an Eye to his Nation, the Country he
was born in, and the prevailing temper of the People, with their National Vices.
By this Rule we shall find Iago an Italian, by Nature Selfish, Jealous, Reserved,
Revengeful and Proud, nor can I see any reason to suppose his Military Profession
shou’d too powerfully influence him to purge away all these Qualities and
establish contrary in their room. . . .
QQQ
83
OTHELLO
IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY
q
“Restore the lock!” she cries; and all around
“Restore the lock!” the vaulted roofs rebound.
Not fierce Othello in so loud a strain
Roared for the handkerchief that caused his pain.
From Te Rape of the Lock (1714)
That Alexander Pope could include such a broad and comical allusion to Othello
in his famous satirical epic testifies not only to the widespread familiarity of
the play among his readers but also to the bombastic manner in which the role
of Othello was played in Pope’s time. Contemporary readers can get a sense of
what a performance of Othello was like from Richard Steele’s description of the
way the noted actor Thomas Betterton played the part in this comment, written
at the time of the actor’s death in 1770:
Te wonderful agony which he appeared in when he examined the
Circumstance of the Handkerchief of Othello, the Mixture of Love that
intruded upon his Mind upon the innocent answers Desdemona makes,
betrayed in his Gesture such a Variety and Vicissitude of Passions as
would admonish a Man to be afraid of his own Heart, and perfectly
convince him that it is to stab it to admit that worst of Daggers,
Jealousy. Whoever reads in his Closet this admirable Scene will find that
he cannot, except he has as warm an Imagination as Shakespeare himself,
find any but dry, incoherent, and broken Sentences. But a Reader that
has seen Betterton act it . . . .
For many eighteenth-century devotees, Shakespeare was better as theater
than on the page; by contrast, many nineteenth-century commentators, such as
Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Charles Lamb, preferred Shakespeare on the page,
unsullied by dramatic interpretation.
Nonetheless, some of the most important Shakespearean commentary in
the eighteenth century came from the editors who collected and published new
editions of Shakespeare’s texts. Tese editors appended notes and commentary,
discussing not only textual matters but also the shape and circumstances of the
Othello 84
plot, the nature of the characters, and the moral wisdom to be found in the
plays. Samuel Johnson, the most important of these editor-critics and one of
the greatest critics ever, supplied some general comments on Othello, giving it
high praise—particularly for its magnificent characters. Later in the century,
Elizabeth Griffith, in a book on the “morality” of Shakespeare’s plays, would
praise Othello as the author’s masterpiece.
Other critics, however, expressed reservations. Many believed that great
drama should follow the classical “unities,” rules set forth in Aristotle’s Poetics
and derived from the tragedies of his time. For example, plays should feature
a single setting and not roam widely. Othello was thus considered to be flawed,
in part because its first act takes place in Venice, while the rest of the play is
set in Cyprus. Even Samuel Johnson remarked that Othello could be improved
if the first act were simply lopped off and its matter presented in expository
narration later on. (In the nineteenth century, this is exactly what Arrigo Boito
did when he turned Othello into a libretto for Giuseppe Verdi’s opera Otello.)
Some critics, such as John Hughes, also had reservations about the probability
of the action. Tese “failings” were balanced, however, by a sense that despite his
lack of adherence to the “Rules,” as Hughes felt, Shakespeare “penetrated deeply
into the Nature of the Passions” in Othello. Similarly, Lewis Teobald called the
play “most faulty and regular” but still praised it as “excellent” in its depiction of
Othello’s “agonies.”
To many critics, Shakespeare was cavalier, even savage, in his disregard for
convention but also deeply perceptive and beautifully expressive. In France,
Voltaire, the great voice of reason and liberty, also found Shakespeare guilty
of barbarity. In one of his “Letters on the English” (1733), he sarcastically
called Othello “a most tender piece,” in which a “Man strangles his Wife on the
Stage”—a violation of the classical practice of keeping actual violence out of the
audience’s view. Voltaire also found it ridiculous that Desdemona, “that poor
Woman, whilst she is strangling [i.e., being strangled] cries aloud, that she dies
very unjustly.”
Voltaire was not alone in his distress. Some producers of the play in Europe,
such as Jean-François Ducis in France and Friedrich Ludwig Schröder in
Germany, altered the painful ending, permitting Desdemona to live. In England,
the original stood, but the play was consistently cut for purposes of “refinement.”
Bawdy, vulgar, graphic, and overly passionate language was excised. Te great
editions of Shakespeare by Alexander Pope, Samuel Johnson, and Edmund
Malone sold less well than the edition of Francis Gentleman, expurgated for
propriety’s sake. Cutting possibly “offensive” matter was a practice continued and
expanded in the following century, but it had begun in the previous one. Extant
prompt books of Othello, used at the Smock Alley Teater in Dublin during the
last decades of the seventeenth century, show a number of such excisions.
Othello in the Eighteenth Century 85
1710—Sir Richard Steele.
“On the Funeral of Betterton,” from The Tatler
Richard Steele (1672–1729), an essayist, playwright, and politician, is
best known for founding two magazines: The Tatler, in 1709, and, with
Joseph Addison, The Spectator, in 1711.
Having received Notice that the famous Actor Mr. Betterton was to be interred
this Evening in the Cloysters near Westminster Abbey, I was resolved to walk
thither and see the last Office done to a Man whom I had always very much
admired, and from whose Action I had received more strong Impressions of
what is great and noble in Human Nature than from the Arguments of the
most solid Philosophers or the Descriptions of the most charming Poets I
have ever read. As the rude and untaught Multitude are no Way wrought upon
more effectually than by seeing publick Punishments and Executions, so Men
of Letters and Education feel their Humanity most forcibly exercised when
they attend the Obsequies of Men who had arrived at any Perfection in Liberal
Accomplishments. Teatrical Action is to be esteemed as such, except it be
objected that we cannot call that an Art which cannot be attained by Art. Voice,
Stature, Motion, and other Gifts must be very bountifully bestowed by Nature,
or Labour and Industry will but push the unhappy Endeavourer in that Way the
further off his Wishes . . . .
I have hardly a Notion that any Performer of Antiquity could surpass the
Action of Mr. Betterton in any of the Occasions in which he has appeared on
our Stage. Te wonderful Agony which he appeared in when he examined the
Circumstance of the Handkerchief of Othello, the Mixture of Love that intruded
upon his Mind upon the innocent Answers Desdemona makes, betrayed in his
Gesture such a Variety and Vicissitude of Passions as would admonish a Man
to be afraid of his own Heart, and perfectly convince him that it is to stab
it to admit that worst of Daggers, Jealousy. Whoever reads in his Closet this
admirable Scene will find that he cannot, except he has as warm an Imagination
as Shakespeare himself, find any but dry, incoherent, and broken Sentences. But a
Reader that has seen Betterton act it observes there could not be a Word added,
that longer Speech had been unnatural, nay impossible to be uttered in Othello’s
Circumstances. Te charming Passage in the same Tragedy where he tells the
Manner of winning the Affection of his Mistress was urged with so moving and
graceful an Energy that, while I walked in the Cloysters, I thought of him with
the same Concern as if I waited for the Remains of a Person who had in real Life
done all that I had seen him represent . . . .
QQQ
Othello 86
1713—John Hughes.
“On the Tragedy of Othello,” from The Guardian
John Hughes (1677-1720) was a poet, translator, editor, playwright,
and essayist. In his Lives of the Poets, Samuel Johnson (quoting
Jonathan Swift) describes him as “among the mediocrists, in prose
as well as verse.”
Me duce damnosas, homines, conpescite curas. (Ovid, Rem. Amor. v. 69.)
Learn, mortals, from my precepts to control
Te furious passions that disturb the soul.
It is natural for an old man to be fond of such entertainments as revive in his
imagination the agreeable impressions made upon it in his youth: the set of wits
and beauties he was first acquainted with, the balls and drawing-rooms in which
he made an agreeable figure, the music and actors he heard and saw, when his
life was fresh, and his spirits vigorous and quick, have usually the preference in
his esteem to any succeeding pleasures that present themselves when his taste is
grown more languid. It is for this reason I never see a picture of Sir Peter Lely’s,
who drew so many of my first friends and acquaintance, without a sensible
delight; and I am in raptures when I reflect on the compositions of the famous
Mr. Henry Lawes, long before Italian music was introduced into our nation.
Above all, I am pleased in observing that the tragedies of Shakspeare, which in
my youthful days have so frequently filled my eyes with tears, hold their rank still,
and are the great support of our theatre.
It was with this agreeable prepossession of mind, I went, some time ago,
to see the old tragedy of Othello, and took my female wards with me, having
promised them a little before to carry them to the first play of Shakspeare’s
which should be acted. Mrs. Cornelia, who is a great reader, and never fails to
peruse the play-bills, which are brought to her every day, gave me notice of it
early in the morning. When I came to my Lady Lizard’s at dinner, I found the
young folks all dressed, and expecting the performance of my promise. I went
with them at the proper time, placed them together in the boxes, and myself by
them in a corner seat. As I have the chief scenes of the play by heart, I did not
look much on the stage, but formed to myself a new satisfaction in keeping an
eye on the faces of my little audience, and observing, as it were by reflection,
the different passions of the play represented in their countenances. Mrs. Betty
told us the names of several persons of distinction, as they took their places
in their boxes, and entertained us with the history of a new marriage or two,
till the curtain drew up. I soon perceived that Mrs. Jane was touched with the
love of Desdemona, and in a concern to see how she would come off with her
parents. Annabella had a rambling eye, and for some time was more taken up
Othello in the Eighteenth Century 87
with observing what gentlemen looked at her, and with criticising the dress
of the ladies, than with any thing that passed on the stage. Mrs. Cornelia,
who I have often said is addicted to the study of romances, commended
that speech in the play in which Othello mentions his “hair-breadth scapes
in th’ imminent deadly breach,” and recites his travels and adventures with
which he had captivated the heart of Desdemona. Te Sparkler looked several
times frighted: and as the distress of the play was heightened, their different
attention was collected, and fixed wholly on the stage, till I saw them all, with
a secret satisfaction, betrayed into tears.
I have often considered this play as a noble, but irregular, production of a
genius, who had the power of animating the theatre beyond any writer we have
ever known. Te touches of nature in it are strong and masterly; but the economy
of the fable, and in some particulars the probability, are too much neglected. If
I would speak of it in the most severe terms, I should say as Waller does of the
Maid’s Tragedy,
Great are its faults, but glorious is its flame.
But it would be poor employment in a critic to observe upon the faults, and
shew no taste for the beauties, in a work that has always struck the most sensible
part of our audiences in a very forcible manner.
Te chief subject of this piece is the passion of jealousy, which the poet hath
represented at large, in its birth, its various workings and agonies, and its horrid
consequences. From this passion, and the innocence and simplicity of the person
suspected, arises a very moving distress.
It is a remark, as I remember, of a modern writer, who is thought to have
penetrated deeply into the nature of the passions, “that the most extravagant love
is nearest to the strongest hatred.” Te Moor is furious in both these extremes.
His love is tempestuous, and mingled with a wildness peculiar to his character,
which seems very artfully to prepare for the change which is to follow.
How savage, yet how ardent, is that expression of the raptures of his heart,
when, looking after Desdemona as she withdraws, he breaks out,
Excellent wench! Perdition catch my soul,
But I do love thee; and when I love thee not,
Chaos is come again.
Te deep and subtle villany of Iago, in working this change from love
to jealousy, in so tumultuous a mind as that of Othello, prepossessed with a
confidence in the disinterested affection of the man who is leading him on
insensibly to his ruin, is likewise drawn with a masterly hand. Iago’s broken hints,
questions, and seeming care to hide the reason of them; his obscure suggestions
Othello 88
to raise the curiosity of the Moor: his personated confusion, and refusing to
explain himself while Othello is drawn on, and held in suspense till he grows
impatient and angry; then his throwing in the poison, and naming to him in a
caution, the passion he would raise,
—O beware of jealousy!—
are inimitable strokes of art, in that scene which has always been justly esteemed
one of the best which was ever represented on the theatre.
To return to the character of Othello; his strife of passions, his starts, his
returns of love, and threatenings to Iago, who had put his mind on the rack, his
relapses afterward to jealousy, his rage against his wife, and his asking pardon of
Iago, whom he thinks he had abused for his fidelity to him, are touches which
no one can overlook that has the sentiments of human nature, or has considered
the heart of man in its frailties, its penances, and all the variety of its agitations.
Te torments which the Moor suffers are so exquisitely drawn, as to render him
as much an object of compassion, even in the barbarous action of murdering
Desdemona, as the innocent person herself who falls under his hand.
But there is nothing in which the poet has more shewn his judgment in
this play, than in the circumstance of the handkerchief, which is employed as
a confirmation to the jealousy of Othello already raised. What I would here
observe is, that the very slightness of this circumstance is the beauty of it. How
finely has Shakspeare expressed the nature of jealousy in those lines, which, on
this occasion, he puts into the mouth of Iago,
Trifles light as air
Are to the jealous, confirmation strong
As proofs of holy writ.
It would be easy for a tasteless critic to turn any of the beauties I have
here mentioned into ridicule; but such a one would only betray a mechanical
judgment, formed out of borrowed rules and common-place reading, and not
arising from any true discernment in human nature, and its passions.
As the moral of this tragedy is an admirable caution against hasty suspicions,
and the giving way to the first transports of rage and jealousy, which may
plunge a man in a few minutes into all the horrors of guilt, distraction, and
ruin, I shall farther enforce it, by relating a scene of misfortunes of the like kind,
which really happened some years ago in Spain; and is an instance of the most
tragical hurricane of passion I have ever met with in history. It may be easily
conceived, that a heart ever big with resentments of its own dignity, and never
allayed by reflections which make us honour ourselves for acting with reason
and equality, will take fire precipitantly. It will, on a sudden, flame too high to be
Othello in the Eighteenth Century 89
extinguished. Te short story I am going to tell is a lively instance of the truth
of this observation, and a just warning to those of jealous honour, to look about
them, and begin to possess their souls as they ought, for no man of spirit knows
how terrible a creature he is, till he comes to be provoked.
Don Alonzo, a Spanish nobleman, had a beautiful and virtuous wife, with
whom he had lived for some years in great tranquillity. Te gentleman, however,
was not free from the faults usually imputed to his nation; he was proud,
suspicious, and impetuous. He kept a Moor in his house, whom, on a complaint
from his lady, he had punished for a small offence with the utmost severity. Te
slave vowed revenge, and communicated his resolution to one of the lady’s women
with whom he lived in a criminal way. Tis creature also hated her mistress, for
she feared she was observed by her; she therefore undertook to make Don
Alonzo jealous, by insinuating that the gardener was often admitted to his lady in
private, and promising to make him an eye-witness of it. At a proper time agreed
on between her and the Morisco, she sent a message to the gardener, that his
lady, having some hasty orders to give him, would have him come that moment
to her in her chamber. In the mean time she had placed Alonzo privately in an
outer room, that he might observe who passed that way. It was not long before
he saw the gardener appear. Alonzo had not patience, but, following him into the
apartment, struck him at one blow with a dagger to the heart; then dragging his
lady by the hair, without inquiring farther, he instantly killed her.
Here he paused, looked on the dead bodies with all the agitations of a demon
of revenge; when the wench who had occasioned these terrors, distracted with
remorse, threw herself at his feet, and in a voice of lamentation, without sense
of the consequence, repeated all her guilt. Alonzo was overwhelmed with all the
violent passions at one instant, and uttered the broken voices and emotions of
each of them for a moment, till at last he recollected himself enough to end his
agony of love, anger, disdain, revenge, and remorse, by murdering the maid, the
Moor, and himself.
QQQ
1717—Lewis Theobald. From The Censor
Lewis Theobald (1688–1744), editor and author of essays and poet-
ry, produced an edition of Shakespeare in 1734. He also attacked
Alexander Pope’s earlier edition. Pope got his revenge by depicting
Theobald as the epitome of dullness in The Dunciad.
I have frequently perus’d with Satisfaction the Othello of Shakespeare, a Play
most faulty and irregular in many Points but Excellent in one Particular. For
Othello 90
the Crimes and Misfortunes of the Moor are owing to an impetuous Desire of
having his Doubts clear’d, and a Jealousie and Rage, native to him, which he
cannot controul and which push him on to Revenge. He is otherwise in his
Character brave and open, generous and full of Love for Desdemona, but stung
with the subtle Suggestions of Iago and impatient of a Wrong done to his Love
and Honour. Passion at once o’erbears his Reason and gives him up to Toughts
of bloody Reparation. Yet after he has determin’d to murther his Wife his
Sentiments of her suppos’d Injury and his Misfortune are so pathetick that we
cannot but forget his barbarous Resolution, and pity the Agonies which he so
strongly seems to feel.
Oth.: Had it pleas’d Heav’n
To try me with Affliction, had it rain’d
All kind of Sores and Shames on my bare Head . . . .
But there, where I have treasur’d up my Heart,
Where either I must live or bear no Life,
Te Fountain from the which my Current runs,
Or else dries up—to be discarded thence!
QQQ
1733—Voltaire. “The Orphan,”
from Philosophical Letters
Voltaire (1694–1778), author of Candide, was one of the towering fig-
ures of the European Enlightenment and one of the greatest thinkers
in French history. He wrote poetry, history, philosophy, drama, and
fiction. The passage below is taken from a different source from the
brief remarks cited in the introduction to this section, but it is similar
to them in nature; here, Voltaire sarcastically describes several of the
play’s most indecorous scenes.
. . . We cannot sufficiently lament that the translator has, with the same cruelty,
deprived us of the finest scenes of Shakespeare’s “Othello.” With what pleasure
should we have seen the first scene at Venice, and the last at Cyprus! First of
all, a Moor runs away with the daughter of a senator: Iago, the Moor’s officer,
runs to the window of the father’s house; the father appears in his shirt at the
window. “Zounds,” says he, “put on your clothes; a black ram has got upon
your white ewe; come, come, rise and come down, or the devil will make you
a grandsire.”
Othello in the Eighteenth Century 91
SENATOR.—“What’s the matter, what would you be at? Are you a
mad man?”
IAGO—“Zounds, sir, are you one of those who would not serve God if
the devil forbade them? We are come to do you a service, and you take
us for ruffians; I tell you your daughter will be covered by a Barbary
horse; your grandchildren will neigh after you, and African nags will be
your cousins-german.”
SENATOR—“What profane rogue talks to me at this rate?”
IAGO—“Know that your daughter Desdemona and the Moor Othello
now make the beast with two backs.”
Tis same Iago accompanies to Cyprus the Moor Othello and the lady
Desdemona, whom the senate of Venice kindly grants, in spite of the father, for
a wife to the Moor, whom they appoint governor of Cyprus.
Scarcely have they arrived in that island, when Iago undertakes to make
the Moor jealous of his wife, and to inspire him with a suspicion of her
fidelity. Te Moor begins to feel some inquietude, he makes the following
reflections. “After all,” says he, “what sense had I of the pleasure that others
had given her, and of her debauchery? I did not see it, it did not hurt me; I
slept as well as usual. When a thing has been stolen from us of which we
had no occasion, if we are ignorant of the theft, we have lost nothing. I had
been happy if the whole army, and even the pioneers, had enjoyed her, so as
I had known nothing of the matter. Oh no—farewell all content—farewell
the plumed troops, farewell the proud war that makes a virtue of ambition;
farewell the neighing steeds and the shrill trumpets; the fife that pierces the
ear, and the drum that excites the courage, the royal banner; and all the rank,
pride, pomp, and various circumstances of glorious war; and you, you mortal
engines, whose rude throats imitate those of the immortal Jupiter; farewell,
Othello has now no occupation.”
Tis is another of the admirable passages distinguished by [Alexander] Pope’s
commas.
IAGO—“Is it possible, my lord?”
OTHELLO (taking him by the throat)—“Villain, prove that my wife’s a
whore, give me an ocular proof of it; or by the worth of the eternal soul
of man, it would have been better for you, you had been born a dog.”
IAGO—“Tis office by no means pleases me; but since I have gone
so far through pure honesty and friendship for you, I will proceed. I
lay the other night with your lieutenant Cassio; and could not sleep
for the toothache. You cannot but know that there are people so loose
of soul, that in their sleep they talk of their affairs; Cassio is one of
Othello 92
these: he said in his sleep, ‘Dear Desdemona, let us be careful, let us
hide our loves.’ In speaking, he took me by the hand, he patted me,
he cried, ‘Oh, charming creature!’ he kissed me with transport, as if
he had by the roots torn up kisses planted upon my lips, he put his
thighs upon my legs, he sighed, he breathed short, he kissed me, he
cried out, ‘Cursed fate which has given you to the Moor!’ ”
Upon these proofs, so very decently related, and the handkerchief of Othello,
which Cassio had found by accident, the Moorish general strangles his wife in
her bed; but he kisses her before he puts her to death. “Come,” says he, “die, thou
whore.” “Ah, kill me to-morrow, let me live to-night,” says she. “Wretch, if you
stir,” cries he. “Give me but one half hour,” says she. “No,” answers he. “After that
I will delay you no longer; let me at least say my prayers,” says she. “No, it is too
late,” answers Othello. He strangles her; and Desdemona, after she is strangled,
cries out that she is innocent.
When Desdemona is dead, the senate recalls Othello: he is seized in order
to be carried to Venice to take his trial. “Hold,” says he, “a word or two. Tell the
senate, that one day at Aleppo I found a turbaned Turk, who beat a Venetian, and
made a jest of the republic; I took by the beard, the circumcised dog, and smote
him thus.” At these words he stabs himself.
A French translator, who has given us sketches of several English pieces, and
among others, of the “Moor of Venice,” partly in verse, partly in prose, has not
translated any of these important passages which we have laid before our readers;
he makes Othello express himself thus:
L’art n’est pas fait pour moi; c’est un fard que je hais,
Dites leur qu’Othello plus amoureux que sage,
Quoique époux adoré, jaloux jusques à la rage,
Trompé par un esclave, aveuglé par l ’erreur
Immola son épouse, & se perça le cœur.
Art I detest, I all disguise abhor.
Say that Othello, more in love than wise,
Imposed on by a slave, with error blind,
Murdered his wife, then pierced his guilty breast.
Tere is not a word of this in the original; “l ’art n’est pas fait pour moi,” is taken
from the tragedy of “Zaïre,” but the rest is not.
Te reader now has it in his power to decide the dispute for pre-eminence
between the tragedies of London and Paris.
QQQ
Othello in the Eighteenth Century 93
1765—Samuel Johnson. Othello (notes),
from The Plays of William Shakespear
Samuel Johnson (1709–1784) is thought by many to be the greatest
critic in the English language. He was a poet, critic, prose writer, lexi-
cographer, editor, and celebrated raconteur. His edition of the works
of Shakespeare contained some of his famous thoughts on the plays.
The following comments are taken from annotations he supplied to his
text of Othello.
…Act V. Scene vi. (v. ii. 63–5.)
Oh perjur’d woman! Tou dost stone my heart,
And mak’st me call, what I intent to do,
A murder, which I thought a sacrifice.
Tis line is difficult. Tou hast hardened my heart, and makest me kill thee with
the rage of a murderer, when I thought to have sacrificed thee to justice with the
calmness of a priest striking a victim.
It must not be omitted, that one of the elder quartos reads, thou dost stone thy
heart ; which I suspect to be genuine. Te meaning then will be, thou forcest me to
dismiss thee from the world in the state of the murdered without preparation for
death, when I intended that thy punishment should have been a sacrifice atoning
for thy crime.
I am glad that I have ended my revisal of this dreadful scene. It is not to be
endured . . .
General Observation
Te beauties of this play impress themselves so strongly upon the attention of the
reader, that they can draw no aid from critical illustration. Te fiery openness of
Othello, magnanimous, artless, and credulous, boundless in his confidence, ardent
in his affection, inflexible in his resolution, and obdurate in his revenge; the cool
malignity of Iago, silent in his resentment, subtle in his designs, and studious
at once of his interest and his vengeance; the soft simplicity of Desdemona,
confident of merit, and conscious of innocence, her artless perseverance in her
suit, and her slowness to suspect that she can be suspected, are such proofs
of Shakespeare’s skill in human nature, as, I suppose, it is vain to seek in any
modern writer. Te gradual progress which Iago makes in the Moor’s conviction,
and the circumstances which he employs to inflame him, are so artfully natural,
that, though it will perhaps not be said of him as he says of himself, that he is
Othello 94
“a man not easily jealous,” yet we cannot but pity him when at last we find him
“perplexed in the extreme.”
Tere is always danger lest wickedness conjoined with abilities should steal
upon esteem, though it misses of approbation but the character if Iago is so
conducted, that he is from the first scene to the last hated and despised.
Even the inferiour characters of this play would be very conspicuous in
any other piece, not only for their justness but their strength. Cassio is brave,
benevolent, and honest, ruined only by his want of stubbornness to resist an
insidious invitation of Roderigo’s suspicious credulity, and impatient submission
of the cheats which he sees practised upon him, and which by persuasion he
suffers to be repeated, exhibit a strong picture of a weak mind betrayed by
unlawful desires, to a false friend and the virtue of Aemilia is such as we often
find, worn loosely but not cast off, easy to commit small crimes, but quickened
and alarmed at atrocious villanies.
Te Scenes from the beginning to the end are busy, varied but happy
interchanges, and regularly promoting the progression of the story; and the
narrative in the end, though it tells but what is known already, yet is necessary
to produce the death of Othello.
Had the scene opened in Cyprus, and the preceding incidents been
occasionally related, there had been little wanting of a drama of the most exact
and scrupulous regularity.
QQQ
1775—Elizabeth Griffith.
From The Morality of Shakespeare’s Drama Illustrated
Elizabeth Griffith was an actress, dramatist, fiction writer, essayist,
and translator. She is best known for A Series of Genuine Letters between
Henry and Frances, a collection of letters published with her husband.
She also wrote a critical study of the morality of Shakespeare’s plays.
. . . Shakespeare has written three pieces on the subject of jealousy; the Winter’s
Tale, Cymbeline, and this one, besides the character of Ford, in the Merry Wives.
But such was the richness of his genius that he has not borrowed a single thought,
image, or expression, from any one of them to assist him in any of the others. Te
subject seems rather to have grown progressively out of itself, to have inspired its
own sentiments and have dictated its own language. Tis Play, in my opinion, is
very justly considered as the last and greatest effort of our Author’s genius, and
may therefore be looked upon as the chef d’œuvre of dramatic composition.
Othello in the Eighteenth Century 95
. . . It has often surprized me to find the character of Desdemona so much
mistaken and slighted as it too generally is. It is simple, indeed, but that is one of
its merits: for the simplicity of it is that of innocence not of folly. In my opinion,
she seems to be as perfect a model of a wife as either this author, or any other
writer, could possibly have framed. She speaks little; but whatever she says is
sensible, pure, and chaste . . . .
QQQ
97
OTHELLO
IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY
q
In 1826, in London, Ira Aldridge became the first black man to play the role
of Othello. Until then, Othello had been performed by white actors, usually in
blackface. In 1814, Edmund Kean established the tradition of playing Othello
as olive-skinned. So firmly was this a precedent for white actors playing the
Moor that Laurence Olivier’s Othello at the National Theater in London in
the late 1960s was noted for Olivier’s full-body black makeup as well as for the
intensity of his acting.
For nineteenth-century critics, Othello’s skin color continued to be an issue
of aesthetic and dramatic significance. Te German critic August Wilhelm
Schlegel insisted that Othello was a “negro,” with a “wild nature,” moved
by a poison in his blood rather than by a passion of his heart. He described
Othello’s “blackness” as a surface characteristic, in contrast to Iago, who was
“black,” meaning “evil,” to his depth. Other critics also employed a type of racial
analysis that we might find disturbing today. Samuel Taylor Coleridge stated
that Shakespeare could not have drawn Othello as a “negro,” or sub-Saharan
African, as opposed to a lighter-skinned North African. “Can we imagine him
[Shakespeare] so utterly ignorant as to make a barbarous negro plead royal
birth—at a time, too, when negros were not known except as slaves?”
To his credit, Coleridge, whose mind usually showed a greater generosity of
thought than his racial observations suggest, also provided a number of striking
insights regarding the play. For example, he challenged Samuel Johnson’s
assertion that if the first act of Othello were cut, the play would be a “regular
tragedy,” following the traditional “unities,” and therefore superior. “In all acts of
judgment,” Coleridge wrote, “it can never be too often recollected, and scarcely
too often repeated, that rules are means to ends, and, consequently, that the end
must be determined and understood before it can be known what the rules are
or ought to be.” Troughout his “lecture” on Othello, Coleridge explores the
text as a moral psychologist, with such lucid comments as this, derived from his
observation of Iago: “a wicked man will employ real feelings, as well as assume
those most alien from his own, as instruments of his purposes.” Regarding Iago’s
statement, “’Tis in ourselves that we are thus, or thus,” Coleridge observes that
Othello 98
such “speech comprises the passionless character of Iago. It is all will in intellect;
and therefore he is here a bold partizan of a truth, but yet of a truth converted
into a falsehood by the absence of all the necessary modifications caused by the
frail nature of man.”
Charles Lamb, also entangled in the prejudice of his age, argued that the
offensiveness of seeing a black man as the object of a white woman’s love made
Othello more suitable for reading than for viewing.
Nothing can be more soothing, more flattering to the nobler parts
of our natures, than to read of a young Venetian lady of highest
extraction, through the force of love and from a sense of merit in
him whom she loved, laying aside every consideration of kindred, and
country, and colour, and wedding with a coal-black Moor . . . it is the
perfect triumph of virtue over accidents, of the imagination over the
senses . . . But upon the stage, when the imagination is no longer the
ruling faculty, but we are left to our poor unassisted senses, I appeal
to every one that has seen Othello played, whether he did not . . . find
something extremely revolting in the courtship and wedded caresses of
Othello and Desdemona.
Few today would admit to sharing Lamb’s reaction to the union of Othello
and Desdemona. His response, nevertheless, can remind readers of the powerful
psychic tensions Shakespeare confronted in Othello.
Te perceptive essayist William Hazlitt was less concerned with color than
with the play’s brilliant depiction of contrasting characters. He also saw the
play as closer to the concerns of everyday life than any of Shakespeare’s other
tragedies.
Other critics were similarly admiring. Toward the century’s end, Algernon
Charles Swinburne wrote that “in Othello we get the pure poetry of natural and
personal emotion . . . . [A]s a creator, a revealer, and an interpreter, infinite in his
insight and his truthfulness, his tenderness and his wisdom, his justice and his
mercy, no man who ever lived can stand beside the author of Othello.”
As is often the case regarding Shakespeare, the famous playwright George
Bernard Shaw provided a dissenting view. He called the play “pure melodrama,”
adding, “there is not a touch of character in it that goes below the skin.” However,
he also wrote: “But when the worst has been said of Othello that can be provoked
by its superficiality and staginess, it remains magnificent by the volume of its
passion and the splendor of its word-music.”
Othello was also popular outside of Britain. In France, Alfred de Vigny made
a French translation of Othello in 1829. Later, Victor Hugo famously compared
Othello to night and Iago to “evil, the other form of darkness.” In fact, the
play had permeated French cultural imagination so effectively that it also
became subject matter for other types of artists, who in effect provided their
Othello in the Nineteenth Century 99
commentary via a different medium. In 1825, the great French painter Delacroix
saw Edmund Kean perform Othello in London. “No words are strong enough
to express one’s admiration for the genius of Shakespeare, who created Othello
and Iago,” he wrote. In 1827, an English acting company headed by Charles
Kimble performed Othello at the Odéon in Paris. Delacroix was among those
in the audience, and he later wrote: “Te English have opened their theatre.
Tey have worked miracles, for they draw such crowds to the Odéon that all the
paving-stones in the neighborhood rattle under the carriage wheels. In a word,
they are all the rage. Te most stubborn classicists have had to strike their flag.
Our actors go to school to the English, and stare in astonishment.” Delacroix
painted Othello and Desdemona in 1849 and Te Death of Desdemona in 1858. An
equally sumptuous painting showing the death of Desdemona was painted by
Alexandre-Marie Colin in 1829. All three are canvases swollen with texture,
rich in claret, turquoise, and sky-blue tints, the paint vaporously and moodily
applied. Te drama of the pictures relies on the familiarity of the spectators with
the story the scene depicts. Te paintings not only present but also dramatize the
play, offering, in romantic fashion, a voluptuousness of pain.
Te greatest translation of Othello from one medium to another, however,
was not in painting but in music. In February 1887, Giuseppe Verdi’s opera
Otello, using an Italian-language adaptation of Othello by Arrigo Boito, was first
produced at La Scala in Milan.
In the United States, Othello drew the attention of former president John
Quincy Adams. Even this consistently anti-slavery politician couldn’t help
but express his revulsion at the idea of Desdemona’s attraction to Othello. He
declared that Desdemona was actually an unsympathetic character because of
it: “I must believe that, in exhibiting a daughter of a Venitian nobleman of the
highest rank eloping in the dead of the night to marry a thick-lipped wool-headed
Moor, opening a train of consequences which lead to her own destruction by her
husband’s hands, and to that of her father by a broken heart, he did not intend
to present her as an example of the perfection of female virtue.” Such attitudes
were sadly persistent at the time.
1809—August Wilhelm Schlegel.
“Criticisms on Shakspeare’s Tragedies,” from
Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature
August Wilhelm Schlegel (1767–1845) was a scholar, critic, poet, and
professor. He translated a number of Shakespeare’s plays into the
German language and was one of the most influential disseminators of
the ideas of the German Romantic movement.
Othello 100
If Romeo and Juliet shines with the colours of the dawn of morning, but a
dawn whose purple clouds already announce the thunder of a sultry day,
Othello is, on the other hand, a strongly shaded picture: we might call it a
tragical Rembrandt. What a fortunate mistake that the Moor (under which
name in the original novel, a baptized Saracen of the Northern coast of
Africa was unquestionably meant), has been made by Shakespeare in every
respect a negro! We recognize in Othello the wild nature of that glowing
zone which generates the most ravenous beasts of prey and the most deadly
poisons, tamed only in appearance by the desire of fame, by foreign laws of
honour, and by nobler and milder manners. His jealousy is not the jealousy
of the heart, which is compatible with the tenderest feeling and adoration
of the beloved object; it is of that sensual kind which, in burning climes,
has given birth to the disgraceful confinement of women and many other
unnatural usages. A drop of this poison flows in his veins, and sets his whole
blood in the wildest ferment. Te Moor “seems” noble, frank, confiding,
grateful for the love shown him; and he is all this, and, moreover, a hero who
spurns at danger, a worthy leader of an army, a faithful servant of the state;
but the mere physical force of passion puts to flight in one moment all his
acquired and mere habitual virtues, and gives the upper hand to the savage
over the moral man. Tis tyranny of the blood over the will betrays itself even
in the expression of his desire of revenge upon Cassio. In his repentance, a
genuine tenderness for his murdered wife, and in the presence of the damning
evidence of his deed, the painful feeling of annihilated honour at last bursts
forth; and in the midst of these painful emotions he assails himself with the
rage wherewith a despot punishes a runaway slave. He suffers as a double
man; at once in the higher and the lower sphere into which his being was
divided.—While the Moor bears the nightly colour of suspicion and deceit
only on his visage, Iago is black within. He haunts Othello like his evil genius,
and with his light (and therefore the more dangerous,) insinuations, he leaves
him no rest; it is as if by means of an unfortunate affinity, founded however
in nature, this influence was by necessity more powerful over him than the
voice of his good angel Desdemona. A more artful villain than this Iago was
never portrayed; he spreads his nets with a skill which nothing can escape.
Te repugnance inspired by his aims becomes tolerable from the attention of
the spectators being directed to his means: these furnish endless employment
to the understanding. Cool, discontented, and morose, arrogant where he
dare be so, but humble and insinuating when it suits his purposes, he is a
complete master in the art of dissimulation; accessible only to selfish
emotions, he is thoroughly skilled in rousing the passions of others, and of
availing himself of every opening which they give him: he is as excellent an
observer of men as any one can be who is unacquainted with higher motives
Othello in the Nineteenth Century 101
of action from his own experience; there is always some truth in his malicious
observations on them. He does not merely pretend an obdurate incredulity as
to the virtue of women, he actually entertains it; and this, too, falls in with
his whole way of thinking, and makes him the more fit for the execution of
his purpose.
As in every thing he sees merely the hateful side, he dissolves in the rudest
manner the charm which the imagination casts over the relation between the
two sexes: he does so for the purpose of revolting Othello’s senses, whose
heart otherwise might easily have convinced him of Desdemona’s innocence.
Tis must serve as an excuse for the numerous expressions in the speeches of
Iago from which modesty shrinks. If Shakespeare had written in our days he
would not perhaps have dared to hazard them; and yet this must certainly
have greatly injured the truth of his picture. Desdemona is a sacrifice without
blemish. She is not, it is true, a high ideal representation of sweetness and
enthusiastic passion like Juliet; full of simplicity, softness, and humility, and
so innocent, that she can hardly form to herself an idea of the possibility of
infidelity, she seems calculated to make the most yielding and tenderest of
wives. Te female propensity wholly to resign itself to a foreign destiny has
led her into the only fault of her life, that of marrying without her father’s
consent. Her choice seems wrong; and yet she has been gained over to Othello
by that which induces the female to honour in man her protector and guide,—
admiration of his determined heroism, and compassion for the sufferings
which he had undergone. With great art it is so contrived, that from the very
circumstance that the possibility of a suspicion of her own purity of motive
never once enters her mind, she is the less reserved in her solicitations for
Cassio, and thereby does but heighten more and more the jealousy of Othello.
To throw out still more clearly the angelic purity of Desdemona, Shakspeare
has in Emilia associated with her a companion of doubtful virtue. From the
sinful levity of this woman it is also conceivable that she should not confess
the abstraction of the handkerchief when Othello violently demands it back:
this would otherwise be the circumstance in the whole piece the most difficult
to justify.
Cassio is portrayed exactly as he ought to be to excite suspicion without
actual guilt—amiable and nobly disposed, but easily seduced. Te public events
of the first two acts show us Othello in his most glorious aspect, as the support
of Venice and the terror of the Turks: they serve to withdraw the story from the
mere domestic circle, just as this is done in Romeo and Juliet by the dissensions
between the Montagues and the Capulets. No eloquence is capable of painting
the overwhelming force of the catastrophe in Othello,—the pressure of feelings
which measure out in a moment the abysses of eternity.
QQQ
Othello 102
1811—Charles Lamb.
“On the Tragedies of Shakespeare,” from The Ref lector
Charles Lamb (1775–1834), poet and essayist, is most famous for his
“Elia” essays and his children’s book Tales from Shakespear, which he
wrote with his sister, Mary Lamb.
. . . Lear is essentially impossible to be represented on a stage. But how many
dramatic personages are there in Shakspeare, which though more tractable
and feasible (if I may so speak) than Lear, yet from some circumstance, some
adjunct to their character, are improper to be shewn to our bodily eye. Othello
for instance. Nothing can be more soothing, more flattering to the nobler parts
of our natures, than to read of a young Venetian lady of highest extraction,
through the force of love and from a sense of merit in him whom she loved,
laying aside every consideration of kindred, and country, and colour, and wedding
with a coal-black Moor—(for such he is represented, in the imperfect state of
knowledge respecting foreign countries in those days, compared with our own,
or in compliance with popular notions, though the Moors are now well enough
known to be by many shades less unworthy of a white woman’s fancy)—it is the
perfect triumph of virtue over accidents, of the imagination over the senses. She
sees Othello’s colour in his mind. But upon the stage, when the imagination is
no longer the ruling faculty, but we are left to our poor unassisted senses, I appeal
to every one that has seen Othello played, whether he did not, on the contrary,
sink Othello’s mind in his colour; whether he did not find something extremely
revolting in the courtship and wedded caresses of Othello and Desdemona;
and whether the actual sight of the thing did not over-weigh all that beautiful
compromise which we make in reading;—and the reason it should do so is
obvious, because there is just so much reality presented to our senses as to give a
perception of disagreement, with not enough of belief in the internal motives,—
all that which is unseen,—to overpower and reconcile the first and obvious
prejudices. What we see upon a stage is body and bodily action; what we are
conscious of in reading is almost exclusively the mind, and its movements . . . .
QQQ
1817—William Hazlitt. “Othello,”
from Characters of Shakespear’s Plays
William Hazlitt (1778–1830) was an English essayist and one of the
f inest Shakespeare critics of the nineteenth century. He also examined
Othello in the Nineteenth Century 103
the work of poets, dramatists, essayists, and novelists of his own and
earlier times. His essays appeared in such volumes as English Poets,
English Comic Writers, and A View of the English Stage.
It has been said that tragedy purifies the affections by terror and pity. Tat is,
it substitutes imaginary sympathy for mere selfishness. It gives us a high and
permanent interest, beyond ourselves, in humanity as such. It raises the great,
the remote, and the possible to an equality with the real, the little and the near.
It makes man a partaker with his kind. It subdues and softens the stubbornness
of his will. It teaches him that there are and have been others like himself, by
showing him as in a glass what they have felt, thought, and done. It opens
the chambers of the human heart. It leaves nothing indifferent to us that can
affect our common nature. It excites our sensibility by exhibiting the passions
wound up to the utmost pitch by the power of imagination or the temptation
of circumstances; and corrects their fatal excesses in ourselves by pointing to the
greater extent of sufferings and of crimes to which they have led others. Tragedy
creates a balance of the affections. It makes us thoughtful spectators in the lists of
life. It is the refiner of the species; a discipline of humanity. Te habitual study of
poetry and works of imagination is one chief part of a well-grounded education.
A taste for liberal art is necessary to complete the character of a gentleman,
Science alone is hard and mechanical. It exercises the understanding upon
things out of ourselves, while it leaves the affections unemployed, or engrossed
with our own immediate, narrow interests.—Othello furnishes an illustration of
these remarks. It excites our sympathy in an extraordinary degree. Te moral it
conveys has a closer application to the concerns of human life than that of any
other of Shakespeare’s plays. ‘It comes directly home to the bosoms and business
of men.’ Te pathos in Lear is indeed more dreadful and overpowering: but it is
less natural, and less of every day’s occurrence. We have not the same degree of
sympathy with the passions described in Macbeth. Te interest in Hamlet is more
remote and reflex. Tat of Othello is at once equally profound and affecting.
Te picturesque contrasts of character in this play are almost as remarkable
as the depth of the passion. Te Moor Othello, the gentle Desdemona, the
villain Iago, the good-natured Cassio, the fool Roderigo, present a range
and variety of character as striking and palpable as that produced by the
opposition of costume in a picture. Teir distinguishing qualities stand out
to the mind’s eye, so that even when we are not thinking of their actions
or sentiments, the idea of their persons is still as present to us as ever.
Tese characters and the images they stamp upon the mind are the farthest
asunder possible, the distance between them is immense: yet the compass
of knowledge and invention which the poet has shown in embodying these
extreme creations of his genius is only greater than the truth and felicity with
which he has identified each character with itself, or blended their different
Othello 104
qualities together in the same story. What a contrast the character of Othello
forms to that of Iago: at the same time, the force of conception with which
these two figures are opposed to each other is rendered still more intense by
the complete consistency with which the traits of each character are brought
out in a state of the highest finishing. Te making one black and the other
white, the one unprincipled, the other unfortunate in the extreme, would
have answered the common purposes of effect, and satisfied the ambition of
an ordinary painter of character. Shakespeare has laboured the finer shades
of difference in both with as much care and skill as if he had had to depend
on the execution alone for the success of his design. On the other hand,
Desdemona and Aemilia are not meant to be opposed with anything like
strong contrast to each other. Both are, to outward appearance, characters of
common life, not more distinguished than women usually are, by difference
of rank and situation. Te difference of their thoughts and sentiments is,
however, laid as open, their minds are separated from each other by signs as
plain and as little to be mistaken as the complexions of their husbands.
Te movement of the passion in Othello is exceedingly different from that of
Macbeth. In Macbeth there is a violent struggle between opposite feelings, between
ambition and the stings of conscience, almost from first to last: in Othello, the
doubtful conflict between contrary passions, though dreadful, continues only
for a short time, and the chief interest is excited by the alternate ascendancy
of different passions, the entire and unforeseen change from the fondest love
and most unbounded confidence to the tortures of jealousy and the madness of
hatred. Te revenge of Othello, after it has once taken thorough possession of his
mind, never quits it, but grows stronger and stronger at every moment of its delay.
Te nature of the Moor is noble, confiding, tender, and generous; but his blood
is of the most inflammable kind; and being once roused by a sense of his wrongs,
he is stopped by no considerations of remorse or pity till he has given a loose to
all the dictates of his rage and his despair. It is in working his noble nature up
to this extremity through rapid but gradual transitions, in raising passion to its
height from the smallest beginnings and in spite of all obstacles, in painting the
expiring conflict between love and hatred, tenderness and resentment, jealousy
and remorse, in unfolding the strength and the weaknesses of our nature, in
uniting sublimity of thought with the anguish of the keenest woe, in putting
in motion the various impulses that agitate this our mortal being, and at last
blending them in that noble tide of deep and sustained passion, impetuous but
majestic, that ‘flows on to the Propontic, and knows no ebb’, that Shakespeare
has shown the mastery of his genius and of his power over the human heart. Te
third act of Othello is his masterpiece, not of knowledge or passion separately,
but of the two combined, of the knowledge of character with the expression of
passion, of consummate art in the keeping up of appearances with the profound
workings of nature, and the convulsive movements of uncontrollable agony, of the
Othello in the Nineteenth Century 105
power of inflicting torture and of suffering it. Not only is the tumult of passion
heaved up from the very bottom of the soul, but even the slightest undulation
of feeling is seen on the surface, as it arises from the impulses of imagination
or the different probabilities maliciously suggested by Iago. Te progressive
preparation for the catastrophe is wonderfully managed from the Moor’s first
gallant recital of the story of his love, of ‘the spells and witchcraft he had used’,
from his unlooked-for and romantic success, the fond satisfaction with which he
dotes on his own happiness, the unreserved tenderness of Desdemona and her
innocent importunities in favour of Cassio, irritating the suspicions instilled into
her husband’s mind by the perfidy of Iago, and rankling there to poison, till he
loses all command of himself, and his rage can only be appeased by blood. She
is introduced, just before Iago begins to put his scheme in practice, pleading for
Cassio with all the thoughtless gaiety of friendship and winning confidence in
the love of Othello.
What! Michael Cassio?
Tat came a wooing with you, and so many a time,
When I have spoke of you dispraisingly,
Hath ta’en your part, to have so much to do
To bring him in?—Why this is not a boon:
’Tis as I should entreat you wear your gloves,
Or feed on nourishing meats, or keep you warm;
Or sue to you to do a peculiar profit
To your person. Nay, when I have a suit,
Wherein I mean to touch your love indeed,
It shall be full of poise, and fearful to be granted.
Othello’s confidence, at first only staggered by broken hints and insinuations,
recovers itself at sight of Desdemona; and he exclaims
If she be false, O then Heav’n mocks itself:
I’ll not believe it.
But presently after, on brooding over his suspicions by himself, and yielding
to his apprehensions of the worst, his smothered jealousy breaks out into open
fury, and he returns to demand satisfaction of Iago like a wild beast stung with
the envenomed shaft of the hunters. ‘Look where he comes’, &c. In this state of
exasperation and violence, after the first paroxysms of his grief and tenderness
have had their vent in that passionate apostrophe, ‘I felt not Cassio’s kisses on
her lips,’ Iago by false aspersions, and by presenting the most revolting images to
his mind, [See the passage beginning, ‘It is impossible you should see this, Were
they as prime as goats,’ .] easily turns the storm of Passion from himself against
Othello 106
Desdemona, and works him up into a trembling agony of doubt and fear, in
which he abandons all his love and hopes in a breath.
Now do I see’tis true. Look here, Iago,
All my fond love thus do I blow to Heav’n. Tis gone.
Arise, black vengeance, from the hollow hell;
Yield up, O love, thy crown and hearted throne
To tyrannous hate! Swell, bosom, with thy fraught;
For’tis of aspicks’ tongues.
From this time, his raging thoughts ‘never look back, ne’er ebb to humble love’ till
his revenge is sure of its object, the painful regrets and involuntary recollections
of past circumstances which cross his mind amidst the dim trances of passion,
aggravating the sense of his wrongs, but not shaking his purpose. Once indeed,
where Iago shows him Cassio with the handkerchief in his hand, and making
sport (as he thinks) of his misfortunes, the intolerable bitterness of his feelings,
the extreme sense of shame, makes him fall to praising her accomplishments and
relapse into a momentary fit of weakness, ‘Yet, oh, the pity of it, Iago, the pity
of it!’ Tis returning fondness, however, only serves, as it is managed by Iago,
to whet his revenge, and set his heart more against her. In his conversations
with Desdemona, the persuasion of her guilt and the immediate proofs of her
duplicity seem to irritate his resentment and aversion to her; but in the scene
immediately preceding her death, the recollection of his love returns upon him in
all its tenderness and force; and after her death, he all at once forgets his wrongs
in the sudden and irreparable sense of his loss:
My wife! My wife! What wife? I have no wife.
Oh insupportable! Oh heavy hour!
Tis happens before he is assured of her innocence; but afterwards his remorse is
as dreadful as his revenge has been, and yields only to fixed and death like despair.
His farewell speech, before he kills himself, in which he conveys his reasons to
the senate for the murder of his wife, is equal to the first speech in which he gave
them an account of his courtship of her, and ‘his whole course of love’. Such an
ending was alone worthy of such a commencement.
If anything could add to the force of our sympathy with Othello, or
compassion for his fate, it would be the frankness and generosity of his nature,
which so little deserve it. When Iago first begins to practise upon his unsuspecting
friendship, he answers:
—Tis not to make me jealous,
To say my wife is fair, feeds well, loves company,
Othello in the Nineteenth Century 107
Is free of speech, sings, plays, and dances well;
Where virtue is, these are most virtuous.
Nor from my own weak merits will I draw
Te smallest fear or doubt of her revolt,
For she had eyes and chose me.
Tis character is beautifully (and with affecting simplicity) confirmed by what
Desdemona herself says of him to Aemilia after she has lost the handkerchief,
the first pledge of his love to her:
Believe me, I had rather have lost my purse
Full of cruzadoes. And but my noble Moor
Is true of mind, and made of no such baseness,
As jealous creatures are, it were enough
To put him to ill thinking.
Aemilia. Is he not jealous?
Desdemona. Who he? I think the sun where he was
born drew all such humours from him.
In a short speech of Aemilia’s there occurs one of those side-intimations of
the fluctuations of passion which we seldom meet with but in Shakespeare.
After Othello has resolved upon the death of his wife, and bids her dismiss her
attendant for the night, she answers:
I will, my Lord.
Aemilia. How goes it now? HE LOOKS GENTLER THAN HE
DID.
Shakespeare has here put into half a line what some authors would have spun
out into ten set speeches.
Te character of Desdemona herself is inimitable both in itself, and as
it contrasts with Othello’s groundless jealousy, and with the foul conspiracy
of which she is the innocent victim. Her beauty and external graces are only
indirectly glanced at; we see ‘her visage in her mind’; her character everywhere
predominates over her person:
A maiden never bold:
Of spirit so still and quiet, that her motion
Blushed at itself.
Tere is one fine compliment paid to her by Cassio, who exclaims triumphantly
when she comes ashore at Cyprus after the storm:
Othello 108
Tempests themselves, high seas, and howling winds,
As having sense of beauty, do omit
Teir mortal natures, letting safe go by
Te divine Desdemona.
In general, as is the case with most of Shakespeare’s females, we lose sight of
her personal charms in her attachment and devotedness to her husband. ‘She is
subdued even to the very quality of her lord’; and to Othello’s ‘honours and his
valiant parts her soul and fortunes consecrates’. Te lady protests so much herself,
and she is as good as her word. Te truth of conception, with which timidity
and boldness are united in the same character, is marvellous. Te extravagance of
her resolutions, the pertinacity of her affections, may be said to arise out of the
gentleness of her nature. Tey imply an unreserved reliance on the purity of her
own intentions, an entire surrender of her fears to her love, a knitting of herself
(heart and soul) to the fate of another. Bating the commencement of her passion,
which is a little fantastical and headstrong (though even that may perhaps
be consistently accounted for from her inability to resist a rising inclination
[Footnote: Iago. Ay, too gentle. Othello. Nay, that’s certain.]) her whole character
consists in having no will of her own, no prompter but her obedience. Her
romantic turn is only a consequence of the domestic and practical part of her
disposition; and instead of following Othello to the wars, she would gladly have
‘remained at home a moth of peace’, if her husband could have stayed with her.
Her resignation and angelic sweetness of temper do not desert her at the last.
Te scenes in which she laments and tries to account for Othello’s estrangement
from her are exquisitely beautiful. After he has struck her, and called her names,
she says:
—Alas, Iago,
What shall I do to win my lord again?
Good friend, go to him; for by this light of heaven,
I know not how I lost him. Here I kneel;
If e’er my will did trespass ’gainst his love,
Either in discourse, or thought, or actual deed,
Or that mine eyes, mine ears, or any sense
Delighted them on any other form-
Or that I do not, and ever did
And ever will, though he do shake me off
To beggarly divorcement, love him dearly,
Comfort forswear me. Unkindness may do much,
And his unkindness may defeat my life,
But never taint my love.
Iago. I pray you be content: ’tis but his humour.
Othello in the Nineteenth Century 109
Te business of the state does him offence.
Desdemona. If ’twere no other!—
Te scene which follows with Aemilia and the song of the Willow are equally
beautiful, and show the author’s extreme power of varying the expression of
passion, in all its moods and in all circumstances;
Aemilia. Would you had never seen him.
Desdemona. So would not I: my love doth so approve him,
Tat even his stubbornness, his checks, his frowns,
Have grace and favour in them.
Not the unjust suspicions of Othello, not Iago’s treachery, place Desdemona in
a more amiable or interesting light than the casual conversation (half earnest,
half jest) between her and Aemilia on the common behaviour of women to their
husbands. Tis dialogue takes place just before the last fatal scene. If Othello had
overheard it, it would have prevented the whole catastrophe; but then it would
have spoiled the play.
Te character of Iago is one of the supererogations of Shakespeare’s
genius. Some persons, more nice than wise, have thought this whole character
unnatural, because his villainy is WITHOUT A SUFFICIENT MOTIVE.
Shakespeare, who was as good a philosopher as he was a poet, thought
otherwise. He knew that the love of power, which is another name for the
love of mischief, is natural to man. He would know this as well or better than
if it had been demonstrated to him by a logical diagram, merely from seeing
children paddle in the dirt or kill flies for sport. Iago in fact belongs to a
class of characters common to Shakespeare and at the same time peculiar to
him; whose heads are as acute and active as their hearts are hard and callous.
Iago is, to be sure, an extreme instance of the kind; that is to say, of diseased
intellectual activity, with an almost perfect indifference to moral good or evil,
or rather with a decided preference of the latter, because it falls more readily in
with his favourite propensity, gives greater zest to his thoughts and scope to his
actions. He is quite or nearly as indifferent to his own fate as to that of others;
he runs all risks for a trifling and doubtful advantage; and is himself the dupe
and victim of his ruling passion—an insatiable craving after action of the most
difficult and dangerous kind. ‘Our ancient’ is a philosopher, who fancies that
a lie that kills has more point in it than an alliteration or an antithesis; who
thinks a fatal experiment on the peace of a family a better thing than watching
the palpitations in the heart of a flea in a microscope; who plots the ruin of his
friends as an exercise for his ingenuity, and stabs men in the dark to prevent
ennui. His gaiety, such as it is, arises from the success of his treachery; his
ease from the torture he has inflicted on others. He is an amateur of tragedy
Othello 110
in real life; and instead of employing his invention on imaginary characters,
or long-forgotten incidents, he takes the bolder and more desperate course of
getting up his plot at home, casts the principal parts among his nearest friends
and connexions, and rehearses it in downright earnest, with steady nerves and
unabated resolution. We will just give an illustration or two.
One of his most characteristic speeches is that immediately after the marriage
of Othello.
Roderigo. What a full fortune does the thick lips owe,
If he can carry her thus!
Iago. Call up her father:
Rouse him [Othello], make after him, poison his delight,
Proclaim him in the streets, incense her kinsmen,
And tho’ he in a fertile climate dwell,
Plague him with flies: To’ that his joy be joy,
Yet throw such changes of vexation on it,
As it may lose some colour.
In the next passage, his imagination runs riot in the mischief he is plotting, and
breaks out into the wildness and impetuosity of real enthusiasm.
Roderigo. Here is her father’s house: I’ll call aloud.
Iago. Do, with like timorous accent and dire yell,
As when, by night and negligence, the fire
Is spied in populous cities.
One of his most favourite topics, on which he is rich indeed, and in descanting
on which his spleen serves him for a Muse, is the disproportionate match
between Desdemona and the Moor. Tis is a clue to the character of the lady
which he is by no means ready to part with. It is brought forward in the first
scene, and he recurs to it, when in answer to his insinuations against Desdemona,
Roderigo says:
I cannot believe that in her—she’s full of most blest conditions.
Iago. Bless’d fig’s end. Te wine she drinks is made of grapes. If she had
been blest, she would never have married the Moor.
And again with still more spirit and fatal effect afterwards, when he turns this
very suggestion arising in Othello’s own breast to her prejudice.
Othello. And yet how nature erring from itself—
Iago. Aye, there’s the point;—as to be bold with you,
Othello in the Nineteenth Century 111
Not to affect many proposed matches
Of her own clime, complexion, and degree.
Tis is probing to the quick. Iago here turns the character of poor
Desdemona, as it were, inside out. It is certain that nothing but the genius
of Shakespeare could have preserved the entire interest and delicacy of the
part, and have even drawn an additional elegance and dignity from the
peculiar circumstances in which she is placed. Te habitual licentiousness of
Iago’s conversation is not to be traced to the pleasure he takes in gross or
lascivious images, but to his desire of finding out the worst side of everything,
and of proving himself an over-match for appearances. He has none of
‘the milk of human kindness’ in his composition. His imagination rejects
everything that has not a strong infusion of the most unpalatable ingredients;
his mind digests only poisons. Virtue or goodness or whatever has the least
‘relish of salvation in it’ is, to his depraved appetite, sickly and insipid: and
he even resents the good opinion entertained of his own integrity, as if it
were an affront cast on the masculine sense and spirit of his character. Tus
at the meeting between Othello and Desdemona, he exclaims, ‘Oh, you
are well tuned now: but I’ ll set down the pegs that make this music, AS
HONEST AS I AM’—his character of bonhommie not sitting at all easily
upon him. In the scenes where he tries to work Othello to his purpose, he is
proportionably guarded, insidious, dark, and deliberate. We believe nothing
ever came up to the profound dissimulation and dexterous artifice of the well-
known dialogue in the third act, where he first enters upon the execution of
his design.
Iago. My noble lord.
Othello. What dost thou say, Iago?
Iago. Did Michael Cassio,
When you woo’d my lady, know of your love?
Othello. He did from first to last.
Why dost thou ask?
Iago. But for a satisfaction of my thought,
No further harm.
Othello. Why of thy thought, Iago?
Iago. I did not think he had been acquainted with it.
Othello. O yes, and went between us very oft--
Iago. Indeed!
Othello. Indeed? Ay, indeed. Discern’st thou aught of that?
Is he not honest?
Iago. Honest, my lord?
Othello. Honest? Ay, honest.
Othello 112
Iago. My lord, for aught I know.
Othello. What do’st thou think?
Iago. Tink, my lord!
Othello. Tink, my lord! Alas, thou echo’st me,
As if there was some monster in thy thought
Too hideous to be shown.
Te stops and breaks, the deep workings of treachery under the mask of love
and honesty, the anxious watchfulness, the cool earnestness, and if we may so
say, the PASSION of hypocrisy marked in every line, receive their last finishing
in that inconceivable burst of pretended indignation at Othello’s doubts of his
sincerity.
O grace! O Heaven forgive me!
Are you a man? Have you a soul or sense?
God be wi’ you; take mine office. O wretched fool,
Tat lov’st to make thine honesty a vice!
Oh monstrous world! take note, take note, O world!
To be direct and honest, is not safe.
I thank you for this profit, and from hence
I’ll love no friend, since love breeds such offence.
If Iago is detestable enough when he has business on his hands and all his
engines at work, he is still worse when he has nothing to do, and we only see into
the hollowness of his heart. His indifference when Othello falls into a swoon, is
perfectly diabolical.
Iago. How is it. General? Have you not hurt your head?
Othello. Dost thou mock me?
Iago. I mock you not, by Heaven.
Te part indeed would hardly be tolerated, even as a foil to the virtue and
generosity of the other characters in the play, But for its indefatigable industry
and inexhaustible resources, Which divert the attention of the spectator (as
well as his own) from the end he has in view to the means by which it must
be accomplished.—Edmund the Bastard in Lear is something of the same
character, placed in less prominent circumstances. Zanga is a vulgar caricature
of it.
QQQ
Othello in the Nineteenth Century 113
1818—Samuel Taylor Coleridge. “Notes on Othello,” from
Lectures and Notes on Shakspere and Other English Poets
Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834) was an English poet, philosopher,
and critic. In collaboration with his good friend William Wordsworth,
he published Lyrical Ballads, which included his enduring poem “The
Rime of the Ancient Mariner.” His best-known critical work is Biographia
Literaria.
Act I. sc. 1. Admirable is the preparation, so truly and peculiarly Shakspearian,
in the introduction of Roderigo, as the dupe on whom Iago shall first exercise
his art, and in so doing display his own character. Roderigo, without any fixed
principle, but not without the moral notions and sympathies with honor,
which his rank and connections had hung upon him, is already well fitted
and predisposed for the purpose; for very want of character and strength of
passion, like wind loudest in an empty house, constitute his character. Te first
three lines happily state the nature and foundation of the friendship between
him and Iago,—the purse,—as also the contrast of Roderigo’s intemperance of
mind with Iago’s coolness,—the coolness of a preconceiving experimenter. Te
mere language of protestation—
If ever I did dream of such a matter, abhor me,—
which falling in with the associative link, determines Roderigo’s continuation of
complaint—
Tou told’st me, thou didst hold him in thy hate—
elicits at length a true feeling of Iago’s mind, the dread of contempt habitual
to those, who encourage in themselves, and have their keenest pleasure in, the
expression of contempt for others. Observe Iago’s high self-opinion, and the
moral, that a wicked man will employ real feelings, as well as assume those most
alien from his own, as instruments of his purposes:—
—And, by the faith of man, I know my place,
I am worth no worse a place.
I think [scholar Tomas] Tyrwhitt’s reading of ‘life’ for ‘wife’—
A fellow almost damn’d in a fair wife—
Othello 114
the true one, as fitting to Iago’s contempt for whatever did not display power,
and that intellectual power. In what follows, let the reader feel how by and
through the glass of two passions, disappointed vanity and envy, the very vices
of which he is complaining, are made to act upon him as if they were so many
excellences, and the more appropriately, because cunning is always admired and
wished for by minds conscious of inward weakness;—but they act only by half,
like music on an inattentive auditor, swelling the thoughts which prevent him
from listening to it.
Roderigo: What a full fortune does the ‘thick-lips’ owe,
If he can carry’t thus.
Roderigo turns off to Othello; and here comes one, if not the only, seeming
justification of our blackamoor or negro Othello. Even if we supposed this an
uninterrupted tradition of the theatre, and that Shakspeare himself, from want
of scenes, and the experience that nothing could be made too marked for the
senses of his audience, had practically sanctioned it,—would this prove aught
concerning his own intention as a poet for all ages? Can we imagine him so
utterly ignorant as to make a barbarous negro plead royal birth,—at a time, too,
when negros were not known except as slaves?
—As for Iago’s language to Brabantio, it implies merely that Othello was
a Moor, that is, black. Tough I think the rivalry of Roderigo sufficient to
account for his wilful confusion of Moor and Negro,—yet, even if compelled
to give this up, I should think it only adapted for the acting of the day, and
should complain of an enormity built on a single word, in direct contradiction
to Iago’s ‘Barbary horse.’ Besides, if we could in good earnest believe
Shakspeare ignorant of the distinction, still why should we adopt one
disagreeable possibility instead of a ten times greater and more pleasing
probability? It is a common error to mistake the epithets applied by the
‘dramatis personae’ to each other, as truly descriptive of what the audience
ought to see or know. No doubt Desdemona saw Othello’s visage in his
mind; yet, as we are constituted, and most surely as an English audience was
disposed in the beginning of the seventeenth century, it would be something
monstrous to conceive this beautiful Venetian girl falling in love with a
veritable negro. It would argue a disproportionateness, a want of balance,
in Desdemona, which Shakspeare does not appear to have in the least
contemplated.
Brabantio’s speech:—Tis accident is not unlike my dream:—
Te old careful senator, being caught careless, transfers his caution to his
dreaming power at least.
Othello in the Nineteenth Century 115
Iago’s speech:—
—For their souls,
Another of his fathom they have not,
To lead their business:—
Te forced praise of Othello followed by the bitter hatred of him in this speech!
And observe how Brabantio’s dream prepares for his recurrence to the notion of
philtres, and how both prepare for carrying on the plot of the arraignment of
Othello on this ground.
[In act 1, scene 2]
Othello: ’Tis better as it is.
How well these few words impress at the outset the truth of Othello’s own
character of himself at the end—‘that he was not easily wrought!’ . . .
. . .
[In act 1, scene 3]
Brabantio: Look to her, Moor; have a quick eye to see;
She has deceiv’d her father, and may thee.
Othello: My life upon her faith.
In real life, how do we look back to little speeches as presentimental of, or
contrasted with, an affecting event! Even so, Shakspeare, as secure of being read
over and over, of becoming a family friend, provides this passage for his readers,
and leaves it to them.
Iago’s speech:—
Virtue? a fig! ’tis in ourselves, that we are thus, or thus, &c.
Tis speech comprises the passionless character of Iago. It is all will in intellect;
and therefore he is here a bold partizan of a truth, but yet of a truth converted
into a falsehood by the absence of all the necessary modifications caused by the
frail nature of man.
. . .
Note Iago’s pride of mastery in the repetition of ‘Go, make money!’ to his
anticipated dupe, even stronger than his love of lucre: and when Roderigo is
completely won—
I am chang’d. I’ll go sell all my land—
Othello 116
when the effect has been fully produced, the repetition of triumph—
Go to; farewell; put money enough in your purse!
Te remainder—Iago’s soliloquy—the motive-hunting of a motiveless malignity
—how awful it is! Yea, whilst he is still allowed to bear the divine image, it is too
fiendish for his own steady view,—for the lonely gaze of a being next to devil,
and only not quite devil,—and yet a character which Shakspeare has attempted
and executed, without disgust and without scandal!
Dr. Johnson has remarked that little or nothing is wanting to render the
Othello a regular tragedy, but to have opened the play with the arrival of Othello
in Cyprus, and to have thrown the preceding act into the form of narration. Here
then is the place to determine, whether such a change would or would not be
an improvement;—nay, (to throw down the glove with a full challenge) whether
the tragedy would or not by such an arrangement become more regular,—that is,
more consonant with the rules dictated by universal reason, on the true common-
sense of mankind, in its application to the particular case. For in all acts of
judgment, it can never be too often recollected, and scarcely too often repeated,
that rules are means to ends, and, consequently, that the end must be determined
and understood before it can be known what the rules are or ought to be.
. . . Observe in how many ways Othello is made, first, our acquaintance, then
our friend, then the object of our anxiety, before the deeper interest is to be
approached!
…
Montano: But, good lieutenant, is your general wiv’d?
Cassio: Most fortunately: he hath achiev’d a maid
Tat paragons description, and wild fame;
One that excels the quirks of blazoning pens,
And, in the essential vesture of creation,
Does bear all excellency.
Here is Cassio’s warm-hearted, yet perfectly disengaged, praise of Desdemona,
and sympathy with the ‘most fortunately’ wived Othello;—and yet Cassio is an
enthusiastic admirer, almost a worshipper, of Desdemona. O, that detestable code
that excellence cannot be loved in any form that is female, but it must needs be
selfish! Observe Othello’s “honest,” and Cassio’s “bold” Iago, and Cassio’s full
guileless-hearted wishes for the safety and love-raptures of Othello and “the
divine Desdemona.” And also note the exquisite circumstance of Cassio’s kissing
Iago’s wife, as if it ought to be impossible that the dullest auditor should not
feel Cassio’s religious love of Desdemona’s purity. Iago’s answers are the sneers
which a proud bad intellect feels towards woman, and expresses to a wife. Surely
Othello in the Nineteenth Century 117
it ought to be considered a very exalted compliment to women, that all the
sarcasms on them in Shakspeare are put in the mouths of villains.
. . .
Iago, aside: He takes her by the palm: Ay, well said, whisper; with
as little a web as this, will I ensnare as great a fly as Cassio. Ay,
smile upon her, do, &c.
Te importance given to trifles, and made fertile by the villainy of the observer.
. . .
Act v. last scene. Othello’s speech:—
—Of one, whose hand,
Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away
Richer than all his tribe, &c.
. . .
Othello wishes to excuse himself on the score of ignorance, and yet not to
excuse himself,—to excuse himself by accusing. Tis struggle of feeling is finely
conveyed in the word “base,” which is applied to the rude Indian, not in his own
character, but as the momentary representative of Othello’s . . . .
Finally, let me repeat that Othello does not kill Desdemona in jealousy, but
in a conviction forced upon him by the almost superhuman art of Iago, such a
conviction as any man would and must have entertained who had believed Iago’s
honesty as Othello did. We, the audience, know that Iago is a villain from the
beginning; but in considering the essence of the Shakspearian Othello, we must
perseveringly place ourselves in his situation, and under his circumstances . . . .
Othello had no life but in Desdemona:—the belief that she, his angel, had
fallen from the heaven of her native innocence, wrought a civil war in his heart.
She is his counterpart; and, like him, is almost sanctified in our eyes by her
absolute unsuspiciousness, and holy entireness of love. As the curtain drops,
which do we pity the most?
QQQ
1836—John Quincy Adams. “The Character
of Desdemona,” from The American Monthly Magazine
John Quincy Adams was elected president of the United States in 1824.
After his defeat in the 1828 election, he served eight consecutive terms
as a member of Congress, during which time he became a staunch
Othello 118
opponent of the expansion of slavery. He also wrote his memoirs,
poetry, and a number of essays.
Tere are critics who cannot bear to see the virtue and delicacy of Shakspeare’s
Desdemona called in question; who defend her on the ground that Othello is not
an Ethiopian, but a Moor; that he is not black, but only tawny; and they protest
against the sable mask of Othello upon the stage, and against the pictures of him
in which he is always painted black. Tey say that prejudices have been taken
against Desdemona from the slanders of lago, from the railings of Roderigo,
from the disappointed paternal rancour of Brabantio, and from the desponding
concessions of Othello himself.
I have said, that since I entered upon the third of Shakspeare’s seven ages,
the first and chief capacity in which I have read and studied him is as a teacher of
morals; and that I had scarcely ever seen a player of his parts who regarded him
as a moralist at all. I further said, that in my judgment no man could understand
him who did not study him preeminently as a teacher of morals. Tese critics say
they do not incline to put Shakspeare on a level with Aesop! Sure enough they
do not study Shakspeare as a teacher of morals. To them, therefore, Desdemona
is a perfect character; and her love for Othello is not unnatural, because he is not
a Congo negro but only a sooty Moor, and has royal blood in his veins.
My objections to the character of Desdemona arise not from what lago,
or Roderigo, or Brabantio, or Othello says of her; but from what she herself
does. She absconds from her father’s house, in the dead of night, to marry a
blackamoor. She breaks a father’s heart, and covers his noble house with shame,
to gratify—what? Pure love, like that of Juliet or Miranda? No! unnatural
passion; it cannot be named with delicacy. Her admirers now say this is criticism
of 1835; that the color of Othello has nothing to do with the passion of
Desdemona. No? Why, if Othello had been white, what need would there have
been for her running away with him? She could have made no better match. Her
father could have made no reasonable objection to it; and there could have been
no tragedy. If the color of Othello is not as vital to the whole tragedy as the age
of Juliet is to her character and destiny, then have I read Shakspeare in vain. Te
father of Desdemona charges Othello with magic arts in obtaining the affections
of his daughter. Why, but because her passion for him is unnatural; and why is
it unnatural, but because of his color? In the very first scene, in the dialogue
between Roderigo and lago, before they rouse Brabantio to inform him of his
daughter’s elopement, Roderigo contemptuously calls Othello “the thick lips.” I
cannot in decency quote here—but turn to the book, and see in what language
Iago announces to her father his daughter’s shameful misconduct. Te language
of Roderigo is more supportable. He is a Venitian gentleman, himself a rejected
suitor of Desdemona; and who has been forbidden by her father access to his
house. Roused from his repose at the dead of night by the loud cries of these
Othello in the Nineteenth Century 119
two men, Brabantio spurns, with indignation and scorn, the insulting and beastly
language of Iago; and sharply chides Roderigo, whom he supposes to be hovering
about his house in defiance of his prohibitions and in a state of intoxication. He
threatens him with punishment. Roderigo replies—
Sir, I will answer any thing. But I beseech you,
If ’t be your pleasure, and most wise consent,
(As partly, I find, it is,) that your fair daughter
At this odd-even and dull watch o’ the night, Transported—with no
worse nor better guard,
But with a knave of common hire, a gondolier,—
To the gross clasps to a lascivious Moor,—
If this be known of you, and your allowance,
We then have done you bold and saucy wrongs;
But if you know not this, my manners tell me,
We have your wrong rebuke. Do not believe,
Tat, from the sense of all civility,
I thus would play and trifle with your reverence:
Your daughter—if you have not given her leave,—
I say again, hath made a gross revolt;
Tying her duty, beauty, wit, and fortunes,
In an extravagant and wheeling stranger,
Of here and every where: Straight satisfy yourself:
If she be in her chamber, or your house,
Let loose on me the justice of the state
For thus deluding you.
Struck by this speech as by a clap of thunder, Brabantio calls up his people,
remembers a portentous dream, calls for light, goes and searches with his
servants, and comes back saying—
It is too true an evil: gone she is:
And what’s to come of my despised time,
Is nought but bitterness.
Te father’s heart is broken; life is no longer of any value to him; he repeats this
sentiment time after time whenever he appears in the scene; and in the last scene
of the play, where Desdemona lies dead, her uncle Gratiano says—
Poor Desdemona! I am glad thy father’s dead,
Ty match was mortal to him, and pure grief
Shore his old thread in twain.
Othello 120
Indeed! indeed! I must look at Shakspeare in this as in all his pictures
of human life, in the capacity of a teacher of morals. I must believe that, in
exhibiting a daughter of a Venitian nobleman of the highest rank eloping in the
dead of the night to marry a thick-lipped wool-headed Moor, opening a train
of consequences which lead to her own destruction by her husband’s hands,
and to that of her father by a broken heart, he did not intend to present her as
an example of the perfection of female virtue. I must look first at the action,
then at the motive, then at the consequences, before I inquire in what light it
is received and represented by the other persons of the drama. Te first action
of Desdemona discards all female delicacy, all filial duty, all sense of ingenuous
shame. So I consider it—and so, it is considered, by her own father. Her offence
is not a mere elopement from her father’s house for a clandestine marriage. I
hope it requires no unreasonable rigour of morality to consider even that as
suited to raise a prepossession rather unfavorable to the character of a young
woman of refined sensibility and elevated education. But an elopement for a
clandestine marriage with a blackamoor!—Tat is the measure of my estimation
of the character of Desdemona from the beginning; and when I have passed my
judgment upon it, and find in the play that from the first moment of her father’s
knowledge of the act it made him loathe his life, and that it finally broke his
heart, I am then in time to inquire, what was the deadly venom which inflicted
the immedicable wound:—and what is it, but the color of Othello?
Now, Roderigo,
Where did’st thou see her?—Oh, unhappy girl!—
With the Moor, say’st thou?—Who would be a father?
Tese are the disjointed lamentations of the wretched parent when the first
disclosure of his daughter’s shame is made known to him. Tis scene is one of
the inimitable pictures of human passion in the hands of Shakspeare, and that
half line,
With the MOOR say’st thou?
comes from the deepest recesses of the soul.
Again, when Brabantio first meets Othello, he breaks out:
O, thou foul thief, where hast thou stow’d my daughter?
Damn’d as thou art, thou hast enchanted her:
For I’ll refer me to all things of sense,
If she, in chains of magic were not bound,
Whether a maid so tender, fair, and happy,
So opposite to marriage that she shunn’d
Othello in the Nineteenth Century 121
Te wealthly curled darlings of our nation,
Would ever have to incur our general mock,
Run from her guardage to the sooty bosom
Of such a thing as thou; to fear, not to delight.
Several of the English commentators have puzzled themselves with the inquiry
why the epithet “curled” is here applied to the wealthy darlings of the nation; and
Dr. Johnson thinks it has no reference to the hair; but it evidently has. Te curled
hair is in antithetic contrast to the sooty bosom, the thick lips, and the woolly
head. Te contrast of color is the very hinge upon which Brabantio founds his
charge of magic, counteracting the impulse of nature.
At the close of the same scene (the second of the first act) Brabantio, hearing
that the duke is in council upon public business of the State, determines to carry
Othello before him for trial upon the charge of magic. “Mine,” says he,
Mine’s not a middle course; the duke himself
Or any of my brothers of the state
Cannot but feel the wrong, as ’twere their own:
For if such actions may have passage free,
Bond slaves and Pagans shall our statesmen be.
And Steevens, in his note on this passage, says, “He alludes to the common
condition of all blacks who come from their own country, both slaves and pagans;
and uses the word in contempt of Othello and his complexion. If this Moor is
now suffered to escape with impunity, it will be such an encouragement to his
black countrymen, that we may expect to see all the first offices of our state filled
up by the Pagans and bond-slaves of Africa.” Othello himself in his narrative
says that he had been taken by the insolent foe and sold to slavery. He had been
a slave.
Once more—When Desdemona pleads to the Duke and the council for
permission to go with Othello to Cyprus, she says,
Tat I did love the Moor, to live with him,
My downright violence and storm of fortune
May trumpet to the world; my heart’s subdued,
Even to the very quality of my lord;
I saw Othello’s visage in his mind;
And to his honours and his valiant parts
Did I my soul and fortunes consecrate.
In commenting upon this passage, Wm. Henley says, “Tat quality here signifies
the Moorish complexion of Othello, and not his military profession (as Malone
Othello 122
had supposed), is obvious from what immediately follows: ‘I saw Othello’s visage
in his mind;’ and also from what the Duke says to Brabantio—
If virtue no delighted beauty lack
Your son-in-law is far more fair than black.
Te characters of Othello and Iago in this play are evidently intended as
contrasted pictures of human nature, each setting off the other. Tey are
national portraits of man—the I and the M. Te Italian is white,
crafty, and cruel; a consummate villain; yet, as often happens in the realities of
that description whom we occasionally meet in the intercourse of life, so vain of
his own artifices that he betrays himself by boasting of them and their success.
Accordingly, in the very first scene he reveals to Roderigo the treachery of his
own character:—
For when my outward action doth demonstrate
Te native act and figure of my heart
In compliment extern, ’tis not long after
But I will wear my heart upon my sleeve
For daws to peck at: I am not what I am.
Tere is a seeming inconsistency in the fact that a double dealer should disclose
his own secret, which must necessarily put others upon their guard against him;
but the inconsistency is in human nature, and not in the poet.
Te double dealing Italian is a very intelligent man, a keen and penetrating
observer, and full of ingenuity to devise and contrive base expedients. His
language is coarse, rude, and obscene: his humor is caustic and bitter. Conscious
of no honest principle in himself, he believes not in the existence of honesty in
others. He is jealous and suspicious; quick to note every trifle light as air, and to
draw from it inferences of evil as confirmed circumstances. In his dealings with
the Moor, while he is even harping upon his honesty, he offers to commit any
murder from extreme attachment to his person and interests. In all that Iago says
of others, and especially of Desdemona, there is a mixture of truth and falsehood,
blended together, in which the truth itself serves to accredit the lie; and such is
the ordinary character of malicious slanders. Doctor Johnson speaks of “the soft
simplicity,” the “innocence,” the “artlessness” of Desdemona. Iago speaks of her
as a supersubtle Venitian; and, when kindling the sparks of jealousy in the soul of
Othello, he says,
She did deceive her father, marrying you:
And when she seemed to shake and fear your looks,
She loved them most.
Othello in the Nineteenth Century 123
“And so she did,” answers Othello. Tis charge, then, was true; and Iago
replies:
Why, go to, then;
She that so young could give out such a seeming
To seal her father’s eyes up, close as oak.—
He thought ’twas witchcraft.
It was not witchcraft; but surely as little was it simplicity, innocence,
artlessness. Te effect of this suggestion upon Othello is terrible only because
he knows it is true. Brabantio, on parting from him, had just given him the
same warning, to which he had not then paid the slightest heed. But soon his
suspicions are roused—he tries to repel them; they are fermenting in his brain:
he appears vehemently moved and yet unwilling to acknowledge it. Iago, with
fiend-like sagacity, seizes upon the paroxysm of emotion, and then comes the
following dialogue:—
Iago: My lord, I see you are mov’d.
Othello: No, not much mov’d:—
I do not think but Desdemona’s honest.
Iago: Long live she so! and long live you to think so!
Oth.: And yet, how nature erring from itself,—
Iago: Ay, there’s the point:—As,—to be bold with you,—
Not to affect many proposed matches,
Of her own clime, complexion, and degree;
Whereto, we see, in all things nature tends:
Foh! one may smell, in such, a will most rank,
Foul disproportion, thoughts unnatural.
Te deadly venom of these imputations, working up to frenzy the suspicions
of the Moor, consist not in their falsehood but in their truth.
I have said the character of Desdemona was deficient in delicacy. Besides
the instances to which I referred in proof of this charge, observe what she says
in pleading for the restoration of Cassio to his office, from which he had been
cashiered by Othello for beastly drunkenness and a consequent night-brawl, in
which he had stabbed Montano—the predecessor of Othello as Governor of
Cypress—and nearly killed him; yet in urging Othello to restore Cassio to his
office and to favor, Desdemona says—
in faith, he’s penitent;
And yet his trespass, in our common reason,
(Save that, they say, the wars must make examples
Othello 124
Out of their best,) is not almost a fault
To incur a private check.
Now, to palliate the two crimes of Cassio—his drunken fit and his stabbing
of Montano—the reader knows that he has been inveigled to the commission
of them by the accursed artifices of Iago; but Desdemona knows nothing of
this; she has no excuse for Cassio—nothing to plead for him but his penitence.
And is this the character for a woman of delicate sentiment to give of such a
complicated and heinous offence as that of which Cassio has been guilty, even
when pleading for his pardon? No! it is not for female delicacy to extenuate the
crimes of drunkenness and bloodshed, even when performing the appropriate
office of raising the soul-subduing voice for mercy.
Afterwards, in the same speech, she says—
What! Michael Cassio,
Tat came a-wooing with you; and many a time,
When I have spoke of you dispraisingly,
Hath ta’en your part; to have so much to do
To bring him in!
I will not inquire how far this avowal that she had been in the frequent habit
of speaking dispraisingly of Othello at the very time when she was so deeply
enamoured with his honors and his valiant parts, was consistent with sincerity.
Young ladies must be allowed a little concealment and a little disguise, even for
passions of which they have no need to be ashamed. It is the rosy pudency—the
irresistible charm of the sex; but the exercise of it in satirical censure upon the
very object of their most ardent affections is certainly no indication of innocence,
simplicity, or artlessness.
I still retain, then, the opinion—
First. Tat the passion of Desdemona for Othello is unnatural, solely and
exclusively because of his color.
Second. Tat her elopement to him, and secret marriage with him, indicate
a personal character not only very deficient in delicacy, but totally regardless of
filial duty, of female modesty, and of ingenuous shame.
Tird. Tat her deficiency in delicacy is discernible in her conduct and
discourse throughout the play.
I perceive and acknowledge, indeed, the admirable address with which the
part has been contrived to inspire and to warm the breast of the spectator
with a deep interest in her fate; and I am well aware that my own comparative
insensibility to it is not in unison with the general impression which it produces
upon the stage. I shrink from the thought of slandering even a creature of
the imagination. When the spectator or reader follows, on the stage or in the
Othello in the Nineteenth Century 125
closet, the infernal thread of duplicity and of execrable devices with which Iago
entangles his victims, it is the purpose of the dramatist to merge all the faults and
vices of the sufferers in the overwhelming flood of their calamities, and in the
unmingled detestation of the inhuman devil, their betrayer and destroyer. And in
all this, I see not only the skill of the artist, but the power of the moral operator,
the purifier of the spectator’s heart by the agency of terror and pity.
Te characters of Othello and Desdemona, like all the characters of men and
women in real life, are of “mingled yarn,” with qualities of good and bad—of
virtues and vices in proportion differently composed. Iago, with a high order of
intellect, is, in moral principle, the very spirit of evil. I have said the moral of the
tragedy is, that the intermarriage of black and white blood is a violation of the
law of nature. Tat is the lesson to be learned from the play. To exhibit all the
natural consequences of their act, the poet is compelled to make the marriage
secret. It must commence by an elopement, and by an outrage upon the decorum
of social intercourse. He must therefore assume, for the performance of this
act, persons of moral character sufficiently frail and imperfect to be capable
of performing it, but in other respects endowed with pleasing and estimable
qualities. Tus, the Moor is represented as of a free, and open, and generous
nature; as a Christian; as a distinguished military commander in the service of
the Republic of Venice; as having rendered important service to the State, and
as being in the enjoyment of a splendid reputation as a warrior. Te other party
to the marriage is a maiden, fair, gentle, and accomplished; born and educated in
the proudest rank of Venitian nobility.
Othello, setting aside his color, has every quality to fascinate and charm
the female heart. Desdemona, apart from the grossness of her fault in being
accessible to such a passion for such an object, is amiable and lovely; among the
most attractive of her sex and condition. Te faults of their characters are never
brought into action excepting as they illustrate the moral principle of the whole
story. Othello is not jealous by nature. On the contrary, with a strong natural
understanding, and all the vigilance essential to an experienced commander,
he is of a disposition so unsuspicious and confiding, that he believes in the
exceeding honesty of Iago long after he has ample cause to suspect and distrust
him. Desdemona, supersubtle as she is in the management of her amour with
Othello; deeply as she dissembles to deceive her father; and, forward as she is in
inviting the courtship of the Moor; discovers neither artifice nor duplicity from
the moment that she is Othello’s wife. Her innocence, in all her relations with
him, is pure and spotless; her kindness for Cassio is mere untainted benevolence;
and, though unguarded in her personal deportment towards him, it is far from the
slightest soil of culpable impropriety. Guiltless of all conscious reproach in this
part of her conduct, she never uses any of the artifices to which she had resorted
to accomplish her marriage with Othello. Always feeling that she has given him
no cause of suspicion, her endurance of his cruel treatment and brutal abuse of
Othello 126
her through all its stages of violence, till he murders her in bed, is always marked
with the most affecting sweetness of temper, the most perfect artlessness, and the
most endearing resignation. Te defects of her character have here no room for
developement, and the poet carefully keeps them out of sight. Hence it is that the
general reader and spectator, with Dr. Johnson, give her unqualified credit for soft
simplicity, artless-ness, and innocence—forgetful of the qualities of a different
and opposite character, stamped upon the transactions by which she effected her
marriage with the Moor. Te marriage, however, is the source of all her calamities;
it is the primitive cause of all the tragic incidents of the play, and of its terrible
catastrophe. Tat the moral lesson to be learned from it is of no practical utility in
England, where there are no valiant Moors to steal the affections of fair and high-
born dames, may be true; the lesson, however, is not the less, couched under the
form of an admirable drama; nor needs it any laborious effort of the imagination
to extend the moral precept resulting from the story to a salutary admonition
against all ill-assorted, clandestine, and unnatural marriages.
QQQ
1864—Victor Hugo. From William Shakespeare
Victor Hugo (1802–1885), the great French author of Les Misérables and
The Hunchback of Notre Dame, also wrote a study of Shakespeare.
Now what is Othello? He is the night, An immense fatal figure. Night is
amorous of day. Darkness loves the dawn. Te African adores the white woman.
Othello has for his light and for his frenzy, Desdemona. And then, how easy
to him is jealousy! He is great, he is dignified, he is majestic, he soars above all
heads; he has as an escort bravery, battle, the braying of trumpets, the banners of
war, renown, glory; he is radiant with twenty victories, he is studded with stars,
this Othello: but he is black. And thus how soon, when jealous, the hero becomes
the monster, the black becomes the negro! How speedily has night beckoned to
death!
By the side of Othello, who is night, there is Iago, who is evil—evil, the other
form of darkness. Night is but the night of the world; evil is the night of the soul.
How deeply black are perfidy and falsehood! It is all one whether what courses
through the veins be ink or treason. Whoever has jostled against imposture and
perjury, knows it: one must blindly grope one’s way with knavery. Pour hypocrisy
upon the break of day, and you put out the sun; and this, thanks to false religions,
is what happens to God.
Iago near Othello is the precipice near the landslip. “Tis way!” he says in a
low voice. Te snare advises blindness. Te lover of darkness guides the black.
Othello in the Nineteenth Century 127
Deceit takes upon itself to give what light may be required by night. Falsehood
serves as a blind man’s dog to jealousy. Othello the negro and Iago the traitor
pitted against whiteness and candor: what more formidable? Tese ferocities of
darkness act in unison. Tese two incarnations of the eclipse conspire, the one
roaring, the other sneering, for the tragic suffocation of light.
Sound this profound thing. Othello is the night, and being night, and
wishing to kill, what does he take to slay with? Poison? the club? the axe? the
knife? No; the pillow. To kill is to lull to sleep. Shakespeare himself perhaps did
not take this into account. Te creator sometimes, almost unknown to himself,
yields to his type, so truly is that type a power. And it is thus that Desdemona,
spouse of the man Night, dies, stifled by the pillow upon which the first kiss was
given, and which receives the last sigh.
QQQ
1880—Algernon Charles Swinburne.
From A Study of Shakespeare
A. C. Swinburne (1837–1909), most famous for his ornate poetry, was
also an astute critic.
In the seventh story of the third decade of the Hecatommithi of M.
Giovanbattista Giraldi Cinthio, “nobile Ferrarese,” first published in 1565, there
is an incident so beautifully imagined and so beautifully related that it seems
at first inexplicable how Shakespeare, when engaged in transfiguring this story
into the tragedy of Othello, can have struck it out of his version. Te loss of
the magic handkerchief which seals the doom of the hero and his fellow-victim
is far less plausibly and far less beautifully explained by a mere accident, and a
most unlikely accident, than by a device which heightens at once the charm of
Desdemona and the atrocity of Iago. It is through her tenderness for his little
child that he takes occasion to destroy her.
Te ancient or ensign, who is nameless as every other actor in the story except
the Moor’s wife, is of course, if compared with Iago, a mere shadow cast before
it by the advent of that awful figure. But none the less is he the remarkably
powerful and original creature of a true and tragic genius. Every man may make
for himself, and must allow that he cannot pretend to impose upon any other, his
own image of the most wicked man ever created by the will of man or God. But
Cinthio’s villain is distinctly and vividly set before us: a man “of most beautiful
presence, but of the wickedest nature that ever was man in the world.” Less
abnormal and less inhumanly intellectual than Iago, who loved Desdemona “not
out of absolute lust” (perhaps the strangest and subtlest point of all that go to
Othello 128
make up his all but inscrutable character), this simpler villain, “no whit heeding
the faith given to his wife, nor friendship, nor faith, nor obligation, that he might
have to the Moor, fell most ardently in love with Desdemona. And he set all his
thought to see if it might become possible for him to enjoy her.”
Tis plain and natural motive would probably have sufficed for any of those
great contemporaries who found it easier to excel all other tragic or comic
poets since the passing of Sophocles and Aristophanes than to equal or draw
near to Shakespeare. For him it was insufficient. Neither envy nor hatred nor
jealousy nor resentment, all at work together in festering fusion of conscious
and contemplative evil, can quite explain Iago even to himself: yet neither
Macbeth nor even Hamlet is by nature more inevitably introspective. But the
secret of the abyss of this man’s nature lies deeper than did ever plummet sound
save Shakespeare’s. Te bright and restless devil of Goethe’s invention, the
mournfuller and more majestic devil created by Marlowe, are spirits of less deep
damnation than that incarnate in the bluff plain-spoken soldier whose honesty
is the one obvious thing about him, the one unmistakable quality which neither
man nor woman ever fails to recognise and to trust.
And what is even the loftier Faust, whose one fitting mate was Helen, if
compared with the subjects of Iago’s fathomless and bottomless malice? Tis
quarry cries on havoc louder than when Hamlet fell. Shakespeare alone could
have afforded to cancel the most graceful touch, to efface the loveliest feature, in
the sketch of Cinthio’s heroine. But Desdemona can dispense with even this.
Te Moor’s wife went often, as I have said, to the ancient’s wife’s house,
and abode with her a good part of the day. Whence this man seeing that
she sometimes bore about her a handkerchief which he knew that the
Moor had given her, the which handkerchief was wrought in Moorish
wise most subtly, and was most dear to the lady, and in like wise to
the Moor, he bethought him to take it from her secretly, and thence
to prepare against her her final ruin. And he having a girl of three
years old, which child was much beloved of Disdemona, one day that
the hapless lady had gone to stay at the house of this villain, he took
the little girl in his arms and gave her to the lady, who took her and
gathered her to her breast: this deceiver, who was excellent at sleight of
hand, reft from her girdlestead the handkerchief so cunningly that she
was no whit aware of it, and departed from her right joyful. Disdemona,
knowing not this, went home, and being busied with other thoughts
took no heed of the handkerchief. But some days thence, seeking for it
and not finding it, she was right fearful lest the Moor should ask it of
her, as he was often wont to do.
No reader of this terribly beautiful passage can fail to ask himself why
Shakespeare forbore to make use of it. Te substituted incident is as much
Othello in the Nineteenth Century 129
less probable as it is less tragic. Te wife offers to bind the husband’s aching
forehead with this especially hallowed handkerchief: “he puts it from him, and
it drops,” unnoticed by either, for Emilia to pick up and reflect, “I am glad I
have found this napkin.” What can be the explanation of what a dunce who
knows better than Shakespeare might call an oversight? Tere is but one: but
it is all-sufficient. In Shakespeare’s world as in nature’s it is impossible that
monsters should propagate: that Iago should beget, or that Goneril or Regan
should bring forth. Teir children are creatures unimaginable by man. Te old
chronicles give sons to Goneril who vanquish Cordelia in battle and drive her
to suicide in prison: but Shakespeare knew that such a tradition was not less
morally and physiologically incongruous than it was poetically and dramatically
impossible. And Lear’s daughters are not monsters in the proper sense: their
unnatural nature is but the sublimation and exaggeration of common evil
qualities, unalloyed, untempered, unqualified by any ordinary admixture of
anything not ravenously, resolutely, mercilessly selfish. Tey are devils only by
dint of being more utterly and exclusively animals—and animals of a lower
and hatefuller type—than usual. But any one less thoroughly intoxicated with
the poisonous drug of lifelong power upon all others within reach of his royal
hand would have been safe from the convincing and subjugating influence
of Goneril and Regan. Tat is plain enough: but who will be fool enough to
imagine that he would have been safe against the more deadly and inevitable
influence of Iago?
Te most fearful evidence of his spiritual power—for it would have been easy
for a more timid nature than his wife’s to secure herself beforehand against his
physical violence by a warning given betimes to either of his intended victims—
was necessarily suppressed by Shakespeare as unfit for dramatic service. Emilia
will not believe Othello’s assurance of her husband’s complicity in the murder
of Desdemona: the ancient’s wife in Cinthio’s terrible story “knew all, seeing
that her husband would fain have made use of her as an instrument in the lady’s
death, but she would never assent, and for dread of her husband durst not tell
her anything.” Tis is not more striking and satisfying in a tale than it would
have been improper and ineffectual in a tragedy. So utter a prostration of spirit,
so helpless an abjection of soul and abdication of conscience under the absolute
pressure of sheer terror, would have been too purely dreadful and contemptible a
phase of debased nature for Shakespeare to exhibit and to elaborate as he must
needs have done throughout the scenes in which Iago’s wife must needs have
figured: even if they could have been as dramatic, as living, as convincing as those
in which the light, unprincipled, untrustworthy, loving, lying, foolish, fearless
and devoted woman is made actual and tangible to our imagination as none but
Shakespeare could have made her: a little afraid, it may be, of her husband, when
she gives him the stolen handkerchief, but utterly dauntless when his murderous
hand is lifted against her to silence her witness to the truth.
Othello 130
Te crowning mark of difference between such a nature as this and such a
nature as that of the mistress for whose sake she lays down her life too late to
save her is less obvious even in their last difference of opinion—as to whether
there are or are not women who abuse their husbands as Othello charges his
wife with abusing him—than in the previous scene when Emilia most naturally
and inevitably asks her if he has not just shown himself to be jealous, and she
answers:
Who, he? I think the sun where he was born
Drew all such humours from him.
Tis would be a most noble stroke of pathos if the speaker were wrong—misled
by love into loving error; but the higher Shakespearean pathos, unequalled and
impossible for man to conceive as ever possibly to be equalled by man, consists in
the fact that she was right. And the men of Shakespeare’s age could see this: they
coupled together with equally assured propriety and justice of epithet “Honest
Iago” and “the jealous Moor.”
Te jealousy of the one and the honesty of the other must stand or fall
together. Othello, when overmastered by the agony of the sudden certitude that
the devotion of his love has been wasted on a harlot who has laid in ashes the
honour and the happiness of his life, may naturally or rather must inevitably so
bear himself as to seem jealous in the eyes of all—and they are all who know
him—to whom Iago seems the living type of honesty: a bluff, gallant, outspoken
fellow, no conjurer and no saint, coarse of speech and cynical of humour, but
true and tried as steel: a man to be trusted beyond many a far cleverer and many
a more refined companion in peril or in peace. It is the supreme triumph of his
superb hypocrisy so to disguise the pride of intellect which is the radical instinct
of his nature and the central mainspring of his action as to pass for a man of
rather inferior than superior intelligence to the less blunt and simple natures of
those on whom he plays with a touch so unerring at the pleasure of his merciless
will. One only thing he cannot do: he cannot make Desdemona doubt of Othello.
Te first terrible outbreak of his gathering passion in a triple peal of thunder fails
to convince her that she has erred in believing him incapable of jealousy. She can
only believe that he has vented upon her the irritation aroused by others, and
repent that she should have charged him even in thought with unkindness on no
more serious account than this. “Nay, we must think men are not gods”: and she
had been but inconsiderate and over-exacting, an “unhandsome warrior” unfit to
bear the burden and the heat of the day—of a lifelong union and a fellowship in
battle and struggle against the trials and the tests of chance—to repine internally
for a moment on such a score as that.
Were no other proof extant and flagrant of the palpable truth that
Shakespeare excelled all other men of all time on record as a poet in the most
Othello in the Nineteenth Century 131
proper and literal sense—as a creator of man and woman—there would be
overflowing and overwhelming proof of it in the creation and interaction of these
three characters. In the more technical and lyrical sense of the word, no less than
in height of prophetic power, in depth of reconciling and atoning inspiration, he
is excelled by Æschylus; though surely, on the latter score, by Æschylus alone.
But if the unique and marvellous power which at the close of the Oresteia leaves
us impressed with a crowning and final sense of high spiritual calm and austere
consolation in face of all the mystery of suffering and of sin—if this supreme gift
of the imaginative reason was no more shared by Shakespeare than by any poet
or prophet or teacher of Hebrew origin, it was his and his alone to set before us
the tragic problem of character and event, of all action and all passion, all evil and
all good, all natural joy and sorrow and chance and change, in such fullness and
perfection of variety, with such harmony and supremacy of justice and of truth,
that no man known to historic record ever glorified the world whom it would
have been so utterly natural and so comparatively rational to fall down before
and worship as a God.
For nothing human is ever for a moment above the reach or beyond the
scope or beneath the notice of his all but superhuman genius. In this very play
he sets before mankind for ever not only the perfect models of heroic love and
honour, of womanly sweetness and courage, of intelligent activity and joyous
energy in evil, but also an unsurpassable type of the tragicomic dullard. Roderigo
is not only Iago’s but (in Dryden’s masterly phrase) “God Almighty’s fool.” And
Shakespeare shows the poor devil no more mercy than Iago or than God. You
see at once that he was born to be plundered, cudgeled, and killed—if he tries
to play the villain—like a dog. No lighter comic relief than this rather grim and
pitiless exhibition of the typic fool could have been acceptable or admissible on
the stage of so supreme a tragedy.
Such humorous realism—and it is excellent of its kind—as half relieves and
half intensifies the horror of Cinthio’s tale may serve as well as any other point
of difference to show with what matchless tact of transfiguration by selection
and rejection the hand of Shakespeare wrought his will and set his mark on the
materials left ready for it by the hand of a lesser genius. Te ancient waylays and
maims the lieutenant on a dark night as he comes from the house of a harlot
“with whom he was wont to solace himself ”; and when the news gets abroad next
morning, and reaches the ears of Disdemona, “she, who was of a loving nature
and thought not that evil should thence befall her, shewed that she had right
great sorrow for such a mishap. Hereof the Moor took the worst opinion that
might be, and went to find the ancient, and said to him, ‘Tou knowest well that
my ass of a wife is in so great trouble for the lieutenant’s mishap that she is like
to run mad.’ ‘And how could you,’ said he, ‘deem otherwise, seeing that he is her
soul?’ ‘Her soul, eh?’ replied the Moor. ‘I will pluck—that will I—the soul from
her body.’ ” Shakespeare and his one disciple Webster alone could have afforded
Othello 132
to leave this masterly bit of dialogue unused or untranslated. For they alone
would so have elevated and ennobled the figure of the protagonist as to make it
unimaginable that he could have talked in this tone of his wife and her supposed
paramour with the living instrument of his revenge. Could he have done so, he
might have been capable of playing the part played by the merciless Moor who
allows the ancient to thrash her to death with a stocking stuffed with sand. No
later master of realistic fiction can presumably have surpassed the simple force of
impression and effect conveyed by this direct and unlovely narrative.
And as they debated with each other whether the lady should be done
to death by poison or dagger, and resolved not on either the one or the
other of these, the ancient said, “A way there is come into my mind
whereby you shall satisfy yourself, and there shall be no suspicion of it
whatever. And it is this. Te house wherein you dwell is very old, and
the ceiling of your chamber has many chinks in it. I will that with a
stocking full of sand we smite Disdemona so sore that she die thereof,
whereby there may seem on her no sign of blows: when she shall be
dead, we will make part of the ceiling fall, and will shatter the lady’s
head; feigning that a beam as it fell has shattered it and killed her: and
in this wise there shall be no one who may conceive any suspicion of
you, every man believing that her death has befallen by accident.” Te
cruel counsel pleased the Moor, and after abiding the time that seemed
convenient to him, he being one night with her abed, and having already
hidden the ancient in a little chamber that opened into the bedchamber,
the ancient, according to the order taken between them, made some
manner of noise in the little chamber: and, hearing it, the Moor said,
suddenly, to his wife, “Hast thou heard that noise?” “I have heard it,” said
she. “Get up,” subjoined the Moor, “and see what is the matter.” Up rose
the hapless Disdemona, and, as soon as she came near the little chamber,
forth came thereout the ancient, who, being a strong man, and of good
muscle, with the stocking which he had ready gave her a cruel blow in
the middle of her back, whereby the lady instantly fell, without being
able wellnigh to draw breath. But with that little voice that she could
get she called on the Moor to help her, and he, risen out of bed, said to
her, “Most wicked lady, thou hast the wage of thine unchastity: thus fare
those women, who, feigning to love their husbands, set horns on their
heads.” Te wretched lady, hearing this, and feeling herself come to her
end, inasmuch as the ancient had given her another blow, said that in
witness of her faith she called upon the divine justice, seeing that the
world’s failed her. And as she called on God to help her, when the third
blow followed, she lay slain by the villainous ancient. Ten, having laid
her in bed, and shattered her head, he and the Moor made the rooftree
Othello in the Nineteenth Century 133
of the chamber fall, as they had devised between them, and the Moor
began to call for help, for the house was falling: at whose voice the
neighbours came running, and having uncovered the bed, they found the
lady under the roof-beams dead.
We are a long way off Shakespeare in this powerfully dramatic and realistic
scene of butchery: it is a far cry from Othello, a nature made up of love and
honour, of resolute righteousness and heroic pity, to the relentless and deliberate
ruffian whose justice is as brutal in its ferocity as his caution is cold-blooded in
its foresight. Te sacrificial murder of Desdemona is no butchery, but tragedy—
terrible as ever tragedy may be, but not more terrible than beautiful; from the
first kiss to the last stab, when the sacrificing priest of retribution immolates the
victim whose blood he had forborne to shed for pity of her beauty till impelled
to forget his first impulse and shed it for pity of her suffering. His words can
bear no other meaning, can imply no other action, that would not be burlesque
rather than grotesque in its horror. And the commentators or annotators who
cannot understand or will not allow that a man in almost unimaginable passion
of anguish may not be perfectly and sedately mindful of consistency and master
of himself must explain how Desdemona manages to regain her breath so as to
speak three times and utter the most heavenly falsehood that ever put truth to
shame, after being stifled to death. To recover breath enough to speak, to think,
and to lie in defence of her slayer, can hardly be less than to recover breath
enough to revive and live, if undespatched by some sharper and more summary
method of homicide. Te fitful and intermittent lack of stage directions which
has caused and perpetuated this somewhat short-sighted oversight is not a more
obvious evidence of the fact that Shakespeare’s text has lost more than any other
and lesser poet’s for want of the author’s revision than is the misplacing of a
letter which, as far as I know, has never yet been set right. When Othello hears
that Iago has instigated Roderigo to assassinate Cassio, he exclaims, ‘O villain!’
and Cassio ejaculates, ‘Most heathenish, and most gross!’ Te sense is improved
and the metre is rectified when we perceive that the original printer mistook the
word ‘villanie’ for the word ‘ villaine.’ Such corrections of an unrevised text may
seem slight and trivial matters to Englishmen who give thanks for the like labour
when lavished on second-rate or third-rate poets of classical antiquity: the toil
bestowed by a Bentley or a Porson on Euripides or Horace must naturally, in the
judgment of universities, seem wasted on Shakespeare or on Shelley.
One of the very few poets to be named with these has left on everlasting
record the deliberate expression of his judgment that Othello combines and
unites the qualities of King Lear, “the most tremendous effort of Shakespeare
as a poet” (a verdict with which I may venture to express my full and absolute
agreement), and of Hamlet, his most tremendous effort “as a philosopher or
meditator.” It may be so: and Coleridge may be right in his estimate that “Othello
Othello 134
is the union of the two.” I should say myself, but with no thought of setting my
opinion against that of the man who at his best was now and then the greatest
of all poets and all critics, that the fusion of thought and passion, inspiration
and meditation, was at its height in King Lear. But in Othello we get the pure
poetry of natural and personal emotion, unqualified by the righteous doubt and
conscientious intelligence which instigate and impede the will and the action of
Hamlet. Te collision and the contrast of passion and intellect, of noble passion
and infernal intellect, was never before and can never be again presented and
verified as in this most tragic of all tragedies that ever the supreme student of
humanity bequeathed for the study of all time. As a poet and a thinker Æschylus
was the equal, if not the superior, of Shakespeare; as a creator, a revealer, and an
interpreter, infinite in his insight and his truthfulness, his tenderness and his
wisdom, his justice and his mercy, no man who ever lived can stand beside the
author of Othello.
QQQ
1897—George Bernard Shaw. “Mainly
About Shakespeare,” from London Saturday Review
George Bernard Shaw, one of the great dramatists of his time, was
also known for his sometimes idiosyncratic criticism, in which he often
expressed his ambivalence toward Shakespeare. Some of his most
famous plays include Saint Joan, Pygmalion (later adapted into the musi-
cal and film My Fair Lady), Man and Superman, and Caesar and Cleopatra.
“Othello,” on the other hand, is pure melodrama. Tere is not a touch of
character in it that goes below the skin; and the fitful attempts to make Iago
something better than a melodramatic villain only make a hopeless mess of him
and his motives. To any one capable of reading the play with an open mind as
to its merits, it is obvious that Shakespeare plunged through it so impetuously
that he had it finished before he had made up his mind as to the character and
motives of a single person in it. Probably it was not until he stumbled into the
sentimental fit in which he introduced the willow song that he saw his way
through without making Desdemona enough of the “supersubtle Venetian” of
Iago’s description to strengthen the case for Othello’s jealousy. Tat jealousy, by
the way, is purely melodramatic jealousy. Te real article is to be found later on
in “A Winter’s Tale,” where Leontes is an unmistakable study of a jealous man
from life. But when the worst has been said of “Othello” that can be provoked
by its superficiality and staginess, it remains magnificent by the volume of its
Othello in the Nineteenth Century 135
passion and the splendor of its word-music, which sweep the scenes up to a plane
on which sense is drowned in sound. Te words do not convey ideas: they are
streaming ensigns and tossing branches to make the tempest of passion visible.
In this passage, for instance:
“Like to the Pontic sea,
Whose icy current and compulsive course
Ne’er feels retiring ebb, but keeps due on
To the Propontic and the Hellespont,
E’en so my bloody thoughts, with violent pace,
Shall ne’er look back, ne’er ebb to humble love
Till that a capable and wide revenge
Swallow them up,”
if Othello cannot turn his voice into a thunder and surge of passion, he will
achieve nothing but a ludicrously misplaced bit of geography. If in the last
scene he cannot throw the darkness of night and the shadow of death over
such lines as
“I know not where is that Promethean heat
Tat can thy light relume,”
he at once becomes a person who, on his way to commit a pettish murder, stops
to philosophize foolishly about a candle end. Te actor cannot help himself by
studying his part acutely; for there is nothing to study in it. Tested by the brain,
it is ridiculous: tested by the ear, it is sublime. He must have the orchestral
quality in him; and as that is a matter largely of physical endowment, it follows
that only an actor of certain physical endowments can play Othello. Let him
be as crafty as he likes without that, he can no more get the effect than he can
sound the bottom C on a violoncello. Te note is not there, that is all; and he
had better be content to play Iago, which is within the compass of any clever
actor of normal endowments.
. . .
But the character [Iago] defies all consistency. Shakespeare, as usual, starts with
a rough general notion of a certain type of individual, and then throws it over at
the first temptation. Iago begins as a coarse blackguard, whose jovial bluntness
passes as “honesty,” and who is professionally a routine subaltern incapable
of understanding why a mathematician gets promoted over his head. But the
moment a stage effect can be made, or a fine speech brought off by making
him refined, subtle and dignified, he is set talking like Hamlet, and becomes a
godsend to students of the “problems” presented by our divine William’s sham
Othello 136
characters. Mr. [Franklin] McLeay does all that an actor can do with him. He
follows Shakespeare faithfully on the rails and off them. He plays the jovial
blackguard to Cassio and Roderigo and the philosopher and mentor to Othello
just as the lines lead him, with perfect intelligibility and with so much point,
distinction and fascination that the audience loads him with compliments, and
the critics all make up their minds to declare that he shows the finest insight
into the many-sided and complex character of the prince of villains . . . .
QQQ
137
OTHELLO
IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY
q
In the twentieth century, commentary on Othello continued to build on the
work of critics past. A. C. Bradley’s enduring Shakespearean Tragedy, published
in 1904, follows in the tradition of Schlegel and Coleridge, at the start of the
nineteenth century, and of Swinburne, near the century’s end. Bradley’s work
is concerned with the formal structure of Shakespeare’s plays and the analysis
of characters—their psychology, their motives, and their place on the moral
spectrum. Bradley claimed that Iago was one of Shakespeare’s four “most won-
derful” characters, along with Falstaff, Hamlet, and Cleopatra.
Other critics followed Bradley in admiring Iago’s diabolic brilliance. Harold
C. Goddard, writing in 1951, called Iago “a moral pyromaniac.” Te poet W.
H. Auden, however, argued that Iago is essentially a practical joker, with no
identity of his own, someone who, out of envy, thrives on subverting the identity
of others. In 1956, Robert B. Heilman said of Iago, “As the spiritual have-not,
Iago is universal, that is, many things at once, and of many times at once.” In
1992, Harold Bloom, in an introduction to a collection of criticism specifically
on the character of Iago, compared him to Hamlet: “Hamlet and Iago alike
are theatrical geniuses, though the Prince of Denmark’s genius is universal,
whereas Iago, who prides himself upon his military talents, displays throughout
a dramatic grasp of the power of fantasy that rivals Shakespeare’s own.”
In 1927, another great poet, T. S. Eliot, spoke out against the character of
Othello. He argued that Othello’s last speech is simply an instance of Othello
“cheering himself up,” having been unable to understand and take responsibility
for his terrible delusion. Tis line of thought, followed by other critics, such
as F. R. Leavis, has not proved as persuasive as commentaries that more fully
acknowledge Othello’s nobility.
In 1930, G. Wilson Knight analyzed the language of Othello. He termed
the poetic language of the main character “the Othello music.” Knight, unlike
Eliot, believed that “during the last scene, Othello is a nobly tragic figure.” Later
in the century, the poet Anthony Hecht would agree, writing, in his interesting
overview of the play, of the “painful but undoubted nobility” of Othello’s suicide.
Othello 138
In his 1983 book Te New Mimesis, the critic A. D. Nuttall took Eliot’s statement
as a starting point for his own examination of the play.
In 1936, William Empson, writing about Othello in the periodical Life and
Letters To-Day, sought to reveal the force of the play and the psychology of
its characters through an analysis of the multiple, ironic, and puzzling ways
Shakespeare manipulates the meanings of words such as “honest.” In 1951, the
critic Kenneth Burke provided a symbolic analysis of Othello, in his famous essay
“‘Othello’: An Essay to Illustrate a Method.” Allowing Desdemona, Othello,
and Iago their full human dimensionality as characters, Burke’s essay also
examines them in the relation of “possession, possessor, and estrangement.”
In the 1980s, the civil rights movement in the United States, the feminist
movement, and the gay liberation movement all exerted a strong influence on the
academic study of literature. Othello was examined as a play about race relations,
black masculinity, the social constraints imposed upon women, and more. Some
critics even saw a subconscious homoerotic bond between Iago and Othello.
In his book Renaissance Self-Fashionings, Stephen Greenblatt examined Othello,
among other works, as he propounded a new critical theory that became known
as New Historicism.
Othello was staged frequently during the twentieth century and provided a
vehicle for some of the century’s great actors, such as Paul Robeson, Laurence
Olivier, James Earl Jones, and Anthony Hopkins. It was also adapted for the
movies. Orson Welles played Othello in a 1952 stripped-down film version, now
considered a masterpiece. Olivier’s National Teater production of 1965 was also
filmed. In 1995, Laurence Fishburne and Kenneth Branagh played Othello and
Iago in a less successful production.
Te twentieth century saw the adaptation of Othello as the basis for new
works that both re-imagine the play and use it to comment on contemporary
social and sexual currents. In 1994, Paula Vogel published Desdemona: A Play
about a Handkerchief, an exploration of female sexuality in which Desdemona
is made both as promiscuous as Othello fears her to be and yet guilty of no
breach of conduct. Good Night Desdemona (Good Morning Juliet), by Ann-Marie
MacDonald, deconstructs Othello (and Romeo and Juliet) by placing a graduate
student into each play and allowing her to manipulate its plot as she seeks to
come to terms with her own life and identity.
1904—A. C. Bradley.
“Othello,” from Shakespearean Tragedy
A. C. Bradley (1851–1935) was a professor at Oxford and other institu-
tions. His book Shakespearean Tragedy was one of the most significant
works of Shakespeare criticism of the twentieth century.
Othello in the Twentieth Century 139
1
Evil has nowhere else been portrayed with such mastery as in the character of
Iago. Richard III., for example, beside being less subtly conceived, is a far greater
figure and a less repellent. His physical deformity, separating him from other men,
seems to offer some excuse for his egoism. In spite of his egoism, too, he appears
to us more than a mere individual: he is the representative of his family, the Fury
of the House of York. Nor is he so negative as Iago: he has strong passions, he has
admirations, and his conscience disturbs him. Tere is the glory of power about
him. Tough an excellent actor, he prefers force to fraud, and in his world there
is no general illusion as to his true nature. Again, to compare Iago with the Satan
of Paradise Lost seems almost absurd, so immensely does Shakespeare’s man
exceed Milton’s Fiend in evil . . . . It is only in Goethe’s Mephistopheles that a fit
companion for Iago can be found. Here there is something of the same deadly
coldness, the same gaiety in destruction. But then Mephistopheles, like so many
scores of literary villains, has Iago for his father. And Mephistopheles, besides, is
not, in the strict sense, a character. He is half person, half symbol. A metaphysical
idea speaks through him. He is earthy, but could never live upon the earth.
. . . [I]f Iago had been a person as attractive as Hamlet, as many thousands of
pages might have been written about him, containing as much criticism good
and bad. As it is, the majority of interpretations of his character are inadequate
not only to Shakespeare’s conception, but, I believe, to the impressions of most
readers of taste who are unbewildered by analysis. Tese false interpretations,
if we set aside the usual lunacies, fall into two groups. Te first contains views
which reduce Shakespeare to common-place. In different ways and degrees
they convert his Iago into an ordinary villain. Teir Iago is simply a man
who has been slighted and revenges himself; or a husband who believes he
has been wronged, and will make his enemy suffer a jealousy worse than his
own; or an ambitious man determined to ruin his successful rival—one of
these, or a combination of these, endowed with unusual ability and cruelty.
Tese are the more popular views. Te second group of false interpretations is
much smaller, but it contains much weightier matter than the first. Here Iago
is a being who hates good simply because it is good, and loves evil purely for
itself. His action is not prompted by any plain motive like revenge, jealousy or
ambition. It springs from a ‘motiveless malignity,’ or a disinterested delight in
the pain of others; and Othello, Cassio and Desdemona are scarcely more than
the material requisite for the full attainment of this delight. Tis second Iago,
evidently, is no conventional villain, and he is much nearer to Shakespeare’s
Iago than the first. Only he is, if not a psychological impossibility, at any rate
not a human being. He might be in place, therefore, in a symbolical poem like
Faust, but in a purely human drama like Othello he would be a ruinous blunder.
Moreover, he is not in Othello: he is a product of imperfect observation
and analysis.
Othello 140
Coleridge, the author of that misleading phrase ‘motiveless malignity,’ has
some fine remarks on Iago; and the essence of the character has been described,
first in some of the best lines Hazlitt ever wrote, and then rather more fully
by Mr. Swinburne,—so admirably described that I am tempted merely to read
and illustrate these two criticisms. Tis plan, however, would make it difficult
to introduce all that I wish to say. I propose, therefore, to approach the subject
directly, and, first, to consider how Iago appeared to those who knew him, and
what inferences may be drawn from their illusions; and then to ask what, if we
judge from the play, his character really was. And I will indicate the points where
I am directly indebted to the criticisms just mentioned.
But two warnings are first required. One of these concerns Iago’s nationality.
It has been held that he is a study of that peculiarly Italian form of villainy which
is considered both too clever and too diabolical for an Englishman. I doubt if
there is much more to be said for this idea than for the notion that Othello is
a study of Moorish character. No doubt the belief in that Italian villainy was
prevalent in Shakespeare’s time, and it may perhaps have influenced him in some
slight degree both here and in drawing the character of Iachimo in Cymbeline.
But even this slight influence seems to me doubtful. If Don John in Much Ado
had been an Englishman, critics would have admired Shakespeare’s discernment
in making his English villain sulky and stupid. If Edmund’s father had been
Duke of Ferrara instead of Earl of Gloster, they would have said that Edmund
could have been nothing but an Italian. Change the name and country of
Richard III., and he would be called a typical despot of the Italian Renaissance.
Change those of Juliet, and we should find her wholesome English nature
contrasted with the southern dreaminess of Romeo. But this way of interpreting
Shakespeare is not Shakespearean. With him the differences of period, race,
nationality and locality have little bearing on the inward character, though they
sometimes have a good deal on the total imaginative effect, of his figures. When
he does lay stress on such differences his intention is at once obvious, as in
characters like Fluellen or Sir Hugh Evans, or in the talk of the French princes
before the battle of Agincourt. I may add that Iago certainly cannot be taken to
exemplify the popular Elizabethan idea of a disciple of Macchiavelli. Tere is no
sign that he is in theory an atheist or even an unbeliever in the received religion.
On the contrary, he uses its language, and says nothing resembling the words of
the prologue to the Jew of Malta:
I count religion but a childish toy,
And hold there is no sin but ignorance.
. . .
I come to a second warning. One must constantly remember not to believe
a syllable that Iago utters on any subject, including himself, until one has tested
his statement by comparing it with known facts and with other statements of
Othello in the Twentieth Century 141
his own or of other people, and by considering whether he had in the particular
circumstances any reason for telling a lie or for telling the truth. Te implicit
confidence which his acquaintances placed in his integrity has descended to most
of his critics; and this, reinforcing the comical habit of quoting as Shakespeare’s
own statement everything said by his characters, has been a fruitful source of
misinterpretation. I will take as an instance the very first assertions made by Iago.
In the opening scene he tells his dupe Roderigo that three great men of Venice
went to Othello and begged him to make Iago his lieutenant; that Othello,
out of pride and obstinacy, refused; that in refusing he talked a deal of military
rigmarole, and ended by declaring (falsely, we are to understand) that he had
already filled up the vacancy; that Cassio, whom he chose, had absolutely no
practical knowledge of war, nothing but bookish theoric, mere prattle, arithmetic,
whereas Iago himself had often fought by Othello’s side, and by ‘old gradation’
too ought to have been preferred. Most or all of this is repeated by some critics
as though it were information given by Shakespeare, and the conclusion is quite
naturally drawn that Iago had some reason to feel aggrieved. But if we ask
ourselves how much of all this is true we shall answer, I believe, as follows. It
is absolutely certain that Othello appointed Cassio his lieutenant, and nothing
else is absolutely certain. But there is no reason to doubt the statement that Iago
had seen service with him, nor is there anything inherently improbable in the
statement that he was solicited by three great personages on Iago’s behalf. On
the other hand, the suggestions that he refused out of pride and obstinacy, and
that he lied in saying he had already chosen his officer, have no verisimilitude;
and if there is any fact at all (as there probably is) behind Iago’s account of the
conversation, it doubtless is the fact that Iago himself was ignorant of military
science, while Cassio was an expert, and that Othello explained this to the great
personages. Tat Cassio, again, was an interloper and a mere closet-student
without experience of war is incredible, considering first that Othello chose him
for lieutenant, and secondly that the senate appointed him to succeed Othello in
command at Cyprus; and we have direct evidence that part of Iago’s statement is
a lie, for Desdemona happens to mention that Cassio was a man who ‘all his time
had founded his good fortunes’ on Othello’s love and had ‘shared dangers’ with
him (iii. iv. 93). Tere remains only the implied assertion that, if promotion had
gone by old gradation, Iago, as the senior, would have been preferred. It may be
true: Othello was not the man to hesitate to promote a junior for good reasons.
But it is just as likely to be a pure invention; and, though Cassio was young, there
is nothing to show that he was younger, in years or in service, than Iago. Iago, for
instance, never calls him ‘young,’ as he does Roderigo; and a mere youth would
not have been made Governor of Cyprus. What is certain, finally, in the whole
business is that Othello’s mind was perfectly at ease about the appointment,
and that he never dreamed of Iago’s being discontented at it, not even when the
intrigue was disclosed and he asked himself how he had offended Iago.
Othello 142
2
It is necessary to examine in this manner every statement made by Iago. But it is
not necessary to do so in public, and I proceed to the question what impression
he made on his friends and acquaintances. In the main there is here no room
for doubt. Nothing could be less like Iago than the melodramatic villain so often
substituted for him on the stage, a person whom everyone in the theatre knows
for a scoundrel at the first glance. Iago, we gather, was a Venetian soldier, eight-
and-twenty years of age, who had seen a good deal of service and had a high
reputation for courage. Of his origin we are ignorant, but, unless I am mistaken,
he was not of gentle birth or breeding. He does not strike one as a degraded
man of culture: for all his great powers, he is vulgar, and his probable want of
military science may well be significant. He was married to a wife who evidently
lacked refinement, and who appears in the drama almost in the relation of a
servant to Desdemona. His manner was that of a blunt, bluff soldier, who spoke
his mind freely and plainly. He was often hearty, and could be thoroughly jovial;
but he was not seldom rather rough and caustic of speech, and he was given to
making remarks somewhat disparaging to human nature. He was aware of this
trait in himself, and frankly admitted that he was nothing if not critical, and
that it was his nature to spy into abuses. In these admissions he characteristically
exaggerated his fault, as plain-dealers are apt to do; and he was liked none the
less for it, seeing that his satire was humorous, that on serious matters he did
not speak lightly (iii. iii. 119), and that the one thing perfectly obvious about
him was his honesty. ‘Honest’ is the word that springs to the lips of everyone
who speaks of him. It is applied to him some fifteen times in the play, not to
mention some half-dozen where he employs it, in derision, of himself. In fact he
was one of those sterling men who, in disgust at gush, say cynical things which
they do not believe, and then, the moment you are in trouble, put in practice
the very sentiment they had laughed at. On such occasions he showed the
kindliest sympathy and the most eager desire to help. When Cassio misbehaved
so dreadfully and was found fighting with Montano, did not Othello see that
‘honest Iago looked dead with grieving’? With what difficulty was he induced,
nay, compelled, to speak the truth against the lieutenant! Another man might
have felt a touch of satisfaction at the thought that the post he had coveted was
now vacant; but Iago not only comforted Cassio, talking to him cynically about
reputation, just to help him over his shame, but he set his wits to work and at
once perceived that the right plan for Cassio to get his post again was to ask
Desdemona to intercede. So troubled was he at his friend’s disgrace that his
own wife was sure ‘it grieved her husband as if the case was his.’ What wonder
that anyone in sore trouble, like Desdemona, should send at once for Iago (iv.
ii. 106)? If this rough diamond had any flaw, it was that Iago’s warm loyal heart
incited him to too impulsive action. If he merely heard a friend like Othello
Othello in the Twentieth Century 143
calumniated, his hand flew to his sword; and though he restrained himself he
almost regretted his own virtue (i. ii. 1-10).
Such seemed Iago to the people about him, even to those who, like Othello,
had known him for some time. And it is a fact too little noticed but most
remarkable, that he presented an appearance not very different to his wife. Tere
is no sign either that Emilia’s marriage was downright unhappy, or that she
suspected the true nature of her husband. No doubt she knew rather more of him
than others. Tus we gather that he was given to chiding and sometimes spoke
shortly and sharply to her (iii. iii. 300 f.); and it is quite likely that she gave him
a good deal of her tongue in exchange (ii. i. 101 f.). He was also unreasonably
jealous; for his own statement that he was jealous of Othello is confirmed by
Emilia herself, and must therefore be believed (iv. ii. 145). But it seems clear
that these defects of his had not seriously impaired Emilia’s confidence in her
husband or her affection for him. She knew in addition that he was not quite
so honest as he seemed, for he had often begged her to steal Desdemona’s
handkerchief. But Emilia’s nature was not very delicate or scrupulous about
trifles. She thought her husband odd and ‘wayward,’ and looked on his fancy for
the handkerchief as an instance of this (iii. iii. 292); but she never dreamed he
was a villain, and there is no reason to doubt the sincerity of her belief that he
was heartily sorry for Cassio’s disgrace. Her failure, on seeing Othello’s agitation
about the handkerchief, to form any suspicion of an intrigue, shows how little she
doubted her husband. Even when, later, the idea strikes her that some scoundrel
has poisoned Othello’s mind, the tone of all her speeches, and her mention of the
rogue who (she believes) had stirred up Iago’s jealousy of her, prove beyond doubt
that the thought of Iago’s being the scoundrel has not crossed her mind (iv. ii. 115-
147). And if any hesitation on the subject could remain, surely it must be dispelled
by the thrice-repeated cry of astonishment and horror, ‘My husband!’, which
follows Othello’s words, ‘Ty husband knew it all’; and by the choking indignation
and desperate hope which we hear in her appeal when Iago comes in:
Disprove this villain if thou be’st a man:
He says thou told’st him that his wife was false:
I know thou did’st not, thou’rt not such a villain:
Speak, for my heart is full.
Even if Iago had betrayed much more of his true self to his wife than to others,
it would make no difference to the contrast between his true self and the self he
presented to the world in general. But he never did so. Only the feeble eyes of
the poor gull Roderigo were allowed a glimpse into that pit.
Te bearing of this contrast upon the apparently excessive credulity of
Othello has been already pointed out. What further conclusions can be drawn
Othello 144
from it? Obviously, to begin with, the inference, which is accompanied by a thrill
of admiration, that Iago’s powers of dissimulation and of self-control must have
been prodigious: for he was not a youth, like Edmund, but had worn this mask for
years, and he had apparently never enjoyed, like Richard, occasional explosions
of the reality within him. In fact so prodigious does his self-control appear that
a reader might be excused for feeling a doubt of its possibility. But there are
certain observations and further inferences which, apart from confidence in
Shakespeare, would remove this doubt. It is to be observed, first, that Iago was
able to find a certain relief from the discomfort of hypocrisy in those caustic or
cynical speeches which, being misinterpreted, only heightened confidence in his
honesty. Tey acted as a safety-valve, very much as Hamlet’s pretended insanity
did. Next, I would infer from the entire success of his hypocrisy—what may also
be inferred on other grounds, and is of great importance—that he was by no
means a man of strong feelings and passions, like Richard, but decidedly cold
by temperament. Even so, his self-control was wonderful, but there never was
in him any violent storm to be controlled. Tirdly, I would suggest that Iago,
though thoroughly selfish and unfeeling, was not by nature malignant, nor even
morose, but that, on the contrary, he had a superficial good-nature, the kind of
good-nature that wins popularity and is often taken as the sign, not of a good
digestion, but of a good heart. And lastly, it may be inferred that, before the giant
crime which we witness, Iago had never been detected in any serious offence and
may even never have been guilty of one, but had pursued a selfish but outwardly
decent life, enjoying the excitement of war and of casual pleasures, but never yet
meeting with any sufficient temptation to risk his position and advancement by
a dangerous crime. So that, in fact, the tragedy of Othello is in a sense his tragedy
too. It shows us not a violent man, like Richard, who spends his life in murder,
but a thoroughly bad, cold man, who is at last tempted to let loose the forces
within him, and is at once destroyed.
3
In order to see how this tragedy arises let us now look more closely into Iago’s
inner man. We find here, in the first place, as has been implied in part, very
remarkable powers both of intellect and of will. Iago’s insight, within certain
limits, into human nature; his ingenuity and address in working upon it; his
quickness and versatility in dealing with sudden difficulties and unforeseen
opportunities, have probably no parallel among dramatic characters. Equally
remarkable is his strength of will. Not Socrates himself, not the ideal sage of
the Stoics, was more lord of himself than Iago appears to be. It is not merely
that he never betrays his true nature; he seems to be master of all the motions
that might affect his will. In the most dangerous moments of his plot, when
the least slip or accident would be fatal, he never shows a trace of nervousness.
When Othello takes him by the throat he merely shifts his part with his usual
Othello in the Twentieth Century 145
instantaneous adroitness. When he is attacked and wounded at the end he is
perfectly unmoved. As Mr. Swinburne says, you cannot believe for a moment
that the pain of torture will ever open Iago’s lips. He is equally unassailable by the
temptations of indolence or of sensuality. It is difficult to imagine him inactive;
and though he has an obscene mind, and doubtless took his pleasures when and
how he chose, he certainly took them by choice and not from weakness, and if
pleasure interfered with his purposes the holiest of ascetics would not put it more
resolutely by. ‘What should I do?’ Roderigo whimpers to him; ‘I confess it is my
shame to be so fond; but it is not in my virtue to amend it.’ He answers: ‘Virtue!
a fig! ’tis in ourselves that we are thus and thus. It all depends on our will. Love is
merely a lust of the blood and a permission of the will. Come, be a man . . . . Ere I
would say I would drown myself for the love of a guinea-hen, I would change my
humanity with a baboon.’ Forget for a moment that love is for Iago the appetite
of a baboon; forget that he is as little assailable by pity as by fear or pleasure;
and you will acknowledge that this lordship of the will, which is his practice as
well as his doctrine, is great, almost sublime. Indeed, in intellect (always within
certain limits) and in will (considered as a mere power, and without regard to its
objects) Iago is great.
To what end does he use these great powers? His creed—for he is no sceptic,
he has a definite creed—is that absolute egoism is the only rational and proper
attitude, and that conscience or honour or any kind of regard for others is an
absurdity. He does not deny that this absurdity exists. He does not suppose
that most people secretly share his creed, while pretending to hold and practise
another. On the contrary, he regards most people as honest fools. He declares
that he has never yet met a man who knew how to love himself; and his one
expression of admiration in the play is for servants
Who, trimmed in forms and visages of duty,
Keep yet their hearts attending on themselves.
‘Tese fellows,’ he says, ‘have some soul.’ He professes to stand, and he
attempts to stand, wholly outside the world of morality.
Te existence of Iago’s creed and of his corresponding practice is evidently
connected with a characteristic in which he surpasses nearly all the other
inhabitants of Shakespeare’s world. Whatever he may once have been, he
appears, when we meet him, to be almost destitute of humanity, of sympathetic
or social feeling. He shows no trace of affection, and in presence of the most
terrible suffering he shows either pleasure or an indifference which, if not
complete, is nearly so. Here, however, we must be careful. It is important to
realise, and few readers are in danger of ignoring, this extraordinary deadness
of feeling, but it is also important not to confuse it with a general positive
ill-will. When Iago has no dislike or hostility to a person he does not show
Othello 146
pleasure in the suffering of that person: he shows at most the absence of
pain. Tere is, for instance, not the least sign of his enjoying the distress
of Desdemona. But his sympathetic feelings are so abnormally feeble and
cold that, when his dislike is roused, or when an indifferent person comes in
the way of his purpose, there is scarcely anything within him to prevent his
applying the torture.
What is it that provokes his dislike or hostility? Here again we must look
closely. Iago has been represented as an incarnation of envy, as a man who, being
determined to get on in the world, regards everyone else with enmity as his rival.
But this idea, though containing truth, seems much exaggerated. Certainly he is
devoted to himself; but if he were an eagerly ambitious man, surely we should see
much more positive signs of this ambition; and surely too, with his great powers,
he would already have risen high, instead of being a mere ensign, short of money,
and playing Captain Rook to Roderigo’s Mr. Pigeon. Taking all the facts, one
must conclude that his desires were comparatively moderate and his ambition
weak; that he probably enjoyed war keenly, but, if he had money enough, did not
exert himself greatly to acquire reputation or position; and, therefore, that he was
not habitually burning with envy and actively hostile to other men as possible
competitors.
But what is clear is that Iago is keenly sensitive to anything that touches his
pride or self-esteem. It would be most unjust to call him vain, but he has a high
opinion of himself and a great contempt for others. He is quite aware of his
superiority to them in certain respects; and he either disbelieves in or despises
the qualities in which they are superior to him. Whatever disturbs or wounds
his sense of superiority irritates him at once; and in that sense he is highly
competitive. Tis is why the appointment of Cassio provokes him. Tis is why
Cassio’s scientific attainments provoke him. Tis is the reason of his jealousy of
Emilia. He does not care for his wife; but the fear of another man’s getting the
better of him, and exposing him to pity or derision as an unfortunate husband,
is wormwood to him; and as he is sure that no woman is virtuous at heart, this
fear is ever with him. For much the same reason he has a spite against goodness
in men (for it is characteristic that he is less blind to its existence in men, the
stronger, than in women, the weaker). He has a spite against it, not from any
love of evil for evil’s sake, but partly because it annoys his intellect as a stupidity;
partly (though he hardly knows this) because it weakens his satisfaction with
himself, and disturbs his faith that egoism is the right and proper thing; partly
because, the world being such a fool, goodness is popular and prospers. But he,
a man ten times as able as Cassio or even Othello, does not greatly prosper.
Somehow, for all the stupidity of these open and generous people, they get on
better than the ‘fellow of some soul.’ And this, though he is not particularly
eager to get on, wounds his pride. Goodness therefore annoys him. He is always
ready to scoff at it, and would like to strike at it. In ordinary circumstances
Othello in the Twentieth Century 147
these feelings of irritation are not vivid in Iago—no feeling is so—but they are
constantly present.
4
Our task of analysis is not finished; but we are now in a position to consider the
rise of Iago’s tragedy. Why did he act as we see him acting in the play? What is
the answer to that appeal of Othello’s:
Will you, I pray, demand that demi-devil
Why he hath thus ensnared my soul and body?
Tis question Why? is the question about Iago, just as the question Why did
Hamlet delay? is the question about Hamlet. Iago refused to answer it; but I will
venture to say that he could not have answered it, any more than Hamlet could
tell why he delayed. But Shakespeare knew the answer, and if these characters are
great creations and not blunders we ought to be able to find it too.
Is it possible to elicit it from Iago himself against his will? He makes various
statements to Roderigo, and he has several soliloquies. From these sources, and
especially from the latter, we should learn something. For with Shakespeare
soliloquy generally gives information regarding the secret springs as well as the
outward course of the plot; and, moreover, it is a curious point of technique with
him that the soliloquies of his villains sometimes read almost like explanations
offered to the audience. Now, Iago repeatedly offers explanations either to
Roderigo or to himself. In the first place, he says more than once that he ‘hates’
Othello. He gives two reasons for his hatred. Othello has made Cassio lieutenant;
and he suspects, and has heard it reported, that Othello has an intrigue with
Emilia. Next there is Cassio. He never says he hates Cassio, but he finds in him
three causes of offence: Cassio has been preferred to him; he suspects him too
of an intrigue with Emilia; and, lastly, Cassio has a daily beauty in his life which
makes Iago ugly. In addition to these annoyances he wants Cassio’s place. As for
Roderigo, he calls him a snipe, and who can hate a snipe? But Roderigo knows
too much; and he is becoming a nuisance, getting angry, and asking for the gold
and jewels he handed to Iago to give to Desdemona. So Iago kills Roderigo. Ten
for Desdemona: a fig’s-end for her virtue! but he has no ill-will to her. In fact he
‘loves’ her, though he is good enough to explain, varying the word, that his ‘lust’ is
mixed with a desire to pay Othello in his own coin. To be sure she must die, and
so must Emilia, and so would Bianca if only the authorities saw things in their
true light; but he did not set out with any hostile design against these persons.
Is the account which Iago gives of the causes of his action the true account?
Te answer of the most popular view will be, ‘Yes. Iago was, as he says, chiefly
incited by two things, the desire of advancement, and a hatred of Othello due
principally to the affair of the lieutenancy. Tese are perfectly intelligible causes;
Othello 148
we have only to add to them unusual ability and cruelty, and all is explained.
Why should Coleridge and Hazlitt and Swinburne go further afield?’ To which
last question I will at once oppose these: If your view is correct, why should Iago
be considered an extraordinary creation; and is it not odd that the people who
reject it are the people who elsewhere show an exceptional understanding of
Shakespeare?
Te difficulty about this popular view is, in the first place, that it attributes
to Iago what cannot be found in the Iago of the play. Its Iago is impelled by
passions, a passion of ambition and a passion of hatred; for no ambition or hatred
short of passion could drive a man who is evidently so clear-sighted, and who
must hitherto have been so prudent, into a plot so extremely hazardous. Why,
then, in the Iago of the play do we find no sign of these passions or of anything
approaching to them? Why, if Shakespeare meant that Iago was impelled by
them, does he suppress the signs of them? Surely not from want of ability to
display them. Te poet who painted Macbeth and Shylock understood his
business. Who ever doubted Macbeth’s ambition or Shylock’s hate? And what
resemblance is there between these passions and any feeling that we can trace in
Iago? Te resemblance between a volcano in eruption and a flameless fire of coke;
the resemblance between a consuming desire to hack and hew your enemy’s flesh,
and the resentful wish, only too familiar in common life, to inflict pain in return
for a slight. Passion, in Shakespeare’s plays, is perfectly easy to recognise. What
vestige of it, of passion unsatisfied or of passion gratified, is visible in Iago? None:
that is the very horror of him. He has less passion than an ordinary man, and yet
he does these frightful things. Te only ground for attributing to him, I do not
say a passionate hatred, but anything deserving the name of hatred at all, is his
own statement, ‘I hate Othello’; and we know what his statements are worth.
But the popular view, beside attributing to Iago what he does not show,
ignores what he does show. It selects from his own account of his motives one or
two, and drops the rest; and so it makes everything natural. But it fails to perceive
how unnatural, how strange and suspicious, his own account is. Certainly he
assigns motives enough; the difficulty is that he assigns so many. A man moved
by simple passions due to simple causes does not stand fingering his feelings,
industriously enumerating their sources, and groping about for new ones. But
this is what Iago does. And this is not all. Tese motives appear and disappear in
the most extraordinary manner. Resentment at Cassio’s appointment is expressed
in the first conversation with Roderigo, and from that moment is never once
mentioned again in the whole play. Hatred of Othello is expressed in the First
Act alone. Desire to get Cassio’s place scarcely appears after the first soliloquy,
and when it is gratified Iago does not refer to it by a single word. Te suspicion
of Cassio’s intrigue with Emilia emerges suddenly, as an afterthought, not in
the first soliloquy but the second, and then disappears for ever. Iago’s ‘love’ of
Desdemona is alluded to in the second soliloquy; there is not the faintest trace
Othello in the Twentieth Century 149
of it in word or deed either before or after. Te mention of jealousy of Othello is
followed by declarations that Othello is infatuated about Desdemona and is of
a constant nature, and during Othello’s sufferings Iago never shows a sign of the
idea that he is now paying his rival in his own coin. In the second soliloquy he
declares that he quite believes Cassio to be in love with Desdemona; it is obvious
that he believes no such thing, for he never alludes to the idea again, and within
a few hours describes Cassio in soliloquy as an honest fool. His final reason for
ill-will to Cassio never appears till the Fifth Act.
What is the meaning of all this? Unless Shakespeare was out of his mind, it
must have a meaning. And certainly this meaning is not contained in any of the
popular accounts of Iago.
Is it contained then in Coleridge’s word ‘motive-hunting’? Yes, ‘motive-
hunting’ exactly answers to the impression that Iago’s soliloquies produce. He is
pondering his design, and unconsciously trying to justify it to himself. He speaks
of one or two real feelings, such as resentment against Othello, and he mentions
one or two real causes of these feelings. But these are not enough for him. Along
with them, or alone, there come into his head, only to leave it again, ideas and
suspicions, the creations of his own baseness or uneasiness, some old, some new,
caressed for a moment to feed his purpose and give it a reasonable look, but never
really believed in, and never the main forces which are determining his action.
In fact, I would venture to describe Iago in these soliloquies as a man setting out
on a project which strongly attracts his desire, but at the same time conscious of
a resistance to the desire, and unconsciously trying to argue the resistance away
by assigning reasons for the project. He is the counterpart of Hamlet, who tries
to find reasons for his delay in pursuing a design which excites his aversion.
And most of Iago’s reasons for action are no more the real ones than Hamlet’s
reasons for delay were the real ones. Each is moved by forces which he does
not understand; and it is probably no accident that these two studies of states
psychologically so similar were produced at about the same period.
What then were the real moving forces of Iago’s action? Are we to fall back
on the idea of a ‘motiveless malignity;’ that is to say, a disinterested love of evil,
or a delight in the pain of others as simple and direct as the delight in one’s
own pleasure? Surely not. I will not insist that this thing or these things are
inconceivable, mere phrases, not ideas; for, even so, it would remain possible
that Shakespeare had tried to represent an inconceivability. But there is not
the slightest reason to suppose that he did so. Iago’s action is intelligible; and
indeed the popular view contains enough truth to refute this desperate theory.
It greatly exaggerates his desire for advancement, and the ill-will caused by his
disappointment, and it ignores other forces more important than these; but it
is right in insisting on the presence of this desire and this ill-will, and their
presence is enough to destroy Iago’s claims to be more than a demi-devil. For
love of the evil that advances my interest and hurts a person I dislike, is a very
Othello 150
different thing from love of evil simply as evil; and pleasure in the pain of a
person disliked or regarded as a competitor is quite distinct from pleasure in the
pain of others simply as others. Te first is intelligible, and we find it in Iago. Te
second, even if it were intelligible, we do not find in Iago.
Still, desire of advancement and resentment about the lieutenancy, though
factors and indispensable factors in the cause of Iago’s action, are neither the
principal nor the most characteristic factors. To find these, let us return to our
half-completed analysis of the character. Let us remember especially the keen
sense of superiority, the contempt of others, the sensitiveness to everything
which wounds these feelings, the spite against goodness in men as a thing not
only stupid but, both in its nature and by its success, contrary to Iago’s nature
and irritating to his pride. Let us remember in addition the annoyance of having
always to play a part, the consciousness of exceptional but unused ingenuity and
address, the enjoyment of action, and the absence of fear. And let us ask what
would be the greatest pleasure of such a man, and what the situation which
might tempt him to abandon his habitual prudence and pursue this pleasure.
Hazlitt and Mr. Swinburne do not put this question, but the answer I proceed to
give to it is in principle theirs.
Te most delightful thing to such a man would be something that gave an
extreme satisfaction to his sense of power and superiority; and if it involved,
secondly, the triumphant exertion of his abilities, and, thirdly, the excitement of
danger, his delight would be consummated. And the moment most dangerous to
such a man would be one when his sense of superiority had met with an affront,
so that its habitual craving was reinforced by resentment, while at the same time
he saw an opportunity of satisfying it by subjecting to his will the very persons
who had affronted it. Now, this is the temptation that comes to Iago. Othello’s
eminence, Othello’s goodness, and his own dependence on Othello, must have
been a perpetual annoyance to him. At any time he would have enjoyed befooling
and tormenting Othello. Under ordinary circumstances he was restrained,
chiefly by self-interest, in some slight degree perhaps by the faint pulsations
of conscience or humanity. But disappointment at the loss of the lieutenancy
supplied the touch of lively resentment that was required to overcome these
obstacles; and the prospect of satisfying the sense of power by mastering Othello
through an intricate and hazardous intrigue now became irresistible. Iago did not
clearly understand what was moving his desire; though he tried to give himself
reasons for his action, even those that had some reality made but a small part
of the motive force; one may almost say they were no more than the turning of
the handle which admits the driving power into the machine. Only once does he
appear to see something of the truth. It is when he uses the phrase ‘to plume up
my will in double knavery.’
To ‘plume up the will,’ to heighten the sense of power or superiority—this
seems to be the unconscious motive of many acts of cruelty which evidently
Othello in the Twentieth Century 151
do not spring chiefly from ill-will, and which therefore puzzle and sometimes
horrify us most. It is often this that makes a man bully the wife or children of
whom he is fond. Te boy who torments another boy, as we say, ‘for no reason,’
or who without any hatred for frogs tortures a frog, is pleased with his victim’s
pain, not from any disinterested love of evil or pleasure in pain, but mainly
because this pain is the unmistakable proof of his own power over his victim.
So it is with Iago. His thwarted sense of superiority wants satisfaction. What
fuller satisfaction could it find than the consciousness that he is the master of
the General who has undervalued him and of the rival who has been preferred
to him; that these worthy people, who are so successful and popular and stupid,
are mere puppets in his hands, but living puppets, who at the motion of his finger
must contort themselves in agony, while all the time they believe that he is their
one true friend and comforter? It must have been an ecstasy of bliss to him. And
this, granted a most abnormal deadness of human feeling, is, however horrible,
perfectly intelligible. Tere is no mystery in the psychology of Iago; the mystery
lies in a further question, which the drama has not to answer, the question why
such a being should exist.
Iago’s longing to satisfy the sense of power is, I think, the strongest of
the forces that drive him on. But there are two others to be noticed. One is
the pleasure in an action very difficult and perilous and, therefore, intensely
exciting. Tis action sets all his powers on the strain. He feels the delight of one
who executes successfully a feat thoroughly congenial to his special aptitude,
and only just within his compass; and, as he is fearless by nature, the fact that
a single slip will cost him his life only increases his pleasure. His exhilaration
breaks out in the ghastly words with which he greets the sunrise after the
night of the drunken tumult which has led to Cassio’s disgrace: ‘By the mass,
’tis morning. Pleasure and action make the hours seem short.’ Here, however,
the joy in exciting action is quickened by other feelings. It appears more simply
elsewhere in such a way as to suggest that nothing but such actions gave him
happiness, and that his happiness was greater if the action was destructive
as well as exciting. We find it, for instance, in his gleeful cry to Roderigo,
who proposes to shout to Brabantio in order to wake him and tell him of his
daughter’s flight:
Do, with like timorous accent and dire yell
As when, by night and negligence, the fire
Is spied in populous cities.
All through that scene; again, in the scene where Cassio is attacked and
Roderigo murdered; everywhere where Iago is in physical action, we catch this
sound of almost feverish enjoyment. His blood, usually so cold and slow, is racing
through his veins.
Othello 152
But Iago, finally, is not simply a man of action; he is an artist. His action is
a plot, the intricate plot of a drama, and in the conception and execution of it
he experiences the tension and the joy of artistic creation. ‘He is,’ says Hazlitt,
‘an amateur of tragedy in real life; and, instead of employing his invention on
imaginary characters or long-forgotten incidents, he takes the bolder and more
dangerous course of getting up his plot at home, casts the principal parts among
his newest friends and connections, and rehearses it in downright earnest, with
steady nerves and unabated resolution.’ Mr. Swinburne lays even greater stress
on this aspect of Iago’s character, and even declares that ‘the very subtlest and
strongest component of his complex nature’ is ‘the instinct of what Mr. Carlyle
would call an inarticulate poet.’ And those to whom this idea is unfamiliar, and
who may suspect it at first sight of being fanciful, will find, if they examine the
play in the light of Mr. Swinburne’s exposition, that it rests on a true and deep
perception, will stand scrutiny, and might easily be illustrated. Tey may observe,
to take only one point, the curious analogy between the early stages of dramatic
composition and those soliloquies in which Iago broods over his plot, drawing at
first only an outline, puzzled how to fix more than the main idea, and gradually
seeing it develop and clarify as he works upon it or lets it work. Here at any rate
Shakespeare put a good deal of himself into Iago. But the tragedian in real life
was not the equal of the tragic poet. His psychology, as we shall see, was at fault
at a critical point, as Shakespeare’s never was. And so his catastrophe came out
wrong, and his piece was ruined.
Such, then, seem to be the chief ingredients of the force which, liberated by
his resentment at Cassio’s promotion, drives Iago from inactivity into action,
and sustains him through it. And, to pass to a new point, this force completely
possesses him; it is his fate. It is like the passion with which a tragic hero wholly
identifies himself, and which bears him on to his doom. It is true that, once
embarked on his course, Iago could not turn back, even if this passion did abate;
and it is also true that he is compelled, by his success in convincing Othello,
to advance to conclusions of which at the outset he did not dream. He is thus
caught in his own web, and could not liberate himself if he would. But, in fact,
he never shows a trace of wishing to do so, not a trace of hesitation, of looking
back, or of fear, any more than of remorse; there is no ebb in the tide. As the crisis
approaches there passes through his mind a fleeting doubt whether the deaths
of Cassio and Roderigo are indispensable; but that uncertainty, which does not
concern the main issue, is dismissed, and he goes forward with undiminished
zest. Not even in his sleep—as in Richard’s before his final battle—does any
rebellion of outraged conscience or pity, or any foreboding of despair, force itself
into clear consciousness. His fate—which is himself—has completely mastered
him: so that, in the later scenes, where the improbability of the entire success of
a design built on so many different falsehoods forces itself on the reader, Iago
Othello in the Twentieth Century 153
appears for moments not as a consummate schemer, but as a man absolutely
infatuated and delivered over to certain destruction.
5
Iago stands supreme among Shakespeare’s evil characters because the greatest
intensity and subtlety of imagination have gone to his making, and because he
illustrates in the most perfect combination the two facts concerning evil which
seem to have impressed Shakespeare most. Te first of these is the fact that
perfectly sane people exist in whom fellow-feeling of any kind is so weak that
an almost absolute egoism becomes possible to them, and with it those hard
vices—such as ingratitude and cruelty—which to Shakespeare were far the worst.
Te second is that such evil is compatible, and even appears to ally itself easily,
with exceptional powers of will and intellect. In the latter respect Iago is nearly
or quite the equal of Richard, in egoism he is the superior, and his inferiority in
passion and massive force only makes him more repulsive. How is it then that
we can bear to contemplate him; nay, that, if we really imagine him, we feel
admiration and some kind of sympathy? Henry the Fifth tells us:
Tere is some soul of goodness in things evil,
Would men observingly distil it out;
but here, it may be said, we are shown a thing absolutely evil, and—what is more
dreadful still—this absolute evil is united with supreme intellectual power. Why
is the representation tolerable, and why do we not accuse its author either of
untruth or of a desperate pessimism?
To these questions it might at once be replied: Iago does not stand alone; he
is a factor in a whole; and we perceive him there and not in isolation, acted upon
as well as acting, destroyed as well as destroying. But, although this is true and
important, I pass it by and, continuing to regard him by himself, I would make
three remarks in answer to the questions.
In the first place, Iago is not merely negative or evil—far from it. Tose very
forces that moved him and made his fate—sense of power, delight in performing
a difficult and dangerous action, delight in the exercise of artistic skill—are not
at all evil things. We sympathise with one or other of them almost every day of
our lives. And, accordingly, though in Iago they are combined with something
detestable and so contribute to evil, our perception of them is accompanied with
sympathy. In the same way, Iago’s insight, dexterity, quickness, address, and the
like, are in themselves admirable things; the perfect man would possess them.
And certainly he would possess also Iago’s courage and self-control, and, like
Iago, would stand above the impulses of mere feeling, lord of his inner world.
All this goes to evil ends in Iago, but in itself it has a great worth; and, although
Othello 154
in reading, of course, we do not sift it out and regard it separately, it inevitably
affects us and mingles admiration with our hatred or horror.
All this, however, might apparently co-exist with absolute egoism and total
want of humanity. But, in the second place, it is not true that in Iago this egoism
and this want are absolute, and that in this sense he is a thing of mere evil. Tey
are frightful, but if they were absolute Iago would be a monster, not a man.
Te fact is, he tries to make them absolute and cannot succeed; and the traces
of conscience, shame and humanity, though faint, are discernible. If his egoism
were absolute he would be perfectly indifferent to the opinion of others; and he
clearly is not so. His very irritation at goodness, again, is a sign that his faith in
his creed is not entirely firm; and it is not entirely firm because he himself has a
perception, however dim, of the goodness of goodness. What is the meaning of
the last reason he gives himself for killing Cassio:
He hath a daily beauty in his life
Tat makes me ugly?
Does he mean that he is ugly to others? Ten he is not an absolute egoist.
Does he mean that he is ugly to himself? Ten he makes an open confession of
moral sense. And, once more, if he really possessed no moral sense, we should
never have heard those soliloquies which so clearly betray his uneasiness and his
unconscious desire to persuade himself that he has some excuse for the villainy
he contemplates. Tese seem to be indubitable proofs that, against his will, Iago
is a little better than his creed, and has failed to withdraw himself wholly from
the human atmosphere about him. And to these proofs I would add, though with
less confidence, two others. Iago’s momentary doubt towards the end whether
Roderigo and Cassio must be killed has always surprised me. As a mere matter
of calculation it is perfectly obvious that they must; and I believe his hesitation
is not merely intellectual, it is another symptom of the obscure working of
conscience or humanity. Lastly, is it not significant that, when once his plot has
begun to develop, Iago never seeks the presence of Desdemona; that he seems
to leave her as quickly as he can (iii. iv. 138); and that, when he is fetched by
Emilia to see her in her distress (iv. ii. 110 ff.), we fail to catch in his words any
sign of the pleasure he shows in Othello’s misery, and seem rather to perceive
a certain discomfort, and, if one dare say it, a faint touch of shame or remorse?
Tis interpretation of the passage, I admit, is not inevitable, but to my mind
(quite apart from any theorising about Iago) it seems the natural one. And if it
is right, Iago’s discomfort is easily understood; for Desdemona is the one person
concerned against whom it is impossible for him even to imagine a ground of
resentment, and so an excuse for cruelty.
Tere remains, thirdly, the idea that Iago is a man of supreme intellect who
is at the same time supremely wicked. Tat he is supremely wicked nobody
Othello in the Twentieth Century 155
will doubt; and I have claimed for him nothing that will interfere with his
right to that title. But to say that his intellectual power is supreme is to make
a great mistake. Within certain limits he has indeed extraordinary penetration,
quickness, inventiveness, adaptiveness; but the limits are defined with the
hardest of lines, and they are narrow limits. It would scarcely be unjust to call
him simply astonishingly clever, or simply a consummate master of intrigue. But
compare him with one who may perhaps be roughly called a bad man of supreme
intellectual power, Napoleon, and you see how small and negative Iago’s mind
is, incapable of Napoleon’s military achievements, and much more incapable of
his political constructions. Or, to keep within the Shakespearean world, compare
him with Hamlet, and you perceive how miserably close is his intellectual
horizon; that such a thing as a thought beyond the reaches of his soul has never
come near him; that he is prosaic through and through, deaf and blind to all but
a tiny fragment of the meaning of things. Is it not quite absurd, then, to call him
a man of supreme intellect?
And observe, lastly, that his failure in perception is closely connected with
his badness. He was destroyed by the power that he attacked, the power of love;
and he was destroyed by it because he could not understand it; and he could
not understand it because it was not in him. Iago never meant his plot to be so
dangerous to himself. He knew that jealousy is painful, but the jealousy of a love
like Othello’s he could not imagine, and he found himself involved in murders
which were no part of his original design. Tat difficulty he surmounted, and his
changed plot still seemed to prosper. Roderigo and Cassio and Desdemona once
dead, all will be well. Nay, when he fails to kill Cassio, all may still be well. He will
avow that he told Othello of the adultery, and persist that he told the truth, and
Cassio will deny it in vain. And then, in a moment, his plot is shattered by a blow
from a quarter where he never dreamt of danger. He knows his wife, he thinks.
She is not over-scrupulous, she will do anything to please him, and she has learnt
obedience. But one thing in her he does not know—that she loves her mistress
and would face a hundred deaths sooner than see her fair fame darkened. Tere
is genuine astonishment in his outburst ‘What! Are you mad?’ as it dawns upon
him that she means to speak the truth about the handkerchief. But he might well
have applied to himself the words she flings at Othello,
O gull! O dolt!
As ignorant as dirt!
Te foulness of his own soul made him so ignorant that he built into the
marvellous structure of his plot a piece of crass stupidity.
To the thinking mind the divorce of unusual intellect from goodness is a
thing to startle; and Shakespeare clearly felt it so. Te combination of unusual
intellect with extreme evil is more than startling, it is frightful. It is rare, but
Othello 156
it exists; and Shakespeare represented it in Iago. But the alliance of evil like
Iago’s with supreme intellect is an impossible fiction; and Shakespeare’s fictions
were truth.
QQQ
1927—T. S. Eliot. “The Hero Cheering Himself Up,”
from “Shakespeare and the Stoicism of Seneca”
T. S. Eliot (1888–1965) was one of the great poets of the twentieth
century as well as one of the most influential literary critics.
. . . I have always felt that I have never read a more terrible exposure of human
weakness—of universal human weakness—than the last great speech of Othello.
I am ignorant whether any one else has ever adopted this view, and it may appear
subjective and fantastic in the extreme. It is usually taken on its face value, as
expressing the greatness in defeat of a noble but erring nature:
Soft you; a word or two before you go.
I have done the state some service, and they know’t—
No more of that. —I pray you, in your letters,
When you shall these unlucky deeds relate,
Speak of me as I am; nothing extenuate,
Nor set down aught in malice: then must you speak
Of one that loved not wisely but too well;
Of one not easily jealous, but being wrought
Perplex’d in the extreme; of one whose hand,
Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away
Richer than all his tribe; of one whose subdued eyes,
Albeit unused to the melting mood,
Drop tears as fast as the Arabian trees
Teir medicinal gum. Set you down this;
And say besides, that in Aleppo once,
Where a malignant and a turban’d Turk
Beat a Venetian and traduced the state,
I took by the throat the circumcised dog,
And smote him—thus.
What Othello seems to me to be doing in making this speech is cheering
himself up. He is endeavoring to escape reality, he has ceased to think about
Desdemona, and is thinking about himself. Humility is the most difficult of all
Othello in the Twentieth Century 157
the virtues to achieve; nothing dies harder than the desire to think well of oneself.
Othello succeeds in turning himself into a pathetic figure, by adopting an aesthetic
rather than a moral attitude, dramatising himself against his environment. He
takes in the spectator, but the human motive is primarily to take in himself. I do
not believe that any writer has ever exposed this bovarysme, the human will to
see things as they are not, more clearly than Shakespeare.
QQQ
1930—G. Wilson Knight.
“The Othello Music,” from The Wheel of Fire
G. Wilson Knight was a professor of English at Leeds University and
also taught at the University of Toronto. At both universities he pro-
duced and acted in Shakespeare’s plays. In addition, Knight wrote plays
for the British stage and television. His books include Shakespearean
Production and Lord Byron: Christian Virtues, but his most famous is The
Wheel of Fire.
In Othello we are faced with the vividly particular rather than the vague and
universal. Te play as a whole has a distinct formal beauty: within it we are
ever confronted with beautiful and solid forms. Te persons tend to appear as
warmly human, concrete. Tey are neither vaguely universalized, as in King Lear
or Macbeth, nor deliberately mechanized and vitalized by the poet’s philosophic
plan as in Measure for Measure and Timon of Athens, wherein the significance
of the dramatic person is dependent almost wholly on our understanding of
the allegorical or symbolical meaning. It is true that Iago is here a mysterious,
inhuman creature of unlimited cynicism: but the very presence of the concrete
creations around, in differentiating him sharply from the rest, limits and defines
him. Othello is a story of intrigue rather than a visionary statement. If, however,
we tend to regard Othello, Desdemona, and Iago as suggestive symbols rather
than human beings, we may, from a level view of their interaction, find a clear
relation existing between Othello and other plays of the hate-theme. Such an
analysis will be here only in part satisfactory. It exposes certain underlying ideas,
abstracts them from the original: it is less able to interpret the whole positive
beauty of the play. With this important reservation, I shall push the interpretative
method as far as possible.
Othello is dominated by its protagonist. Its supremely beautiful effects of
style are all expressions of Othello’s personal passion. Tus, in first analysing
Othello’s poetry, we shall lay the basis for an understanding of the play’s
symbolism: this matter of style is, indeed, crucial, and I shall now indicate
Othello 158
those qualities which clearly distinguish it from other Shakespearian poetry. It
holds a rich music all its own, and possesses a unique solidity and precision of
picturesque phrase or image, a peculiar chastity and serenity of thought. It is,
as a rule, barren of direct metaphysical content. Its thought does not mesh with
the reader’s: rather it is always outside us, aloof. Tis aloofness is the resultant
of an inward aloofness of image from image, word from word. Te dominant
quality is separation, not, as is more usual in Shakespeare, cohesion. Consider
these exquisite poetic movements:
O heavy hour!
Methinks it should be now a huge eclipse
Of sun and moon, and that the affrighted globe
Should yawn at alteration.
(V. ii. 97)
Or,
It is the very error of the moon;
She comes more near the earth than she was wont,
And makes men mad.
(V. ii. 107)
Tese are solid gems of poetry which lose little by divorce from their context:
wherein they differ from the finest passages of King Lear or Macbeth, which are
as wild flowers not to be uptorn from their rooted soil if they are to live. In these
two quotations we should note how the human drama is thrown into sudden
contrast and vivid, unexpected relation with the tremendous concrete machinery
of the universe, which is thought of in terms of individual heavenly bodies: ‘sun’
and ‘moon’. Te same effect is apparent in:
Nay, had she been true,
If Heaven would make me such another world
Of one entire and perfect chrysolite,
I’d not have sold her for it.
(V. ii. 141)
Notice the single word ‘chrysolite’ with its outstanding and remote beauty: this
is typical of Othello.
Te effect in such passages is primarily one of contrast. Te vastness of the
night sky, and its moving planets, or the earth itself—here conceived objectively
as a solid, round, visualized object—these things, though thrown momentarily
into sensible relation with the passions of man, yet remain vast, distant, separate,
Othello in the Twentieth Century 159
seen but not apprehended; something against which the dramatic movement may
be silhouetted, but with which it cannot be merged. Tis poetic use of heavenly
bodies serves to elevate the theme, to raise issues infinite and unknowable. Tose
bodies are not, however, implicit symbols of man’s spirit, as in King Lear: they
remain distinct, isolated phenomena, sublimely decorative to the play. In Macbeth
and King Lear man commands the elements and the stars: they are part of him.
Compare the above quotations from Othello with this from King Lear:
You nimble lightnings, dart your blinding flames
Into her scornful eyes! Infect her beauty,
You fen-suck’d fogs, drawn by the powerful sun,
To fall and blast her pride.
(II. iv. 167)
Tis is typical: natural images are given a human value. Tey are insignificant,
visually: their value is only that which they bring to the human passion which
cries out to them. Teir aesthetic grandeur, in and for themselves, is not relevant
to the King Lear universe. So, too, Macbeth cries
Stars, hide your fires;
Let not light see my black and deep desires.
(I. iv. 50)
And Lady Macbeth:
Come, thick night,
And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of Hell,
Tat my keen knife see not the wound it makes,
Nor Heaven peep through the blanket of the dark,
To cry ‘Hold, hold!’
(I. v. 51)
Here, and in the King Lear extract, there is no clear visual effect as in Othello:
tremendous images and suggestions are evoked only to be blurred as images
by the more powerful passion which calls them into being. Images in Macbeth
are thus continually vague, mastered by passion; apprehended, but not seen. In
Othello’s poetry they are concrete, detached; seen but not apprehended. We meet
the same effect in:
Like to the Pontic sea,
Whose icy current and compulsive course
Ne’er feels retiring ebb, but keeps due on
Othello 160
To the Propontic and the Hellespont,
Even so my bloody thoughts, with violent pace,
Shall ne’er look back, ne’er ebb to humble love,
Till that a capable and wide revenge Swallow them up.
Now, by yond marble heaven,
In the due reverence of a sacred vow
I here engage my words.
(III. iii. 454)
Tis is a strongly typical speech. Te long comparison, explicitly made,
where in King Lear or Macbeth a series of swiftly evolving metaphors would
be more characteristic, is another example of the separateness obtaining
throughout Othello. Tere is no fusing of word with word, rather a careful
juxtaposition of one word or image with another. And there are again
the grand single words, ‘Propontic’, ‘Hellespont’, with their sharp, clear,
consonant sounds, constituting defined aural solids typical of the Othello
music: indeed, fine single words, especially proper names, are a characteristic
of this play—Anthropophagi, Ottomites, Arabian trees, ‘the base Indian’,
the Egyptian, Palestine, Mauretania, the Sagittary, Olympus, Mandragora,
Othello, Desdemona. Tis is a rough assortment, not all used by Othello, but
it points the Othello quality of rich, often expressly consonantal, outstanding
words. Now Othello’s prayer, with its ‘marble heaven’, is most typical and
illustrative. One watches the figure of Othello silhouetted against a flat, solid,
moveless sky: there is a plastic, static suggestion about the image. Compare it
with a similar King Lear prayer:
O heavens,
If you do love old men, if your sweet sway
Allow obedience, if yourselves are old,
Make it your cause; send down and take my part!
(II. iv. 192)
Here we do not watch Lear: ‘We are Lear.’ Tere is no visual effect, no rigid
subject–object relation between Lear and the ‘heavens’, nor any contrast, but an
absolute unspatial unity of spirit. Te heavens blend with Lear’s prayer, each is
part of the other. Tere is an intimate interdependence, not a mere juxtaposition.
Lear thus identifies himself in kind with the heavens to which he addresses
himself directly: Othello speaks of ‘yond marble heaven’, in the third person, and
swears by it, does not pray to it. It is conceived as outside his interests.
Tis detached style, most excellent in point of clarity and stateliness, tends
also to lose something in respect of power. At moments of great tension, the
Othello style fails of a supreme effect. Capable of fine things quite unmatched
Othello in the Twentieth Century 161
in their particular quality in any other play, it nevertheless sinks sometimes to a
studied artificiality, nerveless and without force. For example, Othello thinks of
himself as:
. . . one whose subdued eyes,
Albeit unused to the melting mood,
Drop tears as fast as the Arabian trees
Teir medicinal gum.
(V. ii. 347)
Beside this we might place Macduff’s
O I could play the woman with mine eyes
And braggart with my tongue! But, gentle heavens,
Cut short all intermission . . .
(IV. iii. 229)
Othello’s lines here have a certain restrained, melodic beauty, like the ‘Pontic
sea’ passage; both speeches use the typical Othello picturesque image or word;
both compare, by simile, the passion of man with some picture delightful in
itself, which is developed for its own sake, slightly overdeveloped—so that the
final result makes us forget the emotion in contemplation of the image. Beauty
has been imposed on human sorrow, rather than shown to be intrinsic therein.
But Macduff’s passionate utterance has not time to paint word pictures of ‘yond
marble heaven’, or to search for abstruse geographical images of the Hellespont
or Arabia. Tere is more force in his first line than all Othello’s slightly over-
strained phraseology of ‘subdued eyes’ and ‘melting mood’. Its strength derives
from the compression of metaphor and the sudden heightened significance of a
single, very commonplace, word (‘woman’), whereas the other style deliberately
refuses power in the level prolixity of simile, and searches always for the
picturesque. Te Othello style is diffuse, leisurely, like a meandering river; the
Macbeth style compressed, concentrated, and explosive; often jerky, leaping like
a mountain torrent. But metaphor is not essential to intensest Shakespearian
power. Another, still finer, passage from King Lear on the same theme might
be adduced:
Cordelia. How does my royal lord? How fares your majesty?
Lear. You do me wrong to take me out o’ the grave:
Tou art a soul in bliss; but I am bound
Upon a wheel of fire, that mine own tears
Do scald like molten lead.
(IV. vii. 44)
Othello 162
Te extraordinary force of that ending is gained by simile: but there is no
diffusion of content, no accent that does not carry the maximum of emotion.
It is even more powerful than Macduff’s speech, since it lacks excitability: it
has the control and dignity of Othello’s with the compressed, explosive quality
of Macduff’s. Te Othello style does not compass the overpowering effects of
Macbeth or King Lear: nor does it, as a rule, aim at them. At the most agonizing
moments of Othello’s story, however, there is apparent weakness: we find an
exaggerated, false rhetoric.
Tere is a speech in Othello that begins in the typical restrained manner, but
degenerates finally to what might almost be called bombast. It starts:
Where should Othello go?
Now, how dost thou look now? O ill-starr’d wench!
Pale as thy smock! When we shall meet at compt,
Tis look of thine will hurl my soul from Heaven,
And fiends will snatch at it. Cold, cold, my girl!
Even like thy chastity.
(V. ii. 270)
Here we have the perfection of the Othello style. Concrete, visual, detached.
Compare it with Lear’s, ‘Tou art a soul in bliss . . . ,’ where the effect, though
perhaps more powerful and immediate, is yet vague, intangible, spiritualized.
Now this speech, started in a style that can in its own way challenge that of King
Lear, rapidly degenerates as Othello’s mind is represented as collapsing under the
extreme of anguish:
O cursed, cursed slave! Whip me, ye devils,
From the possession of this heavenly sight!
Blow me about in winds! roast me in sulphur!
Wash me in steep-down gulfs of liquid fire!
O Desdemona! Desdemona! dead!
Oh! Oh! Oh!
(V. ii. 276)
Tere is a sudden reversal of poetic beauty: these lines lack cogency because
they exaggerate rather than concentrate the emotion. Place beside these violent
eschatological images the passage from King Lear:
And my poor fool is hang’d! No, no, no life!
Why should a dog, a horse, a rat have life,
And thou no breath at all? Tou’lt come no more,
Never, never, never, never, never!
Othello in the Twentieth Century 163
Pray you, undo this button: thank you, sir.
Do you see this? Look on her, look, her lips,
Look there, look there!
(V. iii. 307)
Notice by what rough, homely images the passion is transmitted—which are as
truly an integral part of the naturalism of King Lear as the mosaic and polished
phrase and the abstruse and picturesque allusion are, in its best passages,
characteristic of Othello’s speech. Tus the extreme, slightly exaggerated beauty
of Othello’s language is not maintained. Tis is even more true elsewhere.
Othello, who usually luxuriates in deliberate and magnificent rhetoric, raves, falls
in a trance:
Lie with her! lie on her! We say lie on her, when they belie her. Lie
with her! that’s fulsome. Handkerchief—confession—handkerchief!
To confess, and be hanged for his labour; first, to be hanged, and
then to confess—I tremble at it. Nature would not invest herself in
such shadowing passion without some instruction. It is not words
that shake me thus. Pish! Noses, ears, and lips.—Is’t possible?—
Confess—handkerchief—O devil!
(IV. i. 35)
Whereas Lear’s madness never lacks artistic meaning, whereas its most
extravagant and grotesque effects are presented with imaginative cogency,
Othello can speak words like these. Tis is the Iago-spirit, the Iago medicine, at
work, like an acid eating into bright metal. Tis is the primary fact of Othello and
therefore of the play: something of solid beauty is undermined, wedged open so
that it exposes an extreme ugliness.
When Othello is represented as enduring loss of control he is, as Macbeth
and Lear never are, ugly, idiotic; but when he has full control he attains an
architectural stateliness of quarried speech, a silver rhetoric of a kind unique in
Shakespeare:
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 alabaster.
Yet she must die, else she’ll betray more men.
Put out the light, and then put out the light.
If I quench thee, thou flaming minister,
I can again thy former light restore,
Othello 164
Should I repent me: but once put out thy light,
Tou cunning’st pattern of excelling nature,
I know not where is that Promethean heat
Tat can thy light relume. When I have pluck’d the rose,
I cannot give it vital growth again,
It needs must wither: I’ll smell it on the tree.
(V. ii. 1)
Tis is the noble Othello music: highly-coloured, rich in sound and phrase, stately.
Each word solidifies as it takes its place in the pattern. Tis speech well illustrates
the Othello style: the visual or tactile suggestion—‘whiter skin of hers than
snow’, ‘smooth as monumental alabaster’; the slightly over-decorative phrase,
‘flaming minister’; the momentary juxtaposition of humanity and the vast spaces
of the night, the ‘chaste stars’; the concrete imagery of ‘thou cunning’st pattern
of excelling nature’, and the lengthy comparison of life with light; the presence
of simple forward-flowing clarity of dignified statement and of simile in place
of the super-logical welding of thought with molten thought as in the more
compressed, agile, and concentrated poetry of Macbeth and King Lear; and the
fine outstanding single word, ‘Promethean’. In these respects Othello’s speech
is nearer the style of the aftermath of Elizabethan literature, the settled lava of
that fiery eruption, which gave us the solid image of Marvell and the ‘marmoreal
phrase’ of Browne: it is the most Miltonic thing in Shakespeare.
Tis peculiarity of style directs our interpretation in two ways. First, the
tremendous reversal from extreme, almost over-decorative, beauty, to extreme
ugliness—both of a kind unusual in Shakespeare—will be seen to reflect a
primary truth about the play. Tat I will demonstrate later in my essay. Second,
the concreteness and separation of image, word, or phrase, contrasting with the
close-knit language elsewhere, suggests a proper approach to Othello which is
not proper to Macbeth or King Lear. Separation is the rule throughout Othello.
Whereas in Macbeth and King Lear we have one dominant atmosphere, built of
a myriad subtleties of thought and phraseology entwining throughout, subduing
our minds wholly to their respective visions, whereas each has a single quality,
expresses as a whole a single statement, Othello is built rather of outstanding
differences. In Othello all is silhouetted, defined, concrete. Instead of reading a
unique, pervading, atmospheric suggestion—generally our key to interpretation
of what happens within that atmosphere—we must here read the meaning of
separate persons. Te persons here are truly separate. Lear, Cordelia, Edmund
all grow out of the Lear universe, all are levelled by its characteristic atmosphere,
all blend with it and with each other, so that they are less closely and vividly
defined. Tey lack solidity. Othello, Desdemona, Iago, however, are clearly and
vividly separate. All here—but Iago—are solid, concrete. Contrast is raised to
its highest pitch. Othello is statuesque, Desdemona most concretely human and
Othello in the Twentieth Century 165
individual, Iago, if not human or in any usual sense ‘realistic’, is quite unique.
Within analysis of these three persons and their interaction lies the meaning of
Othello. In Macbeth or King Lear we interpret primarily a singleness of vision.
Here, confronted with a significant diversity, we must have regard to the essential
relation existing between the three main personal conceptions. Interpretation
must be based not on unity but differentiation. Terefore I shall pursue an
examination of this triple symbolism; which analysis will finally resolve the
difficulty of Othello’s speech, wavering as it does between what at first sight
appear an almost artificial beauty and an equally inartistic ugliness.
Othello radiates a world of romantic, heroic, and picturesque adventure. All
about him is highly coloured. He is a Moor; he is noble and generally respected; he
is proud in the riches of his achievement. Now his prowess as a soldier is emphasized.
His arms have spent ‘their dearest action in the tented field’ (I. iii. 85). Again,
Te tyrant custom, most grave Senators,
Hath made the flinty and steel couch of war
My thrice-driven bed of down.
(I. iii. 230)
His iron warriorship is suggested throughout. Iago says:
Can he be angry? I have seen the cannon,
When it hath blown his ranks into the air,
And, like the Devil, from his very arm
Puff’d his own brother:—and can he be angry?
Something of moment then: I will go meet him:
Tere’s matter in’t indeed, if he be angry.
(III. iv. 133)
And Lodovico:
Is this the noble nature
Whom passion could not shake? Whose solid virtue
Te shot of accident, nor dart of chance,
Could neither graze nor pierce?
(IV. i. 276)
But we also meet a curious discrepancy. Othello tells us:
Rude am I in my speech,
And little bless’d with the soft phrase of peace.
(I. iii. 81)
Othello 166
Yet the dominant quality in this play is the exquisitely moulded language,
the noble cadence and chiselled phrase, of Othello’s poetry. Othello’s speech,
therefore, reflects not a soldier’s language, but the quality of soldiership in all
its glamour of romantic adventure; it holds an imaginative realism. It has a
certain exotic beauty, is a storied and romantic treasure-house of rich, colourful
experiences. He recounts his adventures, telling of
antres vast and desarts idle,
Rough quarries, rocks, and hills whose heads touch heaven,
(I. iii. 140)
of Cannibals, and the Anthropophagi, and ‘men whose heads do grow beneath
their shoulders’ (I. iii. 144). He tells Desdemona of the handkerchief given by ‘an
Egyptian’ to his mother:
’Tis true: there’s magic in the web of it:
A sibyl, that had number’d in the world
Te sun to course two hundred compasses,
In her prophetic fury sew’d the work;
Te worms were hallow’d that did breed the silk,
And it was dyed in mummy which the skilful
Conserved of maidens’ hearts.
(III. iv. 70)
Swords are vivid, spiritualized things to Othello. Tere is his famous line:
Keep up your bright swords, for the dew will rust them.
(I. ii. 59)
And in the last scene, he says:
I have another weapon in this chamber;
It is a sword of Spain, the ice-brook’s temper.
(V. ii. 251)
In his address at the end, he speaks of himself as
one whose hand,
Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away
Richer than all his tribe.
(V. ii. 345)
Othello in the Twentieth Century 167
His tears flow as the gum from ‘Arabian trees’ (V. ii. 349); he recounts how
in Aleppo he smote ‘a malignant and a turban’d Turk’ (V. ii. 352) for insulting
Venice. Finally there is his noble apostrophe to his lost ‘occupation’:
Farewell the plumed troop and the big wars,
Tat make ambition virtue! O, farewell!
Farewell the neighing steed and the shrill trump,
Te spirit-stirring drum, the ear-piercing fife,
Te royal banner and all quality,
Pride, pomp, and circumstance of glorious war!
And, O you mortal engines, whose rude throats
Te immortal Jove’s dread clamours counterfeit,
Farewell! Othello’s occupation’s gone.
(III. iii. 350)
Again, we have the addition of phrase to separate phrase, rather than the
interdependence, the evolution of thought from thought, the clinging mesh of
close-bound suggestions of other plays. Tis noble eulogy of war is intrinsic to
the conception. War is in Othello’s blood. When Desdemona accepts him, she
knows she must not be ‘a moth of peace’ (I. iii. 258). Othello is a compound
of highly-coloured, romantic adventure—he is himself ‘coloured’—and war;
together with a great pride and a great faith in those realities. His very life
is dependent on a fundamental belief in the validity and nobility of human
action—with, perhaps, a strong tendency towards his own achievement in
particular. Now war, in Shakespeare, is usually a positive spiritual value,
like love. Tere is reference to the soldiership of the protagonist in all the
plays analysed in my present treatment. Soldiership is almost the condition
of nobility, and so the Shakespearian hero is usually a soldier. Terefore
Othello, with reference to the Shakespearian universe, becomes automatically
a symbol of faith in human values of love, of war, of romance in a wide and
sweeping sense. He is, as it were, conscious of all he stands for: from the first
to the last he loves his own romantic history. He is, like Troilus, dedicated
to these values, has faith and pride in both. Like Troilus he is conceived as
extraordinarily direct, simple, ‘credulous’ (IV. i. 46). Othello, as he appears in
the action of the play, may be considered the high-priest of human endeavour,
robed in the vestments of romance, whom we watch serving in the temple of
war at the altar of love’s divinity.
Desdemona is his divinity. She is, at the same time, warmly human. Tere is a
certain domestic femininity about her. She is ‘a maiden never bold’ (I. iii. 94). We
hear that ‘the house affairs’ (had Cordelia any?) drew her often from Othello’s
narrative (I. iii. 147). But she asks to hear the whole history:
Othello 168
I did consent,
And often did beguile her of her tears,
When I did speak of some distressful stroke
Tat my youth suffer’d. My story being done,
She gave me for my pains a world of sighs:
She swore, in faith, ’twas strange, ’twas passing strange,
’Twas pitiful, ’twas wondrous pitiful:
She wish’d she had not heard it, yet she wish’d
Tat heaven had made her such a man.
(I. iii. 155)
Te same domesticity and gentleness is apparent throughout. She talks of ‘to-
night at supper’ (III. iii. 57) or ‘to-morrow dinner’ (III. iii. 58); she is typically
feminine in her attempt to help Cassio, and her pity for him. Tis is how she
describes her suit to Othello:
Why, this is not a boon;
’Tis as I should entreat you wear your gloves,
Or feed on nourishing dishes, or keep you warm,
Or sue to you to do a peculiar profit
To your own person . . .
(III. iii. 76)
—a speech reflecting a world of sex-contrast. She would bind Othello’s head
with her handkerchief—that handkerchief which is to become a terrific symbol
of Othello’s jealousy. Te Othello world is eminently domestic, and Desdemona
expressly feminine. We hear of her needlework (IV. i. 197), her fan, gloves, mask
(IV. ii. 8). In the exquisite willow-song scene, we see her with her maid, Emilia.
Emilia gives her ‘her nightly wearing’ (IV. iii. 16). Emilia says she has laid on
her bed the ‘wedding-sheets’ (IV. ii. 104) Desdemona asked for. Ten there is
the willow-song, brokenly sung whilst Emilia ‘unpins’ (IV. iii. 34) Desdemona’s
dress:
My mother had a maid called Barbara:
She was in love, and he she loved proved mad
And did forsake her . . .
(IV. iii. 26)
Te extreme beauty and pathos of this scene are largely dependent on the
domesticity of it. Othello is eminently a domestic tragedy. But this element in the
play is yet to be related to another more universal element. Othello is concretely
human, so is Desdemona. Othello is very much the typical middle-aged bachelor
Othello in the Twentieth Century 169
entering matrimony late in life, but he is also, to transpose a phrase of Iago’s, a
symbol of human—especially masculine—‘purpose, courage, and valour’ (IV. ii.
218), and, in a final judgement, is seen to represent the idea of human faith and
value in a very wide sense. Now Desdemona, also very human, with an individual
domestic feminine charm and simplicity, is yet also a symbol of woman in general
daring the unknown seas of marriage with the mystery of man. Beyond this, in
the far flight of a transcendental interpretation, it is clear that she becomes a
symbol of man’s ideal, the supreme value of love. At the limit of the series of
wider and wider suggestions which appear from imaginative contemplation of
a poetic symbol she is to be equated with the divine principle. In one scene of
Othello, and one only, direct poetic symbolism breaks across the vividly human,
domestic world of this play.
1
As everything in Othello is separated, defined,
so the plot itself is in two distinct geographical divisions: Venice and Cyprus.
Desdemona leaves the safety and calm of her home for the stormy voyage to
Cyprus and the tempest of the following tragedy. Iago’s plot begins to work in
the second part. Te storm scene, between the two parts, is important.
Storms are continually symbols of tragedy in Shakespeare. Tis scene contains
some most vivid imaginative effects, among them passages of fine storm-poetry
of the usual kind:
For do but stand upon the foaming shore,
Te chidden billow seems to pelt the clouds;
Te wind-shak’d surge, with high and monstrous mane,
Seems to cast water on the burning bear,
And quench the guards of the ever-fixed pole:
I never did like molestation view,
On the enchafed flood.
(II. i. 11)
Tis storm-poetry is here closely associated with the human element. And in this
scene where direct storm-symbolism occurs it is noteworthy that the figures of
Desdemona and Othello are both strongly idealized:
Cassio. Tempests themselves, high seas and howling winds,
Te gutter’d rocks and congregated sands—
Traitors ensteep’d to clog the guiltless keel—
As having sense of beauty, do omit
Teir mortal natures, letting go safely by
Te divine Desdemona.
Montano. What is she?
Cassio. She that I spake of, our great captain’s captain,
Left in the conduct of the bold Iago,
Othello 170
Whose footing here anticipates our thoughts
A se’nnight’s speed. Great Jove, Othello guard,
And swell his sail with thine own powerful breath,
Tat he may bless this bay with his tall ship,
Make love’s quick pants in Desdemona’s arms,
Give renew’d fire to our extincted spirits,
And bring all Cyprus comfort!
Enter Desdemona, &c.
O, behold,
Te riches of the ship is come on shore!
Ye men of Cyprus, let her have your knees.
Hail to thee, lady! and the grace of Heaven,
Before, behind thee, and on every hand,
Enwheel thee round!
(II. i. 68)
Desdemona is thus endued with a certain transcendent quality of beauty and
grace. She ‘paragons description and wild fame’ says Cassio: she is
One that excels the quirks of blazoning pens,
And in the essential vesture of creation
Does tire the ingener.
(II. i. 63)
And Othello enters the port of Cyprus as a hero coming to ‘bring comfort’,
to ‘give renewed fire’ to men. Te entry of Desdemona and that of Othello
are both heralded by discharge of guns: which both merges finely with the
tempest-symbolism and the violent stress and excitement of the scene as a
whole, and heightens our sense of the warrior nobility of the protagonist and
his wife, subdued as she is ‘to the very quality’ of her lord (I. iii. 253). Meeting
Desdemona, he speaks:
Othello. O my fair warrior!
Desdemona. My dear Othello!
Othello. It gives me wonder great as my content
To see you here before me. O my soul’s joy!
If after every tempest come such calms,
May the winds blow till they have waken’d death!
And let the labouring bark climb hills of seas
Olympus-high and duck again as low
As Hell’s from Heaven! If it were now to die,
’Twere now to be most happy; for, I fear,
Othello in the Twentieth Century 171
My soul hath her content so absolute
Tat not another comfort like to this
Succeeds in unknown fate.
(II. i. 185)
Tis is the harmonious marriage of true and noble minds. Othello, Desdemona,
and their love are here apparent, in this scene of storm and reverberating
discharge of cannon, as things of noble and conquering strength: they radiate
romantic valour. Othello is essential man in all his prowess and protective
strength; Desdemona essential woman, gentle, loving, brave in trust of her
warrior husband. Te war is over. Te storm of sea or bruit of cannonade are
powerless to hurt them: yet there is another storm brewing in the venomed
mind of Iago. Instead of merging with and accompanying tragedy the storm
here is to be contrasted with the following tragic events: as usual in Othello,
contrast and separation take the place of fusion and unity. Tis scene is as a
microcosm of the play, reflecting its action. Colours which are elsewhere softly
toned are here splashed vividly on the play’s canvas. Here especially Othello
appears a prince of heroes, Desdemona is lit by a divine feminine radiance:
both are transfigured. Tey are shown as coming safe to land, by Heaven’s
‘grace’, triumphant, braving war and tempestuous seas, guns thundering their
welcome. Te reference of all this, on the plane of high poetic symbolism, to
the play as a whole is evident.
Against these two Iago pits his intellect. In this scene too Iago declares
himself with especial clarity:
O gentle lady, do not put me to’t;
For I am nothing if not critical.
(II. i. 118)
His conversation with Desdemona reveals his philosophy. Presented under
the cloak of fun, it exposes nevertheless his attitude to life: that of the cynic.
Roderigo is his natural companion: the fool is a convenient implement, and
at the same time continual food for his philosophy. Othello and Desdemona
are radiant, beautiful: Iago opposes them, critical, intellectual. Like cold steel
his cynic skill will run through the warm body of their love. Asked to praise
Desdemona, he draws a picture of womanly goodness in a vein of mockery;
and concludes:
Iago. She was a wight if ever such wight were—
Desdemona. To do what?
Iago: To suckle fools and chronicle small beer.
(II. i. 158)
Othello 172
Here is his reason for hating Othello’s and Desdemona’s love: he hates their
beauty, to him a meaningless, stupid thing. Tat is Iago. Cynicism is his
philosophy, his very life, his ‘motive’ in working Othello’s ruin. Te play turns on
this theme: the cynical intellect pitted against a lovable humanity transfigured by
qualities of heroism and grace. As Desdemona and Othello embrace he says:
O you are well tuned now!
But I’ll set down the pegs that make this music,
As honest as I am.
(II. i. 202)
‘Music’ is apt: we remember Othello’s rich harmony of words. Against the Othello
music Iago concentrates all the forces of cynic villainy.
Iago’s cynicism is recurrent:
Virtue! a fig! ’tis in ourselves that we are thus or thus . . .
(I. iii. 323)
Love to him is
. . . merely a lust of the blood and a permission of the will.
(I. iii. 339)
He believes Othello’s and Desdemona’s happiness will be short-lived, since he
puts no faith in the validity of love. Early in the play he tells Roderigo:
It cannot be that Desdemona should long continue her love to the
Moor . . . nor he his to her . . . Tese Moors are changeable in their wills
. . . the food that to him now is as luscious as locusts, shall be to him
shortly as bitter as coloquintida. She must change for youth: when she is
sated with his body, she will find the error of her choice: she must have
change, she must.
(I. iii. 347)
Tis is probably Iago’s sincere belief, his usual attitude to love: he is not
necessarily deceiving Roderigo. After this, when he is alone, we hear that he
suspects Othello with his own wife: nor are we surprised. And, finally, his own
cynical beliefs suggest to him a way of spiting Othello. He thinks of Cassio:
After some time, to abuse Othello’s ear
Tat he is too familiar with his wife.
(I. iii. 401)
Othello in the Twentieth Century 173
Te order is important: Iago first states his disbelief in Othello’s and
Desdemona’s continued love, and next thinks of a way of precipitating its
end. Tat is, he puts his cynicism into action. Te same rhythmic sequence
occurs later. Iago witnesses Cassio’s meeting with Desdemona at Cyprus, and
comments as follows:
He takes her by the palm: ay, well said, whisper: with as little a web as
this will I ensnare as great a fly as Cassio. Ay, smile upon her, do; I will
gyve thee in thine own courtship . . .
(II. i. 168)
Iago believes Cassio loves Desdemona. He has another cynical conversation with
Roderigo as to Desdemona’s chances of finding satisfaction with Othello, and
the probability of her love for Cassio (II. i. 223–79). A kiss, to Iago, cannot be
‘courtesy’: it is
Lechery, by this hand; an index and obscure prologue to the history of
lust and foul thoughts.
(II. i. 265)
Iago is sincere enough and means what he says. Cynicism is the key to his mind
and actions. After Roderigo’s departure, he again refers to his suspicions of
Othello—and Cassio too—with his own wife. He asserts definitely—and here
there is no Roderigo to impress—his belief in Cassio’s guilt:
Tat Cassio loves her, I do well believe it;
Tat she loves him, ’tis apt and of great credit.
(II. i. 298)
In this soliloquy he gets his plans clearer: again, they are suggested by what
he believes to be truth. I do not suggest that Iago lacks conscious villainy: far
from it. Besides, in another passage he shows that he is aware of Desdemona’s
innocence (IV. i. 48). But it is important that we observe how his attitude to
life casts the form and figure of his meditated revenge. His plan arises out of
the cynical depths of his nature. When, at the end, he says, ‘I told him what I
thought’ (V. ii. 174), he is speaking at least a half-truth. He hates the romance of
Othello and the loveliness of Desdemona because he is by nature the enemy of
these things. Cassio, he says,
hath a daily beauty in his life
Tat makes mine ugly.
(V. i. 19)
Othello 174
Tis is his ‘motive’ throughout: other suggestions are surface deep only. He is
cynicism loathing beauty, refusing to allow its existence. Hence the venom of his
plot: the plot is Iago—both are ultimate, causeless, self-begotten. Iago is cynicism
incarnate and projected into action.
Iago is utterly devilish: no weakness is apparent in his casing armour of
unrepentant villainy. He is a kind of Mephistopheles, closely equivalent to
Goethe’s devil, the two possessing the same qualities of mockery and easy
cynicism. He is called a ‘hellish villain’ by Lodovico (V. ii. 367), a ‘demi-devil’ by
Othello (V. ii. 300). Othello says:
I look down towards his feet; but that’s a fable.
If that thou be’est a devil, I cannot kill thee.
(V. ii. 285)
Iago himself recognizes a kinship:
Hell and night
Must bring this monstrous birth to the world’s sight.
(I. iii. 409)
And,
Divinity of Hell!
When devils will the blackest sins put on,
Tey do suggest at first with heavenly shows
As I do now.
(II. iii. 359)
He knows that his ‘poison’ (III. iii. 326) will ‘burn like the mines of sulphur’ (III.
iii. 330) in Othello. Tus Iago is, to Othello, the antithesis of Desdemona: the
relation is that of the spirit of denial to the divine principle. Desdemona ‘plays
the god’ (II. iii. 356) with Othello: if she is false, ‘Heaven mocks itself ’ (III. iii.
278). During the action, as Iago’s plot succeeds, her essential divinity changes, for
Othello, to a thing hideous and devilish—that is to its antithesis:
Her name that was as fresh
As Dian’s visage, is now begrim’d and black
As mine own face.
(III. iii. 387)
She is now ‘devil’ (IV. i. 252, 255) or ‘the fair devil’ (III. iii. 479); her hand, a
‘sweating devil’ (III. iv. 43); the ‘devils themselves’ will fear to seize her for her
Othello in the Twentieth Century 175
heavenly looks (IV. ii. 35). Tus Iago, himself a kind of devil, insidiously eats his
way into this world of romance, chivalry, nobility. Te word ‘devil’ occurs frequently
in the latter acts: devils are alive here, ugly little demons of black disgrace. Tey
swarm over the mental horizon of the play, occurring frequently. Iago is directly
or indirectly their author and originator. ‘Devil’, ‘Hell’, ‘damnation’—these words
are recurrent, and continually juxtaposed to thoughts of ‘Heaven’, prayer, angels.
We are clearly set amid ‘Heaven and men and devils’ (V. ii. 219). Such terms are
related here primarily to sexual impurity. In Othello, pure love is the supreme
good; impurity damnation. Tis pervading religious tonal significance relating to
infidelity explains lines such as:
Turn thy complexion there,
Patience, thou young and rose-lipp’d cherubin—
Ay, there, look grim as Hell!
(IV. ii. 61)
Othello addresses Emilia:
You, mistress,
Tat have the office opposite to Saint Peter,
And keep the gate of Hell!
(IV. ii. 89)
Here faithful love is to be identified with the divine, the ‘heavenly’; unfaithful
love, or the mistrust which imagines it, or the cynic that gives birth to that
imagination—all these are to be identified with the devil. Te hero is set between
the forces of Divinity and Hell. Te forces of Hell win and pure love lies slain.
Terefore Othello cries to ‘devils’ to whip him from that ‘heavenly’ sight (V. ii.
276). He knows himself to have been entrapped by hell-forces. Te Iago–Devil
association is of importance.
It will be remembered that Othello is a play of concrete forms. Tis world
is a world of visual images, colour, and romance. It will also be clear that the
mesh of devil-references I have just suggested show a mental horizon black,
formless, colourless. Tey contrast with the solid, chiselled, enamelled Othello
style elsewhere. Tis devil-world is insubstantial, vague, negative. Now on the
plane of personification we see that Othello and Desdemona are concrete,
moulded of flesh and blood, warm. Iago contrasts with them metaphysically as
well as morally: he is unlimited, formless villainy. He’s the spirit of denial, wholly
negative. He never has visual reality. He is further blurred by the fact of his being
something quite different from what he appears to the others. Is he to look like
a bluff soldier, or Mephistopheles? He is a different kind of being from Othello
and Desdemona: he belongs to a different world. Tey, by their very existence,
Othello 176
assert the positive beauty of created forms—hence Othello’s perfected style of
speech, his strong human appeal, his faith in creation’s values of love and war.
Tis world of created forms, this sculptural and yet pulsing beauty, the Iago-
spirit undermines, poisons, disintegrates. Iago is a demon of cynicism, colourless,
formless, in a world of colours, shapes, and poetry’s music. Of all these he would
create chaos. Othello’s words are apt:
Excellent wretch! Perdition catch my soul
But I do love thee! And when I love thee not,
Chaos is come again.
(III. iii. 90)
Chaos indeed. Iago works at the foundations of human values. Cassio is a soldier:
he ruins him as a soldier, makes him drunk. So he ruins both Othello’s love and
warrior-heart. He makes him absurd, ugly. Toward the end of the play there is
hideous suggestion. We hear of ‘cords, knives, poison’ (III. iii. 389), of lovers ‘as
prime as goats, as hot as monkeys’ (III. iii. 404); we meet Bianca, the whore, told
by Cassio to ‘throw her vile guesses in the Devil’s teeth’ (III. iv. 183); there are
Othello’s incoherent mutterings, ‘Pish! Noses, ears and lips!’ (IV. i. 43), he will
‘chop’ Desdemona ‘into messes’ (IV. i. 210); she reminds him of ‘foul toads’ (IV.
ii. 60). Watching Cassio, he descends to this:
O! I see that nose of yours, but not the dog I shall throw it to.
(IV. i. 144)
Othello strikes Desdemona, behaves like a raging beast. ‘Fire and brimstone!’
(IV. i. 246) he cries, and again, ‘Goats and monkeys!’ (IV. i. 274). ‘Heaven stops
the nose’ at Desdemona’s impurity (IV. ii. 76). Othello in truth behaves like ‘a
beggar in his drink’ (IV. ii. 120). In all these phrases I would emphasize not
the sense and dramatic relevance alone, but the suggestion—the accumulative
effect of ugliness, hellishness, idiocy, negation. It is a formless, colourless essence,
insidiously undermining a world of concrete, visual, richly-toned forms. Tat
is the Iago-spirit embattled against the domesticity, the romance, the idealized
humanity of the Othello world.
Here, too, we find the reason for the extreme contrast of Othello’s two styles:
one exotically beautiful, the other blatantly absurd, ugly. Tere is often no dignity
in Othello’s rage. Tere is not meant to be. Iago would make discord of the
Othello music. Tus at his first conquest he filches something of Othello’s style
and uses it himself:
Not poppy, nor mandragora,
Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world,
Othello in the Twentieth Century 177
Shall ever medicine thee to that sweet sleep
Which thou owed’st yesterday.
(III. iii. 331)
To him Othello’s pride in his life-story and Desdemona’s admiration were ever
stupid:
Mark me with what violence she first loved the Moor, but for bragging
and telling her fantastical lies: and will she love him still for prating?
(II. i. 225)
Iago, ‘nothing if not critical’, speaks some truth of Othello’s style—it is
‘fantastical’. As I have shown, it is somewhat over-decorative, highly-coloured.
Te dramatic value of this style now appears. In fact, a proper understanding
of Othello’s style reveals Iago’s ‘motive’ so often questioned. Tere is something
sentimental in Othello’s language, in Othello. Iago is pure cynicism. Tat Iago
should scheme—in this dramatic symbolism forged in terms of interacting
persons—to undermine Othello’s faith in himself, his wife, and his ‘occupation’,
is inevitable. Logically, the cynic must oppose the sentimentalist: dramatically,
he works his ruin by deceit and deception. Tat Othello often just misses tragic
dignity is the price of his slightly strained emotionalism. Othello loves emotion
for its own sake, luxuriates in it, like Richard II. As ugly and idiot ravings,
disjointed and with no passionate dignity even, succeed Othello’s swell and flood
of poetry, Iago’s triumph seems complete. Te honoured warrior, rich in strength
and experience, noble in act and repute, lies in a trance, nerveless, paralysed by
the Iago-conception:
Work on, my medicine, work.
(IV. i. 45)
But Iago’s victory is not absolute. During the last scene, Othello is a nobly tragic
figure. His ravings are not final: he rises beyond them. He slays Desdemona
finally not so much in rage, as for ‘the cause’ (V. ii. 1). He slays her in love.
Tough Desdemona fails him, his love, homeless, ‘perplexed in the extreme’ (V.
ii. 345), endures. He will kill her and ‘love her after’ (V. ii. 19). In that last scene,
too, he utters the grandest of his poetry. Te Iago-spirit never finally envelops
him, masters him, disintegrates his soul. Tose gem-like miniatures of poetic
movement quoted at the start of my essay are among Othello’s last words. His
vast love has, it is true, failed in a domestic world. But now symbols of the wide
beauty of the universe enrich his thoughts: the ‘chaste stars’, the ‘sun and moon’,
the ‘affrighted globe’, the world ‘of one entire and perfect chrysolite’ that may not
buy a Desdemona’s love. At the end we know that Othello’s fault is simplicity
Othello 178
alone. He is, indeed, ‘a gull, a dolt’ (V. ii. 161); he loves ‘not wisely but too well’ (V.
ii. 343). His simple faith in himself endures: and at the end, he takes just pride
in recalling his honourable service.
In this essay I have attempted to expose the underlying thought of the play.
Interpretation here is not easy, nor wholly satisfactory. As all within Othello—save
the Iago-theme—is separated, differentiated, solidified, so the play itself seems at
first to be divorced from wider issues, a lone thing of meaningless beauty in the
Shakespearian universe, solitary, separate, unyielding and chaste as the moon. It
is unapproachable, yields itself to no easy mating with our minds. Its thought
does not readily mesh with our thought. We can visualize it, admire its concrete
felicities of phrase and image, the mosaic of its language, the sculptural outline
of its effects, the precision and chastity of its form. But one cannot be lost in it,
subdued to it, enveloped by it, as one is drenched and refreshed by the elemental
cataracts of King Lear; one cannot be intoxicated by it as by the rich wine of
Antony and Cleopatra. Othello is essentially outside us, beautiful with a lustrous,
planetary beauty. Yet the Iago-conception is of a different kind from the rest
of the play. Tis conception alone, if no other reason existed, would point the
necessity of an intellectual interpretation. So we see the Iago-spirit gnawing at
the root of all the Othello values, the Othello beauties; he eats into the core and
heart of this romantic world, worms his way into its solidity, rotting it, poisoning
it. Once this is clear, the whole play begins to have meaning. On the plane of
dramatic humanity, we see a story of the cynic intriguing to ruin the soldier
and his love. On the plane of poetic conception, in matters of technique, style,
personification—there we see a spirit of negation, colourless, and undefined,
attempting to make chaos of a world of stately, architectural, and exquisitely
coloured forms. Te two styles of Othello’s speech illustrate this. Tus the
different technique of the Othello and Iago conceptions is intrinsic with the plot
of the play: in them we have the spirit of negation set against the spirit of creation.
Tat is why Iago is undefined, devisualized, inhuman, in a play of consummate
skill in concrete imagery and vivid human delineation. He is a colourless and
ugly thing in a world of colour and harmony. His failure lies in this: in the final
scene, at the moment of his complete triumph, Emilia dies for her mistress to
the words of Desdemona’s willow-song, and the Othello music itself sounds with
a nobler cadence, a richer flood of harmonies, a more selfless and universalized
flight of the imagination than before. Te beauties of the Othello world are not
finally disintegrated: they make ‘a swan-like end, fading in music’.
NOTE
1. But note too the significance of the magic handkerchief as both a symbol of
domestic sanctity and the play’s one link with the supernatural (1947).
QQQ
Othello in the Twentieth Century 179
1936—William Empson.
“The Best Policy,” from Life and Letters To-Day
William Empson (1906–1984) was a professor at Sheffield University,
a poet, and one of the finest literary critics of his time. Two of his best-
known books are Seven Types of Ambiguity and Some Versions of Pastoral.
Most people would agree with what Bradley, for example, implied, that the way
everybody calls Iago honest amounts to a criticism of the word—Shakespeare
means “a bluff forthright manner, and amusing talk, which get a man called
honest, may go with extreme dishonesty.” Or indeed that this is treated as
normal, and the satire is on our nature not on language. But they would
probably maintain that Iago is not honest and does not think himself so,
and only calls himself so as a lie or an irony. It seems to me, if you leave the
matter there, that there is much to be said for what Rymer decided, when the
implications of the hearty use had become simpler and more clear-cut—that
the play is ridiculous, because that sort of villain (silly-clever, full of secret
schemes, ignorant of people) is not mistaken for that sort of honest man. Tis,
if true, is of course a plain fault, whatever you think about “character-analysis.”
It is no use taking short cuts in these things, and I should fancy that what
Rymer said had a large truth when he said it, and also that Iago was a plausible
enough figure in his time. Te only main road into this baffling subject is to
find how the characters use the term themselves.
Both Iago and Othello oppose honesty to mere truth-telling:
Oth.: I know, Iago,
Ty honesty and love doth mince this matter,
Making it light to Cassio.
Iago: It were not for our quiet, nor your good,
Nor for my manhood, honesty, or wisdom
To let you know my thoughts.
No doubt the noun tends to be more old fashioned than the adjective, but
the old “honourable” sense is as broad and vague as the new slang one; it was
easy enough to be puzzled by the word. Iago means partly “faithful to friends,”
which would go with the Restoration use, but partly I think “chaste,” the version
normally used of women; what he has to say is improper. Certainly one cannot
simply treat his version of honest as the Restoration one—indeed, the part of the
snarling critic involves a rather puritanical view, at any rate towards other people.
It is the two notions of being ready to blow the gaff on other people and frank
to yourself about your own desires that seem to me crucial about Iago; they grow
Othello 180
on their own, independently of the hearty feeling that would normally humanise
them; though he can be a good companion as well.
One need not look for a clear sense when he toys with the word about Cassio;
the question is how it came to be so mystifying. But I think a queer kind of
honesty is maintained in Iago through all the puzzles he contrives; his emotions
are always expressed directly and it is only because they are clearly genuine that
he can mislead Othello as to their cause.
Oth.: Is he not honest? [Faithful etc.]
Iago: Honest, my lord? [Not stealing etc. Shocked.]
Oth.: Honest? Ay, honest. [“Why repeat? Te word is clear enough.”]
Iago: My lord, for aught I know. [“In some sense . . . .”]
For Michael Cassio
I dare be sworn I think that he is honest.
Oth.: I think so too.
Iago: Men should be what they seem,
Or those that be not, would they might seem none.
Oth.: Certain, men should be what they seem.
Iago: Why then, I think Cassio’s an honest man.
Te point of these riddles is to get “not hypocritical”—“frank about his own
nature” accepted as the relevant sense; Iago will readily call him honest on
that basis, and Othello cannot be reassured. “Chaste” (the sense normally
used of women) Cassio is not, but he is “not a hypocrite” about Bianca. Iago
indeed despises him for letting her make a fool of him in public; for that and
for other reasons (Cassio is young and without experience) Iago can put a
contemptuous tone into the word; the feeling is genuine but not the sense it
may imply. Tis gives room for a hint that Cassio has been “frank” to Iago in
private about more things than may honestly be told. I fancy too that the idea
of “not being men” gives an extra twist. Iago does not think Cassio manly nor
that it is specially manly to be chaste; this allows him to agree that Cassio
may be honest in the female sense about Desdemona and still keep a tone
which seems to deny it—if he is, after so much encouragement, he must be
“effeminate” (there is a strong idea of “manly” in honest and an irony on that
gives its opposite). Anyway, Iago can hide what reservations he makes but
show that he makes reservations: this suggests an embarrassed defence—
“Taking a broad view, with the world as it is, and Cassio my friend, I can
decently call him honest.” Tis forces home the Restoration idea—“an
honest dog of a fellow, straightforward about women,” and completes the
suspicion. It is a bad piece of writing unless you are keyed up for the shifts of
the word.
Othello in the Twentieth Century 181
Te play with the feminine version is doubtful here, but he certainly does it
the other way round about Desdemona, where it had more point: in the best case
it is for his own amusement when alone.
And what’s he then that says I play the villain,
When this advice is free I give and honest,
Probal to thinking, and indeed the course
To win the Moor again? For ’tis most easy
Te inclining Desdemona to subdue
In any honest suit. She framed as fruitful
As the free elements . . .
Easy, inclining, fruitful, free all push the word the same way, from “chaste” to
“flat, frank and natural”; all turn the ironical admission of her virtue into a
positive insult against her. Te delight in juggling with the word here is close
to the Machiavellian interest in plots for their own sake, which Iago could not
resist and allowed to destroy him. But a good deal of the “motive-hunting” of the
soliloquies must, I think, be seen as part of Iago’s “honesty”; he is quite open to
his own motives or preferences and interested to find out what they are.
Te clear cases where Iago thinks himself honest are at a good distance from
the Restoration use, they bring him into line with the series of sharp unromantic
critics like Jacques and Hamlet:
For I am nothing if not critical
he tells Desdemona to amuse her: his faults, he tells Othello, are due to an excess
of this truthful virtue—
I confess, it is my nature’s plague
To spy into abuses, and oft my virtue
Shapes faults that are not.
Tere seems no doubt that he believes this and thinks it creditable, whatever
policy made him say it here; indeed we know from the soliloquies it is true.
Now this kind of man is really very unlike the Restoration honest fellow, and
for myself I find it hard to combine them in one feeling about the word. But
in a great deal of Iago’s talk to Roderigo—“drown thyself! drown cats and blind
puppies . . . why, thou silly gentleman, I will never love thee after”—he is a wise
uncle, obviously honest in the cheerful sense, and for some time this is our main
impression of him. Perhaps the main connection between the two sorts of honest
men is in not being indulgent towards romantic love:
Othello 182
Oth.: I cannot speake enough of this content,
It stops me heere; it is too much of joye.
And this, and this, the greatest discords be,
Tat e’er our hearts shall make. (Kissing her.)
Iago: Oh you are well tun’d now;
But ile set down the peggs that make this Musicke,
As honeste as I am.
Te grammar may read “because I am so honest” as well as “though I am so
honest” and the irony may deny any resultant sense. He is ironical about the
suggestions in the patronising use, which he thinks are applied to him—“low-
class, and stupid, but good-natured.” But he feels himself really “honest” as the
kind of man who can see through nonsense; Othello’s affair is a passing lust
which has become a nuisance, and Iago can get it out of the way.
Te suggestion of “stupid” in a patronising version of honest (still clear in
“honest Tompson, my gardener,” a Victorian, if not a present-day, use) brings
it near to fool; there is a chance for these two rich words to overlap. Tough
there is an aspect of Iago in which he is the Restoration “honest fellow,” who
is good company because he blows the gaff, we see Iago like this mainly when
he makes sport for his betters; especially when he clowns in the second act to
amuse Desdemona, and she takes his real opinion of love and woman for a
piece of hearty and good-natured fun. Iago’s kind of honesty, he feels, is not
valued as it should be: there is much in Iago of the Clown in Revolt, and the
inevitable clown is almost washed out in this play to give him a free field. It
is not, I think, dangerously far-fetched to take almost all Shakespeare’s uses
of fool as metaphors from the clown, whose symbolism certainly rode his
imagination and was explained to the audience in most of his early plays. Now
Iago’s defence when Othello at last turns on him, among the rich ironies of its
claim to honesty, brings in both Fool and the Vice used in Hamlet as an old
name for the clown.
Iago: O wretched foole,
Tat lou’st to make thine Honesty, a Vice!
Oh monstrous world! Take note, take note (O World)
To be direct and honest, is not safe.
I thank you for this profit, and from hence
I’ll love no Friend, sith Love breeds such offence.
Oth.: Nay stay: thou should’st be honest.
Iago: I should be wise; for Honestie’s a Foole,
And loses that it works for.
Oth.: By the world,
I think my wife be honeste, and thinke she is not.
Othello in the Twentieth Century 183
What comes out here is Iago’s unwillingness to be the Fool he thinks he is taken
for; but it is dramatic irony as well, and that comes back to his notion of honest;
he is fooled by the way his plans run away with him; he fails in knowledge of
others and perhaps even of his own desires.
Othello swears by the world because what Iago has said about being honest
in the world, suggesting what worldly people think, is what has made him
doubtful; yet the senses of honest are quite different—chastity and truth-telling.
Desdemona is called a supersubtle Venetian, and he may suspect she would agree
with what Iago treats as worldly wisdom; whereas it was her simplicity that made
her helpless; though again, the fatal step was her lie about the handkerchief.
Lou’st in the second line (Folios) seems to me better than liu’st (Quarto), as
making the frightened Iago bring in his main claim at once; the comma after
Honesty perhaps makes the sense “loves with the effect of making” rather than
“delights in making”; in any case loue appears a few lines down. Breeds could
suggest sexual love, as if Iago’s contempt for that has spread to his notions of
friendship; Othello’s marriage is what has spoilt their relations (Cassio “came a-
wooing with” Othello, as a social figure, and then got the lieutenantship). In the
same way Othello’s two uses of honest here jump from “loving towards friends,
which breeds honour” to (of women) “chaste.” It is important I think that the
feminine sense, which a later time felt to be quite distinct, is so deeply confused
here with the other ones.
It is not safe to be direct either way, to be honest in Othello’s sense or Iago’s.
Te sanctimonious metaphor profit might carry satire from Iago on Puritans or
show Iago to be like them. Iago is still telling a good deal of truth; the reasons
he gives have always made him despise those who are faithful to their masters,
if not to their friends. It is not clear that he would think himself a bad friend
to his real friends. He believes there is a gaff to blow about the ideal love affair,
though his evidence has had to be forced. Of course he is using honest less in his
own way than to impose on Othello, yet there is a real element of self-pity in
his complaint. It is no whitewashing of Iago—you may hate him the more for
it—but he feels he is now in danger because he has gone the “direct” way to work,
exposed false pretensions, and tried to be “frank” to himself about the whole
situation. I do not think this is an oversubtle treatment of his words; behind
his fear he is gloating over his cleverness, and seems to delight in the audience
provided by the stage.
In the nightmare scene where Othello clings to the word to justify himself he
comes near accepting Iago’s use of it.
Emil.: My Husband!
Oth.: Ay, ’twas he that told me first:
An honest man he is, and hates the slime
Tat sticks on filthy deeds . . . .
Othello 184
Emil.: My husband says that she was false?
Oth.: He, woman;
I say thy husband: dost understand the word?
My friend, thy husband, honest, honest Iago.
From the sound of the last line it seems as bitter and concentrated as the
previous question; to the audience it is. Yet Othello means no irony against
Iago, and it is hard to invent a reason for his repetition. He may feel it painful
that the coarse Iago, not Desdemona or Cassio, should be the only honest
creature, or Iago’s honesty may suggest the truth he told; or indeed you may
call this a trick on the audience, to wind up the irony to its highest before Iago
is exposed. Yet Iago would agree that one reason he was honest was that he
hated the slime. Te same slime would be produced, by Desdemona as well as
by Othello, one would hope, if the act of love were of the most rigidly faithful
character; the disgust in the metaphor is disgust at all sexuality. Iago, playing
“honest” as prude, is the rat who stands up for the ideal; once Othello agrees
he is finely cheated; Iago is left with his pleasures and Othello’s happiness is
destroyed. Iago has always despised his pleasures, always treated sex without
fuss, like the lavatory; it is by this that he manages to combine the “honest dog”
tone with honesty as Puritanism. Te twist of the irony here is that Othello
now feels humbled before such clarity. It is a purity he has failed to attain, and
he accepts it as a form of honour. Te hearty use and the horror of it are united
in this appalling line.
Te only later use comes when Othello’s sword is taken from him by the
State officer; a mark of disgrace, a symbol of cuckoldry; two possible negations
of honour and honesty.
Oth.: I am not valiant neither,
For every puny whipster gets my sword.
But why should honour outlive honesty?
Let it go all.
Tis question so sums up the play that it involves nearly all of both words; it
seems finally to shatter the concept whose connecting links the play has patiently
removed. Tere are ten other uses of honour. Four by Othello about himself,
three by others about Othello, one by Othello about Desdemona, echoed once
ironically by Iago, one ironically from Iago about heroes in general. Te play has
made Othello the personification of honour; if honour does not survive some test
of the idea nor could Othello. And to him honest is “honourable,” from which
it was derived; a test of one is a test of the other. Outlive Desdemona’s chastity,
which he now admits, outlive Desdemona herself, the personification of chastity
(lying again, as he insisted, with her last breath), outlive decent behaviour in,
Othello in the Twentieth Century 185
public respect for, self-respect in, Othello—all these are honour, not honesty;
there is no question whether Othello outlives them. But they are not tests of
an idea; what has been tested is a special sense of honest. Iago has been the
personification of honesty, not merely to Othello but to his world; why should
honour, the father of the word, live on and talk out itself; honesty, that obscure
bundle of assumptions, the play has destroyed. I can see no other way to explain
the force of the question here.
Tere is very little for anybody to add to A. C. Bradley’s magnificent analysis,
but one can maintain that Shakespeare, and the audience he had, and the
audience he wanted, saw the thing in rather different proportions. Many of the
audience were old soldiers disbanded without pension; they would dislike Cassio
as the new type of officer, the boy who can displace men of experience merely
because he knows enough mathematics to work the new guns. Te play plays into
their hands by making Cassio a young fool who can’t keep his mistress in order
and can’t drink. Iago gets a long start at the beginning of the play, where he is
enchantingly amusing and may be in the right. I am not trying to deny that by
the end of the first act he is obviously the villain, and that by the end of the play
we are meant to feel the mystery of his life as Othello did—
Will you, I pray, demand that demi-devil
Why he hath thus ensnared my soul and body?
Shakespeare can now speak his mind about Iago through the conventional final
speech by the highest in rank:
O Spartan dog,
More fell than anguish, hunger, or the sea.
Verbal analysis is not going to weaken the main shape of the thing. But even in
this resounding condemnation the dog is not simple. Te typical Shakespearean
dogmen are Apemantus and Tersites (called “dog” by Homer), malign underdogs,
snarling critics, who yet are satisfactory as clowns and carry something of the claim
of the disappointed idealist; on the other hand, if there is an obscure prophecy
in the treatment of honest, surely the “honest dog” of the Restoration may cast
something of his shadow before. Wyndham Lewis’ interesting treatment of Iago
as “fox” leaves out both these dogs, though the dog is more relevant than the fox
on his analogy of tragedy to bull-baiting; indeed the clash of the two dogs goes
to the root of Iago. But the dog symbolism is a mere incident, like that of fool; the
thought is carried on honest, and I throw in the others only not to over-simplify
the thing. Nor are they used to keep Iago from being a simple villain; the point
is that more force was needed to make Shakespeare’s audience hate Iago than to
make the obviously intolerable Macbeth into a tragic hero.
Othello 186
Tere seems a linguistic difference between what Shakespeare meant by
Iago and what the nineteenth century critics saw in him. Tey took him as an
abstract term “Evil”; he is a critique on an unconscious pun. Tis is seen more
clearly in their own personification of their abstract word; e.g. Te Turn of Te
Screw and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Henry James got a great triumph over some
critics who said his villains were sexual perverts (if the story meant anything they
could hardly be anything else). He said “Ah, you have been letting yourself have
fancies about Evil; I kept it right out of my mind.” Tat indeed is what the story
is about. Stevenson rightly made clear that Dr. Jekyll is about hypocrisy. You can
only consider Evil as all things that destroy the good life; this has no unity; for
instance, Hyde could not be both the miser and the spendthrift and whichever
he was would destroy Jekyll without further accident. Evil here is merely the
daydream of a respectable man, and only left vague so that respectable readers
may equate it unshocked to their own daydreams. Iago may not be a “personality,”
but he is better than these; he is a product of a more actual interest in a word.
QQQ
1951—Harold C. Goddard.
“Othello,” from The Meaning of Shakespeare
Harold C. Goddard (1878–1950) was head of the English Department
at Swarthmore College. One of the most important twentieth-century
books on Shakespeare is his The Meaning of Shakespeare, published after
his death.
I
Hamlet is Shakespeare’s supreme interrogation, the culmination of his capacity
to ask questions of life. In Othello life begins to answer. Not that Hamlet contains
no answers, but they are not so much expressed as to be inferred. Othello speaks
more directly. In it the poet’s tragic genius moves from its negative to its positive
phase and tragedy recovers something of that pre-Euripidean state so eloquently
characterized by Nietzsche in his Birth of Tragedy. Romeo and Juliet, it is true, is
always the exception. It is like an overture to the later Tragedies and contains
hints and glimpses of what was to come in practically every one of them. But
if Juliet is the morning star, Desdemona is the dawn—another morn risen on
the mid-noon of Hamlet. With her, an almost unbroken line of beings begins to
enter the Shakespearean world, with power not so much to solve as to put out of
existence the problems which Hamlet propounded but to which Hamlet himself
had no answer but silence.
Othello in the Twentieth Century 187
Te psychological link between Hamlet and Othello is close. Te one grows out
of the other as naturally as the blossom from the bud. Te obvious tie between the
two is that both are plays of revenge. A far subtler and more intimate one is the
fact that the motifs of eavesdropping, of pouring poison in the ear (“I’ll pour this
pestilence into his ear”), and of the mousetrap—the sublimation of which from
the literal to the figurative had already gone far in the earlier play—are in the
later one carried to the psychological limit. Iago is a sort of super-eavesdropper.
His plot is the last word in traps. And the scene in the third act, where he pours
his vile story in the waking Othello’s ear—accounted by many the most dramatic
one in Shakespeare—makes the corresponding scene where Claudius murders
the sleeping King Hamlet, whether as narrated by the Ghost or re-enacted in the
dumb show, primitive in comparison. However, these metaphorical similarities
and echoes are merely the signs of a more deep-lying organic connection. And
here, again, dreams illuminate the poetic mind.
Te analogy has already been noted between the successive works of a poet
and the successive dreams of a dreamer. On this principle a character with a
double personality in an earlier work may appear as two characters in a later
one, as the promise of both Julius Caesar and Brutus, for example, may be
traced in the man who was, variously, Hal, Prince Henry, and King Henry V.
Te imaginative energy that created Hamlet did not cease functioning when
Hamlet himself expired. Tere could scarcely be a better example than the Prince
of Denmark of the divided, or, we might better say, the dividing man. With the
deep conflict within him of masculine and feminine traits, he is, as we noted, a
sort of unfulfilled promise of the Platonic man-woman. It is as if the tension
between these poles of his nature sought an equilibrium too unstable to be
maintained, so that, like a cell that bifurcates, Hamlet in the next world—that is,
in Othello—divides into Desdemona and Iago.
Te idea must of course not he taken too literally nor pressed too far,
but, within limits, it can be highly suggestive to those interested in psychic
relationships of this sort. (Tose who are not, or who consider them fanciful or
far-fetched, may ignore this one—the rest of the argument does not depend on
it.) Hamlet, it is generally admitted, is the most paradoxical mixture of good and
evil. Iago is close to pure evil; Desdemona close to pure good. Hamlet’s most
endearing traits—his ingenuousness, his modesty, his truthfulness, his freedom,
his courage, his love, his sympathetic imagination—are all Desdemona’s. His
darker and more detestable ones—his suspicion, his coarseness, his sarcastic wit,
his critical intellect, his callousness, his cruelty, his sensuality, his savage hatred,
his bloodiness, his revenge—are all Iago’s. Only in dramatic imagination is the
nobler Hamlet akin to Iago. But even there his final prostitution of that gift to
evil
1
ties him exactly to his counterpart who notoriously did the same. What
looked like an exception clinches the analogy. And the qualities of Hamlet
that neither Desdemona nor Iago inherits—his melancholy, his brooding, his
Othello 188
hesitancy, his hysteria—instead of confuting, confirm the contention: for these
are the result of the strife between his two selves, and when the two have been
split apart the strife naturally ceases. Te strife within Hamlet is replaced by the
strife between Iago and Desdemona (for the possession of Othello), or, if one
prefers, is replaced by the contrast between them, the strife in that case being
between Iago and that part of Othello that loves Desdemona and has faith
in her. Hamlet—not quite able to slough off his atavistic traits and step into
the future—divides into his components, one part going up with Desdemona,
another down with Iago. (Where still other parts go will be seen later.)
It is Othello and Cassio, standing between the extremes, who in a way
inherit and continue the divided nature of Hamlet. In fineness of impulse, in
tenderness, in trustfulness, in openness and freedom, both of them are much
like Desdemona. Shakespeare had to endow all three with these qualities to
make the machinations of Iago credible. If any one of them had been lacking in
faith, his plot would have been frustrated. So, in a sense, it is the triad, Othello-
Cassio-Desdemona, rather than just Desdemona, with whom Iago is thrown
into contrast. But Othello compared with Desdemona is vulnerable, and Cassio
compared with her is common clay. Teir weaknesses are Iago’s opportunity and
the source of the dramatic warfare.
II
And there is another bond between Hamlet and Othello—or more specifically
between the Prince of Denmark and Desdemona. Both dramas emerge from
a parent–child situation. Hamlet obeys his father. Desdemona disobeys hers.
And the more we figure the Father to ourselves as the symbol of Authority
and Force, the deeper the significance of the contrast becomes. Romeo, Hal,
Brutus, and Hamlet opposed to the Father’s will an energy that, viewing them
as a group, steadily mounted until in Hamlet a stage of near-equilibrium was
reached. Desdemona is the next term of the progression. She successfully defies
the Father. It is this seemingly trifling fact that makes Othello the turning point
of Shakespeare.
Brabantio may seem like a very diluted counterpart of the Ghost, and he
is as an emissary of revenge. But his function in the play is in a negative sense
the same. Like Capulet or like Portia’s father, he would impose his will on the
next generation. But Desdemona, unlike Hamlet, will not sacrifice her life or
happiness on the altar of Authority, however willing she is to sacrifice both on
the altar of Love. She stands for freedom, and her audacity in doing what she
thinks right in the face of her father’s opposition is sufficient answer to those
incredible readers who persist in thinking her weak. We are reminded by contrast
of Ophelia, in which case Brabantio falls into Polonius’ place, however unfair in
other respects the comparison may be. Desdemona is Ophelia choosing the other
fork of the road. She is an anti-Ophelia. All we have to ask is what would have
Othello in the Twentieth Century 189
happened in Hamlet if Hamlet had had her love. She never would have deserted
him in his critical hour. “Frailty, thy name is woman.” Desdemona is a living
contradiction of that indispensable premise of Hamlet’s philosophy and action.
In her presence his tragedy would have melted into thin air.
Te significance in the fact that it is a woman who thus refuses to ruin
her life by surrender to the Force of the Past—“the tyrant custom,” as Othello
calls it—cannot be exaggerated, for Desdemona, heralded indeed by Juliet,
is the first of a series of Shakespearean women, in tragedy at least, who defy
authority in this sense. Man after man has wrestled with this problem of force
in vain, for force is traditionally man’s method. Now, women begin to attack
it not in vain—not in vain, that is, from the tragic viewpoint. Te feminine
pole of Shakespeare’s genius is gaining ascendancy. “Shakespeare led a life of
allegory: his works are the comments on it.” Desdemona helps us understand
that alluring sentence.
III
Te audacity of Desdemona’s act is at least quadrupled by the fact that the man
she marries is a Moor. Which raises the old question:
Is Othello brown or black?
Te controversy over this problem has been a long and heated one. Its main
result has been to prove once more that learning is the least imaginative thing in
the world. Te argument has been in part textual: the marshaling on both sides
of every passage in the play that seems in any way pertinent to the question
of Othello’s color; in part historical and ethnological: an attempt to determine
whether Shakespeare could himself have been aware of the distinction between
Moor and Ethiopian. Two things at any rate are clear: (1) Iago’s statements
about Othello’s appearance cannot be taken at face value; (2) the word “black” is
used more than once in the play—even by Desdemona herself—as a synonym
for brunette in contrast with “fair” which, when put over against it, stands for
blonde. Tese considerations may or may not be deemed decisive. Te scholar
who is not convinced one way or the other can still keep his mind open. But the
actor and director in the case of a particular production must decide the question
once for all. On the stage Othello cannot be both brown and black at the same
time, and the decision, in certain places and circumstances, may be a critical one.
Te reader on the other hand is relatively free. He may visualize Othello more
or less to suit himself.
But turn from the world of drama to the world of poetry and we perceive that
all this misses the point and begs the question.
What attracted Shakespeare in the first place to this exotic story of a Moor,
this blood-and-thunder novella of Cinthio’s, so inferior in many ways to anything
else he ever used for tragedy? A futile question, it would seem, beyond the fact
that the tale had obvious theatrical qualities. Yet perhaps not so futile after all, for
Othello 190
in one respect we can answer it with almost as much assurance as if we actually
had access to Shakespeare’s mind.
Te moment he saw that first line, “Tere was once a Moor in Venice . . . ,” how
could he have failed to recall Te Jew of Venice, as the public had apparently insisted
on rechristening his own play laid in the same city? Te scene the same, the title
almost the same, and both stories centering around one alien in the midst of many
native Venetians! Nor did the analogy stop there. Everything in Te Merchant of
Venice turns on the contrast between inner and outer, depth and surface, on the
gilded that is mistaken for the golden, the precious that is hidden beneath the
base. But here, in Cinthio’s tale, is a hero with a dark skin caught in the toils of
a villain with a fair and honest exterior. Te casket theme exactly! the old story
over again—with its implicit tragedy now explicit—only with its material symbols
transmuted into the very stuff of human life, not gold and lead, but good and evil,
light and shadow, black and white. Othello and Iago must have been conceived
at the moment that that analogy struck the poet, one black without and white
within, the other white without and black within. And to these two a third was
inevitably added, Desdemona, white both without and within. Tese contrasts are
obviously the substance and essence of the play, penetrating far under any merely
ethnological or theatrical considerations to the heart of the imagination itself
2

and making even the symbolism of Te Merchant of Venice crude in comparison.
To the imagination, black, not brown, represents the shadow, evil, death. On the
level of poetry that settles it beyond appeal. Othello is black.
Tis contrast scheme of light and dark sets everything in perspective. In a
sense it predetermines the characterization.
I saw Othello’s visage in his mind,
says Desdemona, and instantly we are convinced that though the two are alien
in race they are akin in spirit. Troughout, she seems unconscious of his color
and under the influence of her love he too forgets it. Te symbolism demands
that Desdemona’s own visage, both without and within, be a shining white. And,
symbolism or no symbolism, that is exactly what Shakespeare makes it. Which
is why her role is beyond the reach of any actress. Innocence cannot be imitated.
Only some Desdemona-like woman from some region uncontaminated by
anything theatrical might be Desdemona momentarily on the stage, as a child
becomes what he plays.
Just the opposite is true of Iago. Only a consummate actor can render
him. I wonder if anyone ever has—ever has succeeded, I mean, in making him
convincingly “honest” not just to Othello, Cassio, and Desdemona, but even, in
its presence, to the audience that is in the secret. Tat would be the test. Tat
would make everything credible. Iago is a snake—but a snake under a flower.
On the surface he must not fascinate like a snake. He must charm like a flower.
Othello in the Twentieth Century 191
What wisdom he utters, and into what depravity it turns on his lips! Take his
metaphor of the garden: “Our bodies are our gardens, to the which our wills are
gardeners . . . . If the balance of our lives had not one scale of reason to poise
another of sensuality, the blood and baseness of our natures would conduct us
to most preposterous conclusions”—like the conclusion of this play! What is
that but Hamlet’s speech on blood and judgment translated, significantly, from
poetry into prose? But one was spoken to Horatio, the other to Roderigo. One
in profound affection, the other in murderous contempt. How diametrical ideas
become that are practically identical!
Iago keeps reminding us of Othello’s color just as Desdemona causes us to
forget it. To him Othello is “an old black ram,” or worse. He loses no opportunity
to keep him conscious of his supposed inferiority and he makes the most of the
unnatural character of his union with Desdemona. Te degree to which the ocher
characters are scandalized by the marriage is a measure of their own blindness
or depravity, or both. Brabantio is scandalized by it out of family pride: he wants
to marry his daughter to one of the “wealthy curled darlings of our nation.”
Roderigo, one of those very darlings, is scandalized by it because of envy: he
wants Desdemona for himself, and to him Othello is a “thick-lips.” Emilia refers
to the marriage as Desdemona’s “most filthy bargain.” (Te phrase reveals her
vulgar quality, but it was uttered under a tragic misunderstanding and on the
brink of incredible loyalty, so we forgive it.) Te Duke of Venice, on the other
hand, a man of character and insight, approves the match:
Noble signior,
If virtue no delighted beauty lack,
Your son-in-law is far more fair than black.
And as for Cassio, he seems scarcely more conscious of anything alien in Othello
than Desdemona herself. To the end, in spite of everything, Othello remains to
him just “dear general.”
Tese characters, it is interesting to note, all conform, if less extremely, to the
pattern of light and shade of the three main figures. Like those in Te Merchant
of Venice they are all one thing without, another within. Emilia: common clay
concealing a capacity for devotion almost divine. Roderigo: the fine young
gentleman rotten at the core. Bianca: the courtesan who falls in love. Brabantio:
the unrelenting father, who, nevertheless, dies of a broken heart. Cassio: the
profligate with a pure heart, the drunkard who comes through true as steel. All
this cannot be chance.
IV
Iago’s jealousy of Cassio is real enough, but it is the occasion rather than the
cause of his plot against Othello; and the other reasons he assigns for his hatred
Othello 192
in the course of the play are not so much motives as symptoms of a deeply
underlying condition. Te psychology of Iago is that of the slave-with-brains
who aspires to power yet remains at heart a slave.
We cannot all be masters, nor all masters
Cannot be truly follow’d.
“Some cogging cozening slave,” says Emilia, describing the as yet hypothetical
and unidentified villain who is actually her husband. “O cursed, cursed slave!”
cries Othello, at the end, to that part of himself that Iago had corrupted. We are
led to conjecture that some situation or event early in Iago’s life that produced
a profound sense of injustice or inferiority, and instigated a revolt against it,
could alone have produced so twisted a nature, as in the case of Emily Brontë’s
Heathcliff or Dostoevsky’s Smerdyakov, figures spiritually akin to Shakespeare’s
villain. It would be consumingly interesting to have a peep into Iago’s childhood,
as we have into theirs. It must have been full of power-fantasies like those that
Dostoevsky describes in A Raw Youth. “Te secret consciousness of power is
more insupportably delightful than open domination.” “I don’t know,” the Raw
Youth declares, “whether the spider perhaps does not hate the fly he has marked
and is snaring. Dear little fly! It seems to me that the victim is loved, or at least
may be loved. Here I love my enemy; I am delighted, for instance, that she is so
beautiful.” Compare this with Iago’s words on Desdemona:
Now, I do love her too;
Not out of absolute lust, though peradventure
I stand accountant for as great a sin,
But partly led to diet my revenge,
or his,
So will I turn her virtue into pitch,
And out of her own goodness make the net
Tat shall enmesh them all.
Iago is a spider whose web is spun out of his brain. (Tough that is by no means
all he is.) Whatever he began by being, however human the motives that at
first led him on, he ends by being an image of Death revenging itself on Life
through destruction. Why does a small boy knock down, in pure wantonness,
the tower of blocks his younger brother has so slowly and laboriously built up?
Iago is like that:
Othello in the Twentieth Century 193
If Cassio do remain,
He hath a daily beauty in his life
Tat makes me ugly.
Tese are the most consciously self-revealing words he speaks. Ugliness cannot
tolerate beauty. Death cannot tolerate life.
Tat that likes not me
Pleases me best.
If you are defeated, change the rules of the game, call defeat success (as if to get
the fewest runs in baseball were the object), and then you win! Drag down the
good—it is so much easier than rising. Define darkness as light.
Shakespeare’s archvillain had many Shakespearean forerunners: the melo-
dramatic Richard III, the casuistical Pandulph, the sly and crafty Ulysses. But
they all fade before him. He is perhaps the most terrific indictment of pure
intellect in the literature of the world—“pure intellect,” which, as Emerson
said, “is the pure devil.” “Tink, and die,” as Enobarbus puts it, though he
may not have realized all he was packing into three words. Te intellect, as all
the prophets have divined, should be the servant of the soul. Performing that
function it is indispensable. Tere can scarcely be too much of it. Indeed, the
primacy in the world of art of men like Beethoven, Michelangelo, and Shake-
speare himself is that their imaginations are held in check by their critical
power. But the moment the intellect sets up a claim of sovereignty for itself, it
is the slave in revolt, the torchbearer turned incendiary, Lucifer fallen. Iago is
a moral pyromaniac.
I wonder, if he had been of more limited intelligence, whether he might
not have been, literally, a pyromaniac. He exhibits a dozen traits of that type of
criminal, including a secret joy in being on the scene of the conflagration he has
kindled. Shakespeare himself hints as much in the speech in which, of all in the
play barring the soliloquies, Iago most fully reveals himself for what he is. It is
in the opening scene, while his plot, if conceived, is still unconscious. And he
is boasting to his dupe, Roderigo. He is off guard. But first we must recall the
conscious revelation that leads up to the unconscious one:
For when my outward action doth demonstrate
Te native act and figure of my heart
In compliment extern, ’tis not long after
But I will wear my heart upon my sleeve
For daws to peck at. I am not what I am.
Othello 194
How characteristic of Shakespeare that in his very next speech Iago should place
his heart squarely on his sleeve, and put into words, and still more into tone,
precisely what he is.
Rod.: What a full fortune does the thick-lips owe,
If he can carry’t thus!
Iago: Call up her father:
Rouse him, make after him, poison his delight,
Proclaim him in the streets, incense her kinsmen,
And, though he in a fertile climate dwell,
Plague him with flies; though that his joy be joy,
Yet throw such changes of vexation on ’t,
As it may lose some colour.
Rod.: Here is her father’s house; I’ll call aloud.
Iago: Do, with like timorous accent and dire yell
As when, by night and negligence, the fire
Is spied in populous cities.
Poison! Plague! Fire! Never again, unless to himself, do we hear Iago speak
with such gusto. Te bewildering shift in antecedents of the pronouns (“Rouse
him, make after him”), the first referring to Brabantio, the second to Othello,
is intentional on Shakespeare’s part, revealing in a flash that Iago’s hatred of
Othello is already an obsession. For these few seconds, before he puts on his
perpetual mask and cloak, Iago stands before us naked.
But if he is a moral pyromaniac, it is only morally that he is mad, and,
whatever may be said of the fires he kindles in others, the fire in his own veins is
an icy fire. “Now could I drink hot blood,” cried Hamlet. Iago goes fathoms lower
than that. “For I am nothing if not critical,” he observes calmly, as he scrutinizes
Desdemona’s beauty on the threshold of her destruction; and as he begins to
weave the web that is to enmesh her, he cries:
By the mass, ’tis morning;
Pleasure and action make the hours seem short.
Hot revenge is a fearful thing. But its devastation has bounds, because
its passion reveals its secret, makes it act prematurely, mars its aim, and soon
burns it out. Cold revenge is incredibly more awful. For it can conceal, it can
calculate, it can lie in wait; it can control itself, it can coil and strike without
warning at the crucial moment. Cold revenge is the union of intellect and
hate—the most annihilating of all alliances. Dante was right in making his
nethermost hell of ice.
Othello in the Twentieth Century 195
V
Te deliberate placing of the highest intellectual gifts and achievements at the
service of the lowest human instincts is a phenomenon with which the twentieth
century is acquainted on a scale never previously attained. And whether the
instinct be fear (the main defensive one) or revenge, greed, cruelty, thirst to possess
more power or to assert power already possessed (the main offensive ones) makes
little difference in the end, so readily do they pass into one another.
It is no recent discovery that brain as well as brawn is essential to the
efficient fighter. Te Trojan Horse is the perennial symbol of that truth, and it
is appropriate that Shakespeare put on the lips of Ulysses an encomium on the
“still and mental parts” of war. But it remained for war in our time to effect the
total mobilization of those still and mental parts. Te ideological warfare that
precedes and precipitates the physical conflict (cold war as it has significantly
come to be called); the propaganda that prepares and unifies public opinion;
the conscription, in a dozen spheres, of the nation’s brains; the organization of
what is revealingly known as the intelligence service; but most of all the practical
absorption of science into the military effort: these things, apart from the
knowledge and skill required for the actual fighting, permit us to define modern
war, once it is begun, as an unreserved dedication of the human intellect to death
and destruction.
But that is exactly what Iago is—an unreserved dedication of intellect to
death and destruction. To the extent that this is true, Iago is an incarnation of
the spirit of modern war.
Tis does not mean that those who participate in modern war are Iagos.
Te scientist calmly conducting his experiment in a clean laboratory without
an iota of hate in his heart bears no resemblance to Shakespeare’s Italian fiend.
But there may be hate, and there will almost certainly be fear, in the heart of the
man who months later and thousands of miles away utilizes the results of that
experiment on the fighting front (not to imply for a moment that there may not
be heroism in it also). Nobody wants war. No individual does, that is, or very
few. But that great Composite Personality which is the nation is driven into it
nevertheless against the wishes of the thousands of individuals who make it up.
It is within that Personality, not generally within the individual, that the union
of intellect with animal instincts takes place, the prostitution especially of man’s
supreme intellectual achievement, modern science, to the most destructive of his
ancestral practices. It is something within this Composite Personality that is like
Iago, and, like him, it did not foresee when it set out to make war efficient that
it was playing with the possibility of its own extinction. Te uniqueness of Iago,
like the uniqueness of modern war, does not lie in the spirit of destruction. Tat
has always been common enough. It lies in the genius he dedicates to destructive
ends. Modern war would not recognize itself in the portraits of Shakespeare’s
Othello 196
classical and feudal fighters, in Hector and Hotspur, in Faulconbridge and
Coriolanus, or in Othello himself. But let it look in the glass and it will behold
Iago. In him Shakespeare reveals, with the clarity of nightmare, that unrestrained
intellect, instead of being the opposite of force, and an antidote for it, as much of
the modern world thinks, is force functioning on another plane. It is the immoral
equivalent of war, and as certain to lead to it in due season as Iago’s machinations
were to lead to death. “All other knowledge is hurtful,” says Montaigne, “to him
who has not the science of honesty and goodness.”
VI
To those who forget Emerson’s wise observation that “perpetual modernness
is the measure of merit in any work of art” all this will be an unpardonable
digression from the play. To them it will be allegorizing Othello, reading into it
what could never have entered Shakespeare’s head. On the contrary, it is in this
case demonstrable from the text that Shakespeare definitely intended precisely
this equation between Iago and War, though, naturally, he could not have
foreseen how the changes in the conduct of war between his time and ours were
to sharpen and point the analogy. It is a perfect example of the nature of poetic
foresight as distinguished from the popular conception of prophecy.
Te opening of every one of Shakespeare’s greatest Tragedies, as certainly as
a Wagnerian overture, sounds the central theme or themes of the play. Othello,
taking its cue from Troilus and Cressida, begins with a contrast between the
physical and the mental parts of war. Iago, who is to prove himself such a master
of intrigue, is cursing Othello to Roderigo for preferring Cassio as his lieutenant,
with his “bookish theoric,” “mere prattle, without practice,” to himself with his
active service in the field. However little we may suspect his sincerity at a first
reading, the subject of his introductory speech portends a play in some sense
about war as infallibly as their respective openings indicate that Hamlet will
concern itself with ghosts, Macbeth with the nature of evil, and King Lear with
the relations of the generations.
I doubt whether many people think of Othello as a play about war. But it is,
even literally. Tree of its four main characters are warriors. And the fourth is a
warrior’s wife, herself referred to by her husband at the climax of his joy as “my
fair warrior.” Even Cassio, whom Iago so despised, was considered worthy by
the home government of taking Othello’s place in Cyprus. Furthermore, the war
between the Venetians and the Turks, which is the background and occasion of
the action, is as indispensable to the plot and the “moral” as the feud between the
Capulets and the Montagues is to Romeo and Juliet. It is obvious in the earlier
case that if you drop out the feud the play falls to pieces. It is not so obvious, but
it is just as true, that if you drop out the war from Othello it falls to pieces. Te
more closely one examines the analogy between the two plays in this respect the
more impressive it becomes.
Othello in the Twentieth Century 197
War is the royal occupation. Othello is a follower and master of it. Yet, before
the play is over, “Othello’s occupation’s gone.” Why and how it went it is vital for
us to see, for in these days war is the world’s occupation.
Te Turk in this play, until he disappears beneath the waves, is consistently
represented as the Enemy. At the beginning, his fleet is reported as bearing down
on Cyprus, then on Rhodes, then again on Cyprus. Te Venetians set out to head
him off—or to be on hand when he appears. A terrific storm arises. Te Turks are
all drowned. Te Venetians arrive safe in Cyprus.
All this at first sight seems of no intrinsic interest. It is mere machinery,
mere scenery against which the domestic drama is to be enacted. Unless we are
on guard, we skip it mentally in the reading. But we do so at our peril, for the
“scenery” in Shakespearean tragedy is part of the action, and never more so, not
even in King Lear, than here. “Be what cannot be skipped.” Te war in Othello
conforms to that Emersonian injunction.
Reread the play with sharp attention to the parts in which war figures,
pondering particularly every allusion to the Turks—there are many of them—
and it is inescapable that what Shakespeare is bent on is an insinuation into
the underconsciousness of the reader of an analogy between Iago and the
Turk. Indeed, in one passage Iago openly makes the identification himself.
Desdemona has dubbed him “slanderer” for his strictures upon women. “Nay,
it is true,” retorts Iago, “or else I am a Turk.” But it is not true. And so he is
a Turk.
Te end crowns the whole, and Othello confirms the capital nature of the
analogy in those last words that set the seal on his lips and create the metaphor
he acts out in death:
And say besides, that in Aleppo once,
Where a malignant and a turban’d Turk
Beat a Venetian and traduc’d the state,
I took by the throat the circumcised dog,
And smote him—thus.
Whereupon he stabs himself, as if he would reach down with his dagger to that
Turk-Iago within himself that enabled the other Iago to beat and traduce him.
Te speech in which the analogy is fast set up is one of those seemingly
casual, unnecessarily digressive ones that a stage director can be counted on to
abbreviate or cut out. As we have repeatedly noticed, it is into such passages,
when attention is suspended, that Shakespeare loves to insert his most valuable
clues. So here. A sailor enters and announces that the Turkish preparation makes
for Rhodes. Incredible, says a Senator, that they should not take Cyprus first,
which is both easier to capture and more useful to them. Te expedition to
Rhodes must be a blind.
Othello 198
First Sen.: Tis cannot be,
By no assay of reason; ’tis a pageant,
To keep us in false gaze. When we consider
Te importancy of Cyprus to the Turk,
And let ourselves again but understand
Tat, as it more concerns the Turk than Rhodes,
So may he with more facile question bear it,
For that it stands not in such warlike brace,
But altogether lacks the abilities
Tat Rhodes is dress’d in; if we make thought of this,
We must not think the Turk is so unskilful
To leave that latest which concerns him first,
Neglecting an attempt of ease and gain
To wake and wage a danger profitless.
It would be prosaic to put the analogy on all fours. But who can miss it?
Te Turk is apparently taking one course that under cover of it he may take an
entirely different one. Iago is about to do the same. “A pageant To keep us in false
gaze.” What better description could we ask of his plot? And the last four lines of
the passage quoted—do they not fit Iago as well as they do the Turk? Indeed we
are almost tempted to go on and seek analogies for Cyprus and Rhodes in Iago’s
story. But that would be to force what is thrown out as a suggestion rather than
intended for an exact comparison. What is beyond doubt is that the passage is
prophetic of the plot against Othello, and, in the light of the doom that overcame
the Turks, of its ultimate spiritual defeat and of Iago’s submergence under the
waves of a final silence.
With this hint, the storm scene at the beginning of Act II takes on
undreamed-of meanings.
When, following the tempest that has imperiled them all and engulfed the
Turks, Othello at last arrives in Cyprus, he is shaken to the depths of his nature
by the experience of stepping, as it were, from the embrace of death to the
embrace of Desdemona. Te piercing beauty of the words he speaks to her is
stamped with that individual quality which Shakespeare somehow imparts to the
speech of all his lovers, revealing his belief that every true love between man and
woman is unique. “O my fair warrior!”—note the word, for it is Shakespeare’s as
well as Othello’s—the Moor exclaims, as he catches sight of his wife. “My dear
Othello!” she replies. And, as he takes her in his arms, he goes on:
It gives me wonder great as my content
To see you here before me. O my soul’s joy!
If after every tempest come such calms,
May the winds blow till they have waken’d death!
Othello in the Twentieth Century 199
And let the labouring bark climb hills of seas
Olympus-high, and duck again as low
As hell’s from heaven! If it were now to die,
’Twere now to be most happy; for, I fear,
My soul hath her content so absolute
Tat not another comfort like to this
Succeeds in unknown fate.
At a first reading we enter into Othello’s wonder and joy, a content so absolute
that we, like him, cannot imagine it augmented; and we feel that undertone of
sadness that accompanies all supreme felicity and beauty—enhanced in this
instance by our knowledge of the plot against them. When, however, having
finished the play, we reread these lines, we suddenly realize that Othello has
prayed in them for exactly what the future was to bring him: a storm as much
more terrific than the tumult of wind and wave through which he has just passed
as the ocean of human emotion is more treacherous than any Mediterranean—a
storm whose crest and trough should literally touch heaven and hell.
Wash me in steep-down gulfs of liquid fire!
he was to pray later, when the full fury of that storm burst on him. But little, now,
does he envisage any such tragic answer to his prayer, and, having uttered it, he
kisses Desdemona and exclaims contradictorily:
And this, and this, the greatest discords be
Tat e’er our hearts shall make!
Whereupon Turk-Iago mutters to himself,
O, you are well tuned now!
But I’ll set down the pegs that make this music,
As honest as I am.
To this unoverheard diabolic comment on the situation, Othello, utterly forget-
ting his prayer of the instant before for a vaster war of the elements, unwittingly
replies:
Our wars are done, the Turks are drown’d.
. . . I prithee, good Iago . . . .
Tis, to put it mildly, is premature. Tere is one war that is not done, one Turk
that is not drowned, though he is destined before long to go down in a tempest
Othello 200
of his own raising. Prayers are always answered, but not always in the way or in
the sense that we intend.
Tus does Shakespeare tie Iago with the Turk—and so with the Enemy, and
so with War. Te connection is too often reiterated to be coincidence. It is too
clearly contrived to be unconscious. It is plainly intentional.
So much for the first two readings of this scene. (To something else in it to be
discovered only by a third or later reading I will return before I am done.)
VII
Desdemona is one of those touchstones in which Shakespeare’s plays abound.
Ask a group of people whether Desdemona is a weak or a strong character, and
they characterize themselves by their answers. Tere are those who would dilute
her away into a foolish and timid girl who makes a precipitate and unfortunate
misalliance with a foreigner much older than herself. Tat is to pay scant
attention to the picture Shakespeare gives of her as she was before the shadow
of tragedy touched her, the girl her father referred to as “perfection.” She was
nearer perfection than he suspected. He never dreamed what audacity there
was under her quietness and stillness. Desdemona was not absorbed merely in
household duties. She loved company, could be witty, could dance, play, and sing.
But her world was not bounded by these things either, and if she could do fine
needlework, be sure she could dream over it too. As her response to Othello’s
tales of his adventures shows, she was in love with danger. It takes your shy ones
to be bold. And when she says, as he reports,
she wish’d
Tat heaven had made her such a man,
whatever she meant by it and however Othello took it, Shakespeare plainly
contrived that Delphic line as a preparation for Othello’s own “O my fair
warrior!” Tere was a boy within this girl, a man’s courage at the heart of
this maiden whose very motion blushed at herself. Desdemona is merely
an extreme example of that union of feminine and masculine qualities that
Shakespeare plainly held essential for either the perfect man or the perfect
woman.
It is extraordinary (and especially to be noted for future reference) that
Iago gives the best full-length description of Desdemona in the play. In the
interlude at Cyprus before Othello’s entrance after the storm, Desdemona
asks Iago how he would praise a woman so deserving that malice itself would
have to admit her merit. Malice itself of course is Iago and the deserving
woman Desdemona. She naturally does not recognize either of these facts;
he recognizes them both. And this is his description of the ideal woman he
knows her to be:
Othello in the Twentieth Century 201
She that was ever fair and never proud,
Had tongue at will and yet was never loud,
Never lack’d gold and yet went never gay,
Fled from her wish and yet said, “Now I may,”
She that being anger’d, her revenge being nigh,
Bade her wrong stay and her displeasure fly,
She that in wisdom never was so frail
To change the cod’s head for the salmon’s tail,
She that could think and ne’er disclose her mind,
See suitors following and not look behind,
She was a wight, if ever such wight were,—
and as Iago pauses, Desdemona asks, as he hoped she would, “To do what?”
To suckle fools and chronicle small beer.
O most lame and impotent conclusion!
she exclaims, never guessing what Iago has been up to. His picture reveals with
what completeness he can appraise both truth and beauty, and then revert—as
he does the next second in an aside, “with as little a web as this will I ensnare as
great a fly as Cassio”—to the spider. Desdemona may be evaluated, she will never
be caught—in either sense—by the intellect.
“At some thoughts,” says Dostoevsky, “one stands perplexed, especially at the
sight of men’s sin, and wonders whether one should use force or humble love.
Always decide to use humble love. If you resolve on that once for all, you may
subdue the whole world. Loving humility is marvelously strong, the strongest of
all things and there is nothing else like it.” It would be impertinent to say that
Desdemona believed that. She was it—and it is superfluous to believe what we
are. Desdemona a strong or weak character? Under her spell, one is tempted to
assert that she is the strongest character in all Shakespeare. Who can contend
with her for that eminence? Only the transformed Cordelia. But Desdemona did
not have to be transformed. While blows, physical, mental, and spiritual, rained
on her head, she held to her faith in goodness and to the end helped answer her
own prayer:
Heaven me such uses send,
Not to pick bad from bad, but by bad mend.
“O my fair warrior!” Othello was right. “Te divine Desdemona.” Cassio did not
exaggerate.
And it is precisely one of her divinest acts that, curiously, is most often
set down to her discredit: the dropping of the handkerchief. “Tat is a fault,”
Othello 202
says Othello in the next scene, when he asks his wife to lend him the hand-
kerchief and she cannot produce it, and many readers agree that it was a fault, not
noticing that Shakespeare has been careful to show that, so far as Desdemona
is concerned, the loss of the handkerchief was not only not a fault, but actually
a virtue of an angelic order. Indeed, there is a sense in which Desdemona tells
no lie when she denies that the handkerchief is lost. Tings are lost through
carelessness or genuine accident—and the dropping of the handkerchief
came about through neither of these. Te truth, as contrasted with the fact,
of the matter is that neither Desdemona, nor accident, nor Fate, dropped the
handkerchief. Othello dropped it.
Des.: How now, my dear Othello!
Your dinner, and the generous islanders
By you invited, do attend your presence.
Oth.: I am to blame.
Des.: Why do you speak so faintly?
Are you not well?
Oth.: I have a pain upon my forehead here.
Des.: Faith, that’s with watching; ’twill away again:
Let me but bind it hard, within this hour
It will be well.
Oth.: Your napkin is too little:
Let it alone. Come, I’ll go in with you.
Des.: I am very sorry that you are not well.
And Othello and Desdemona go out as Emilia picks up the handkerchief.
It is vital here to visualize what has happened. Te stage business is left to
the actors and director, but surely there is only one right way of arranging it.
Othello, his mind full of the terrible doubts Iago has poured into it, explains his
embarrassed manner and faint voice as due to headache, as, indeed, they may
well be. Desdemona takes out her handkerchief and starts to bind his forehead.
At the moment, he cannot bear this act of affection with its physical contact
from the woman he has begun to doubt, and with a gesture of impatience—“Let
it alone”—he pushes her hand away, causing the handkerchief to drop, the “it,”
of course, referring not to the handkerchief, as it is often taken to, but to the
forehead. Now if Desdemona had loved Othello less, had been less genuinely
pained by his pain, or had valued a mere token of love above love itself, she
would naturally have noticed the fall of the handkerchief and would, however
unconsciously, have stooped and picked it up. But every fiber of her soul and
body, conscious and unconscious, is so totally devoted to Othello that the
handkerchief for the moment ceases to exist. Te slightest deflection of her eye
Othello in the Twentieth Century 203
in its direction as it dropped would have been a subtraction from the infinity
of her love—just as the movement of Othello’s hand when he pushed her hand
away measured his distrust of that love, gave the villain his unique opportunity,
and sealed his own doom forever. Is there anything in all the drama of the world,
I wonder, to equal this in its own kind? Te moment when Romeo thrust his
rapier between Tybalt and Mercutio is similar. But that was a rapier, the moment
was patently critical, and the act, however impulsive, was a conscious one. Tis,
on the other hand, is only a handkerchief, the situation the most ordinary, and
the act one that almost anybody might be guilty of any day in his life. “Trifles
light as air.” Was there ever a better demonstration that everything may depend
on anything? “Who can control his fate?” asks Othello when it is too late. And
there have been those who think that Shakespeare is asking the same question.
But in that case he is answering: Othello for one could have controlled his—and
Romeo for another—if, like Desdemona’s and Juliet’s, their bounty had been as
boundless as the sea, their love as deep. Tis is not fate. Tis is freedom.
But if the hero foredooms himself by causing the handkerchief to drop, the
villain does as much for himself just twenty-seven lines further on when he
snatches the handkerchief from his wife’s hand. Emilia, as the event proves, was
Iago’s oversight. “It is in just such stupid things,” says Dostoevsky (without any
allusion to Othello of course), “that clever people are most easily caught. Te more
cunning a man is the less he suspects that he will be caught in a simple thing.”
But long before his wife turns the handkerchief against him, Iago uses it with
bloody effect on Othello. When, on top of his account of Cassio’s revelation in
his sleep, he tells him that that very day he saw Cassio wipe his beard with it,
Othello is finally convinced:
Now do I see ’tis true. Look here, Iago;
All my fond love thus do I blow to heaven.
’Tis gone.
Arise, black vengeance, from the hollow hell!
Yield up, O love, thy crown and hearted throne
To tyrannous hate! Swell, bosom, with thy fraught,
For ’tis of aspics’ tongues! . . .
O, blood, blood, blood!
In the next scene where Othello demands the handkerchief and Desdemona
persists in turning the subject back to Cassio—“the handkerchief,” “Cassio”;
“the handkerchief,” “Cassio”—she is generally blamed, first, for lying, and,
second, for an utterly unforgivable lack of sense and tact. But it is Othello,
not Desdemona, who really lies about the handkerchief in this scene! For the
express, if not conscious, purpose of frightening his wife, he invents a fabulous
Othello 204
story of the handkerchief ’s origin and magical properties, the falsity of which
Shakespeare is careful to bring out by having him give a true account of it at the
end of the play. Desdemona is naturally awed, and like a scared child evades her
husband’s questions. Her “guilt” is venial compared with his. And it is precisely
her utter innocence that permits her insistence about Cassio. A guilty woman
would have sensed at once that she must keep clear of so dangerous a subject.
But to Desdemona a chance to help another is a command to do so instantly
and utterly. Truth and compassion are rare. Tact and worldliness are common.
Only those who think that the transformation of a childlike and loving woman
into a discreet and worldly one is a moral ascent can wish that Desdemona had
acted otherwise than she did in this distressing scene. If she exhibits a deficiency
of common sense, she shows an abundance of a sense utterly uncommon. If it
had been a younger daughter entreating a father to forgive an older sister who
had fallen out of his favor, and not allowing herself to be put off, we would have
nothing but admiration for her. We should have nothing but admiration for
Desdemona’s persistence in behalf of Cassio.
Desdemona’s “lie” about the handkerchief is not the only one that is charged
against her. Tere is also what is generally known as her dying lie in the last
words that she speaks:
Emil.: O, who hath done this deed?
Des.: Nobody; I myself. Farewell!
Commend me to my kind lord. O, farewell!
“Truth sits upon the lips of dying men.” Dostoevsky thought it worth while to
write a novel of a thousand pages to bring home the truth that sat upon the lips
of the dying Desdemona. Te central doctrine of Father Zossima in Te Brothers
Karamazov is that each is “to blame for everyone and for all things.” Te plot of
the novel was conceived to illustrate and prove that paradox. Tere is hardly one
of its pages that has no bearing on it. Desdemona expressed it more briefly: “I
myself.” Into those two words she put the whole mystery of the atonement. And
this is what the world chooses to call a lie.
VIII
If, so far, we have said more about Desdemona and Iago than about the one
who gives the title to the play, it is because he cannot be understood without
first understanding them. Tey are the poles between which he moves. At the
opening of the story, before Iago begins to enmesh him, he seems as simple and
noble as Desdemona herself, and, however black without, is rightly described
as white within, made so partly by her love. But when the poison begins to
work, when that simplicity and nobility begin to be contaminated, then Othello
becomes an alternation of mighty opposites, not gray, but black-and-white—the
Othello in the Twentieth Century 205
poet-barbarian, the hero-murderer, the paragon of self-control gone mad, the
harmonious nature to whom chaos comes again. Taking the whole play into
account, he is equally susceptible, almost, to the influence of Desdemona and to
that of Iago. First Desdemona wins him; then Iago; then Desdemona, dead, wins
him back. Tere is the plot reduced to a dozen words. Tough he kills her, she
saves him. Perhaps that is Shakespeare’s unconscious prophecy of the destiny of
a mankind that in so many ways resembles Othello.
Tere is no other among his supreme plays against the plot and the psychology
of which so many objections have been brought as against Othello, and they are
leveled primarily against the conduct of its hero. Te improbabilities of King
Lear are another and more venial matter because of its remote and semimythical
setting and atmosphere. Othello is domestic, it is said, and should submit to more
exacting tests. A real Othello would have gone to his wife for an explanation.
(And, incidentally, a real Desdemona would have found a chance to explain.)
In answer, his defenders are compelled to plead his age, his brief acquaintance
with his wife, his ignorance of Venetian society and consequent self-distrust and
willingness to accept Iago’s account of its habits.
Tis much is true at any rate: Othello regarded Desdemona’s love for him
as a dream too beautiful to be true. Hence, when it is suggested to him that it
is not true, this is in a sense nothing but what he has been ready to believe all
along. What wonder that it is easy for him to dismiss his happiness as an illusion!
“Desdemona love me! Impossible!” When we waken from a dream we do not go
about searching for material evidence that it was not a dream after all. Neither
does Othello. It is the best things in him, his love, his imagination, his lack of
suspicion, his modesty, that give Iago his chance. But such considerations will
not silence the doubters. Apparently only some parallel incident from real life
would convince them that a man of Othello’s temperament could act as Othello
is represented as acting in this play. Such an incident, it would seem, would be
rather difficult to produce. And yet, strangely, it can be produced. Under the title
of A Practical Joke, Dostoevsky’s wife relates a domestic incident which occurred
in the spring of 1876. If it had been expressly written to prove, a fortiori, the
truth of the psychology of Othello, it could scarcely have been improved, as
anyone who reads it will be bound to agree. It runs as follows:
On 18th May, 1876, an incident took place which I recall almost
with terror. Tis is how it happened. A new novel by Mme. Sophie
Smirnov entitled Te Strong Character was running as a serial then in
Te Otechestvennya Zapiski. Fiodor was on friendly terms with Sophie
Smirnov and valued her talent very highly. He was interested in her
latest work, and asked me to get him the numbers of the monthly
as they appeared. I chose those few days, when my husband had a
rest from his work on Te Journal of an Author, and brought him the
Òthcllo 206
numbcrs ol Te Otechestvennya Zapiski. 8ut as journals arc lcnt by thc
librarics only lor two or thrcc days, ! urgcd my husband to rcad thc
journal quickly so as to avoid paying a finc at thc library. So it was also
with thc April numbcr. Fiodor rcad thc novcl and spokc to mc ol how
our dcar Sophic (whom !, too, valucd vcry highly) had succccdcd in
crcating a ccrtain malc charactcr in thc novcl. Tat cvcning my husband
wcnt out to somc gathcring, and altcr sccing thc childrcn to bcd, !
bcgan rcading thc novcl. !n it, by thc way, was publishcd an anonymous
lcttcr, scnt by thc villain to thc hcro, which ran as lollows:
“Ðcar Sir, Noblcst Pctcr !vanovich,
As ! am a pcrlcct strangcr to you, but takc an intcrcst in your
lcclings, ! vcnturc to addrcss thcsc lincs to you. Your nobility is
sufficicntly wcllknown to mc, and my hcart is paincd at thc idca,
that dcspitc all your nobility, a ccrtain pcrson, who is vcry closc
to you, is so bascly dccciving you. Having gonc away with your
blcssing to a placc lour hundrcd milcs off, shc, likc a dclightcd
dovc sprcading its wings and soaring upwards, has no mind to
rcturn to thc marital homc. You havc lct hcr go to your own as wcll
as to hcr ruin, into thc claws ol a man who tcrrifics hcr, but who
lascinatcs hcr by his flattcring addrcsscs. Hc has stolcn hcr hcart,
and thcrc arc no cycs morc bcautilul to hcr than his. ¡vcn hcr
littlc childrcn arc loathsomc to hcr, il shc gcts no loving word lrom
him. !l you want to know who this lcllow thc villain is, ! must not
rcvcal his namc, but look lor yourscll among thosc who lrcqucnt
your housc, and bcwarc ol dark mcn. Vhcn you scc thc dark man,
who lovcs haunting your doors, havc a good look at him. !t is now
a long timc sincc that lcllow has crosscd your path, and you arc thc
only onc who docs not noticc it.
Nothing but your nobility compcls mc to rcvcal this sccrct
to you. And il you don’t trust mc, thcn havc a look at thc lockct
which your wilc wcars round hcr ncck, and scc whosc portrait shc
wcars in that lockct ncar hcr hcart.
vouv vvvv uxxxowx wviiwisnvv.”
! must say hcrc that latcly ! had bccn in thc bcst ol moods, my husband
had had no cpilcptic fits lor a long timc, our childrcn wcrc pcrlcctly
wcll, our dcbts wcrc gradually bcing paid, and thc succcss ol Te Journal
of an Author was markcd. All this strcngthcncd my charactcristic
chccrlulncss, and undcr thc influcncc ol thc anonymous lcttcr, just rcad,
a playlul idca flashcd across my mind—to copy that lcttcr (changing
thc namc and striking out ccrtain lincs) and to scnd it by post to
Othello in the Twentieth Century 207
Fiodor. It seemed to me that, as he had only yesterday read that letter
in Mme. Smirnov’s novel, he would guess at once that it was a joke,
and we should have some fun. Tere also occurred another idea to me,
that my husband might take the letter seriously. In that case I was
interested to see how he would regard it: whether he would show it to
me, or throw it away into the waste-paper basket. As usual with me, I
had no sooner thought of the idea than I put it into execution. At first
I wanted to write the letter in my own handwriting; but as I had been
copying for Fiodor every day, and my handwriting was too familiar to
him, I resolved to cover up my joke and began copying out the letter in
a rounder handwriting than mine. But it turned out to be a hard job,
and I spoilt several sheets before I managed to write the whole letter in
a uniform hand. Next morning I posted it, and in the afternoon it was
delivered to us together with other letters.
Tat day Fiodor was out later than usual, and returned only at five
o’clock and, not wanting to keep the children waiting for their dinner, he
just changed and came straight into the dining room, without looking
at his letters. Te dinner passed off merrily and noisily. Fiodor was in
a good mood; he talked a good deal and laughed, as he answered the
children’s questions. After dinner, with the usual cup of tea in his hand,
he went into his study. I went into the nursery, and in about ten minutes’
time I entered the study to see the effect which my anonymous letter
had produced.
I sat down in my usual seat by the writing table, and purposely
asked Fiodor something to which he had to give an answer. But he kept
a gloomy silence, and paced the room with heavy steps. I saw he was
upset, and instantly I felt sorry. To break the silence I asked him: “Why
are you so gloomy, Fedya?”
Fiodor gave me an angry look, walked across the room a couple of
times and came to a stop just facing me.
“You wear a locket?” he asked in a choking voice.
“I do.”
“Show it to me.”
“What for? You have seen it many times.”
“Show—me—the locket!” Fiodor shouted at the top of his voice.
I realised that my joke had gone too far, and in order to reassure him
I began undoing the collar of my dress. But I had no time to take the
locket out. Fiodor could not restrain the anger which had seized him.
He quickly rushed to me and caught my chain with all his strength. It
was a thin chain which he himself had bought for me in Venice. It broke
instantly, and the locket remained in my husband’s hand. He quickly
swept round the table and with his head bent down, he began opening
Othello 208
the locket. Not knowing where to press the spring, he fussed over it for
a long time. I saw how his hands trembled, and the locket nearly slipped
from them on to the table, I was very sorry for him and terribly angry
with myself. I began to speak in a friendly tone, and proposed to open
the locket for him; but Fiodor with an angry nod of his head refused my
help. At last my husband opened the locket and found there—on one
side the portrait of our little daughter, on the other—his own portrait.
He was absolutely confused, and kept on looking at the portrait in
silence.
“Well, now, have you found it?” I asked him. “Fedya, you silly, how
could you believe an anonymous letter?”
Fiodor instantly turned his face to me. “How do you know of the
letter?”
“How? I myself sent it you!”
“What do you mean; you sent it me? It is incredible!”
“I’ll prove it to you at once.”
I went to the other table on which lay the copy of Te
Otechestvennya Zapiski, and got out several sheets of paper, on which I
had practised my changed handwriting.
Fiodor raised his hands in astonishment. “And did you yourself
compose the letter?”
“Not at all. I simply copied it from Sophie’s novel. Surely you read
it yesterday? I thought you would guess at once.”
“Well, how could I remember! Anonymous letters are always in
that style. I simply can’t understand why you sent it me?”
“I just wanted to have a lark,” I explained.
“How could you play such a joke? I have been in anguish for the
last half hour.”
“How could I know that you would be such an Othello, and get
into such a rage without giving yourself time for a moment’s thought?”
“One does not think in such cases. Ah, well, it is clear that you
have never experienced real love and real jealousy.”
“As for real love, I experience it even now, and as for my not
knowing ‘real jealousy,’ it is your own fault. Why aren’t you unfaithful to
me?” I laughed, wishing to divert his mood. “Please, be unfaithful to me.
Even then I would be kinder than you are. I would not touch you, but I
would scratch out her eyes, the villainess . . . . ”
“Well, you are laughing, Anechka,” Fiodor began apologetically.
“But think what a misfortune might have happened: indeed, in my
anger I could have strangled you. I may indeed say: God has taken pity
on our little ones. And suppose I had not found those portraits, a grain
of doubt as to your faithfulness would have remained in my mind for
Othello in the Twentieth Century 209
ever, and would have tortured me all my life. I implore you, do not play
with such things: in a rage I am not responsible for my actions.”
During the conversation I felt a slight awkwardness in moving my
neck. I passed my handkerchief over it, and there was a line of blood on
it. Evidently the chain in being wrenched off by force had scratched my
skin. Seeing blood on my handkerchief, my husband was in despair.
“My God,” he exclaimed, “what have I done? Anechka, my dear,
forgive me. I have wounded you. Does it pain you, tell me, does it pain
you very much?”
I began to reassure him that there was no “wound,” but just
a mere scratch which would disappear by the morning. Fiodor was
seriously upset, and, above all, was ashamed of his fit of anger. Te whole
evening was given up to his apologies and expressions of sympathy and
tenderness. And I, too, was boundlessly happy that my absurd joke had
ended so happily. I sincerely repented of having made Fiodor suffer, and
I promised myself never again to play such a joke, having learnt from
this experience to what a furious, almost irresponsible state my dear
husband was capable of being reduced in moments of jealousy.
I still preserve the locket and the anonymous letter (of 18th
May, 1876).
Here, then, is another case of an older and experienced man married to a
younger wife, hardly able to believe, as other documents attest,
3
that his happiness
is real. Tis man, moreover, is by general consent one of the profoundest students
of human nature that ever lived, especially of its roots in the unconscious. Yet,
caught in the grip of ancestral jealousy, his wisdom vanishes as if it had never
existed and he becomes as helpless as a child. It would be tedious to point out
all the parallels between this narrative and Othello (the mention of which in
the narrative is itself significant) down even to such a detail as the strangling.
Te same readiness of a profoundly loving nature to believe the worst, the same
precipitate rage and failure to give any opportunity to explain, the same centering
of everything on a token of love, with the other ending only perhaps because
Anna was able to produce the locket as Desdemona was not able to produce its
counterpart, the handkerchief. And the startling thing is that it all happened in
this later case without an Iago—the Russian Desdemona being her own Iago.
Ten how much more easily with him! Te fact that Dostoevsky and Othello,
too, were both prone to epileptic attacks is of more than passing interest, as is
the antipodal reversal of emotion in the two men when the truth appears. All
in all, the irrational and inundating character of jealousy has seldom been better
set forth than in this incident, not even in Leontes in Te Winter’s Tale, whom it
also helps us understand. I can testify from many experiments with this anecdote
that it ends for good and all the doubts of those who until they heard it thought
Othello 210
that in Othello Shakespeare had for once slipped up in his knowledge of human
nature or, worse, had sacrificed that knowledge to theatrical effect.
IX
Tough the main stumbling block to readers of Othello is an incapacity to
realize what jealousy can be when aroused in a nature not easily jealous, there
are other sources of trouble, numerous specific moments in the play where
a failure to notice some “tremendous trifle” in the text is the source of grave
misunderstanding. Tree of them may be mentioned.
1. In the scene, staged by Iago, where Othello oversees Cassio talking with
Bianca, supposedly of Desdemona, and catches fragments of their conversation,
it is frequently held that the Moor is too readily duped. Tis sort of thing is all
right on the stage, but it couldn’t happen in life. Such objectors have forgotten
that Othello has but a moment before emerged from an epileptic fit and is in no
condition to exercise his critical faculty.
2. When Othello, near the end, declares that Cassio has admitted his guilt,
he is usually taken to be speaking in general of the circumstantial case against
him and, more particularly, of Iago’s loathsome account of Cassio’s confession
to him. But he means far more than this. In the darkness and confusion Othello
mistakes the voice of the wounded Roderigo—“O, villain that I am!”—for
Cassio’s. He hears what he fears. He thinks he has heard Cassio with his dying
words admit his guilt. “It is e’en so,” Othello assents. What more convincing
evidence could he ask for? Fail to take that “O, villain that I am!” into account,
and the mistake based on it, and the whole character of Othello’s act in killing
Desdemona is altered. Te point is a capital one. Many must have detected it.
Yet of hundreds of readers of the play I have questioned I have yet to find the
first one who noticed it for himself. Even when asked to find the passage in
which Othello hears with his own ears “Cassio’s” confession, few, even with the
text before them, can locate it.
3. And then the classic question: How could Desdemona speak after she
had been strangled? Medical authority has been marshaled on both sides of this
question. But Shakespeare was seeking poetical, rather than physiological or
anatomical truth (not that the former violates the latter). What happens at this
point should be plain—and there is an old stage tradition, it is said, to support it.
Othello has failed to stifle his wife, and, perceiving signs of life, does not again
try to do what he has attempted in vain, but stabs her at the words “So, so.” Not
only does this make understandable her speaking again before death: the irony,
the contrasts, and the symbolism agree in demanding what it is natural anyway
for Othello to have done in the circumstances. His earlier,
Yet I’ll not shed her blood,
Nor scar that whiter skin of hers than snow,
Othello in the Twentieth Century 211
makes the inference almost irresistible that he will and does shed her blood, that
he will and does scar that skin. Blood, throughout Shakespeare as throughout
poetry, is the symbol of passion, of the instinctive as against the rational life. It
is needed here to make visible Othello’s descent from the judicial and sacrificial
mood in which he enters his wife’s chamber—
It is the cause, it is the cause, my soul,
—to the fury at the last when he denies his victim even a moment for one prayer.
Te linking of Desdemona with snow at this point is a confirmation of the
symbolic color scheme of the play and effects a final fearful contrast with the red
for which Othello has now come to stand. Moreover, Shakespeare seems to have
specifically prepared for the moment when Othello stabs Desdemona by the
moment when he strikes her. In retrospect the earlier scene seems like a rehearsal
of the later. Tey are the two most nearly unendurable moments in the play. Te
sharpness of the contrast depends on Othello’s finally doing with a knife what
he had already done with his hand.
X
Nowhere else in a single pair of characters, nor even in King Lear, does
Shakespeare more squarely confront the diabolic and the divine than in Iago
and Desdemona.
. . . do but see his vice;
’Tis to her virtue a just equinox.
With a change of one word, Iago himself expresses it for us perfectly.
One might expect that in order to make the most of this contrast the two
would be brought into frequent contact in the course of the play. But they are
not. Tey are never alone together, and only twice are there what might be called
dialogues between them. Near the quay at Cyprus, partly to hide her fears about
Othello in the storm, Desdemona indulges in light banter with Iago and, as we
saw, he draws the ideal portrait which clandestinely is a picture of herself and
which he brings to a “lame and impotent conclusion.” No more is needed to
show his sensitiveness to moral beauty. Why did Shakespeare take the trouble
to demonstrate it so convincingly? What becomes of it during the rest of the
play? It is almost wholly repressed. Tat it is capable of rising above the surface,
however, is proved by that extraordinary exclamation near the end,
If Cassio do remain,
He hath a daily beauty in his life
Tat makes me ugly.
Othello 212
But if the daily beauty in Cassio’s life makes Iago ugly, how about the hourly, the
momentary beauty in Desdemona’s? What does that do to him? Te poet, if I
am not mistaken, dedicates the one highly dramatic scene in which the two talk
with each other to bringing that out.
It comes just after the fearful “brothel” scene in which Othello has flung all
the evil he imagines straight in his wife’s face. On his exit, Desdemona, stunned,
sinks into a state beyond the relief of tears. She ominously bids Emilia lay her
wedding sheets on her bed and summon to comfort her in her distress—of all
people on earth—the very one who has caused it! At the nadir of her despair she
will consult Iago on what she can do to win her lord again. Iago comes, and we
have as psychologically interesting a scene as there is in the play. Desdemona’s
condition of semi-somnolence, just preceding it, is the correlative and opposite
of Othello’s epileptic seizure. In each case a scene with Iago follows. Te same
thing that Iago does to Othello in the earlier one is done to him, in a reversed
sense, in the later one. Here, if ever, in this interview between the villain and the
heroine, we have a chance to study the effect on each other of something close
to pure evil and pure good. By way of mediation, Emilia, who is a paradoxical
mixture of the two, is also present.
Te effect of evil on good may be dismissed in a word by saying that good
here not only does not resist evil, it is unaware of its presence. It acts as if it did
not exist—which is another way of saying that it treats the evil man as if he were
good.
Does evil reciprocate and treat good as if it did not exist? It does not. It
cannot. Evil is forever uneasy in the presence of good, and it is significant to
begin with that Desdemona and Emilia in this scene each speak almost twice
as many words as does the usually voluble Iago. But the quality as well as the
quantity of his utterances is altered.
Do not weep, do not weep. Alas the day!
I pray you be content.
Go in, and weep not; all things shall be well.
In their simplicity and sympathy the words sound utterly unlike anything else
in Iago’s role. “Exactly!” it will be said. “Here the man’s histrionic powers are at
their acme. He can feign even pity and compassion perfectly. Here he sinks to
his lowest point—pretending to comfort the one he is about to destroy. Tese,
if any were ever shed, are crocodile tears.” Of course they are crocodile tears.
Short of throwing up his whole plot, Iago is compelled to go on acting. But what
taught this crocodile-Iago to simulate sympathy so consummately? What if not
the very buried sympathy that Desdemona’s presence had activated in him? Te
words that crocodile-Iago needs for his part are the very ones that a genuinely
sympathetic Iago might have spoken. It is as if an inner prompter handed them
Othello in the Twentieth Century 213
to him at a moment when he was at a loss for the next words in his role. Who is
that Inner Prompter? An unconscious as well as a conscious Iago are present in
this scene exactly as there were two Shylocks to offer to Antonio in one breath, as
it were, the loan without interest and the bloody bond. Te parallel is startling. To
feign goodness successfully it is not enough that we should have had experience
with goodness in the past; we must retain potential goodness. Otherwise the
counterfeit will be crude. Iago’s is so true it could be passed for genuine coin. It
was the unconscious Iago that made it so.
Whatever unique thing, good or bad, any individual may have made out of
his inherited qualities, there underneath, however deep down, the human nature
into which he was born is bound to survive in its general composite trend and
upshot as incarnated in the lives of all his ancestors, a mingled web of light
and dark. Only let that individual be taken off guard, suddenly confronted with
some circumstance or person alien to the world to which he has conditioned
himself, and that fundamental human nature will reassert itself. Te situation
here is precisely that. Unless Shakespeare is contravening his seemingly universal
practice and is making Iago a pure abstraction, the rule is bound not to fail. It
does not fail. And this scene is inserted, I believe, to show that it does not fail.
Imagine any man calloused by bitterness and cruelty. If a child, especially a
beautiful child, were without warning to throw her arms about his neck, nestle
up to him confidingly, and speak words of piercing loveliness, is it conceivable
that he would not be moved? No matter how he might try to hide it or deny it
to himself, that remnant of goodness in him that nothing can eradicate would
respond. Dostoevsky chose precisely this situation for the crisis of the first of his
great masterpieces, Crime and Punishment. It is at the moment when the little
girl Polenka throws her arms about the murderer Raskolnikov and kisses him
that he is reborn. He reverts a moment later, as might be expected, to his most
devastating power-fantasies. But the seed has been sown. Long afterward it
comes to fruit. Mutatis mutandis, Shakespeare, if I am not mistaken, gives us the
same situation here, if with the other outcome. We never see Iago repentant as
we do Raskolnikov, but the effect of his brief interview with Desdemona shakes
him to the foundation.
From the moment he enters he is scarcely recognizable as the same man we
have known under the name of Iago, and except for three sharp sentences he
speaks to his wife which make the difference the more conspicuous, the man who
addresses Desdemona remains unrecognizable throughout the scene. If anyone
ignorant of the story were to read it by itself, he would be utterly bewildered. One
Iago is so tender and sympathetic, the other so coarse and ill-tempered.
4
But
we who have read the play, if we have been attentive, will recall certain passages
from Iago’s own role that throw light on this moment of it, for Shakespeare is
nothing if not preparatory. First, we remember his penetrating description of the
moral beauty of the woman into whose intimate presence he now comes for the
Othello 214
first time since the occasion near the quay when he uttered it. He stressed then,
particularly, her power to subdue all feeling of anger or revenge, precisely the
emotions that almost any woman would have given unrestrained vent to after
being struck and insulted by her husband as Desdemona had been just before
this very meeting. “She is of so free, so kind, so apt, so blessed a disposition, that
she holds it a vice in her goodness not to do more than she is requested.” Tat
sentence, too, might well come to mind. And those strange words in soliloquy:
Now, I do love her too,
Not out of absolute lust,
and, finally, the words to Roderigo, “as, they say, base men being in love have then
a nobility in their natures more than is native to them,” which puts in a nutshell
the very truth on which we are now insisting: that no matter how wicked a man
may become, the nobility that is an inevitable part of his inheritance will be there
underneath ready to appear under the right conditions. Are the conditions right
for the appearance of the nobility in this base man? Tey obviously are, whether
he knows it or not.
At the end of their interview Desdemona kneels. It is left to the actress
and to our imaginations to decide whether she kneels just to heaven or to Iago
also, whom she is beseeching to go to her lord on her behalf. If, as I believe, it
should be to Iago too, we have a counterpart of the famous scene where the
sainted Father Zossima kneels to the potential parricide, Dmitri Karamazov, in
Dostoevsky’s novel. (And if we want to press the parallel we may even believe
that something deep in Desdemona’s unconscious mind saw into the future and
was seeking less a reconciliation between herself and her lord than one between
Iago and Othello, of any breach between whom she is of course at the moment
unaware.) It is noteworthy that Desdemona’s final words in this interview are
practically a paraphrase of Shakespeare’s own confession of faith about love in
the 116th sonnet, culminating, in her case, in the lines:
Unkindness may do much;
And his unkindness may defeat my life,
But never taint my love.
If anything was capable of it, this longest and in many respects loveliest speech
in the role of the laconic Desdemona, from which these words come, must have
moved Iago to the depths, imparting a meaning he had never dreamed of to his,
“Now I do love her too.” If it did shake him, it is the supreme tribute to her in
the entire play: even Iago could not escape the effect of her presence. Tat the
whole interview did move him profoundly Shakespeare all but proves, where it
Othello in the Twentieth Century 215
is his habit to prove such things, in the little scene that immediately follows—in
that and in the rest of the play.
When Desdemona goes out, Roderigo enters, and in the first part of what
ensues we see Iago for the first time at his wit’s end, unable to devise anything
by way of answer to Roderigo’s importunities. In his brief and stalling replies to
his dupe’s reiterated complaints Shakespeare is plainly registering the profound
and disturbing effect that Desdemona—and incidentally Emilia—has just had
on him. She has sapped his power. In thirty-four lines of text, these are Iago’s
speeches—Roderigo says all the rest:
What in the contrary?
Will you hear me, Roderigo?
You charge me most unjustly.
Well; go to; very well.
Very well.
You have said now.
Is this Iago? To paraphrase Lodovico’s words about Othello: Is this the
resourceful nature that obstacles could not daunt? He resembles himself as
little as Falstaff does himself at the moment of his rejection, or as Falstaff
resembles that other Falstaff who creeps into the basket of foul linen in the
home of Mistress Ford. It is no answer to say that Iago, before the scene is
over, does partly recover his wits. How came he to lose them? And such wits
as he does recover resemble those of some common ruffian rather than those
of the archpsychologist that Iago was at his intellectual best. Te expedient he
recommends to Roderigo is the desperate one of knocking out Cassio’s brains.
It is not coincidence, but more nearly cause and effect, that from the presence
of Desdemona he steps immediately to this fatal mistake. Te man has himself
received a death blow. For the first time in his life he has encountered a force
more powerful than his own diabolic nature. What has happened to him he
doubtless does not understand. He is intelligent, but not intelligent enough
for that. Never again in the play do we find him perfectly poised and sure of
himself as he had been previously. He almost hesitates about Cassio’s death.
Te final reason he gives for it, the daily beauty of Cassio’s life, shows that
the beauty of Desdemona has given him a mortal (or perhaps we should say
an immortal) wound. He would have been incapable of offering that highly
uncharacteristic reason before he had that fatal interview. He is defeated. From
his first false step he goes on to another and another until he sinks into that
final terrific silence that is but a prelude to the silence of death. Te Turk to
whom he is compared went down under the waters of the Mediterranean. He
goes down under the same element in its symbolic sense.
Othello 216
XI
Into what element did Desdemona pass at death?
Our imaginations cannot help asking that question, however idle it may
seem. If Iago went down under water, Desdemona might well have been lifted
into air. If his end was silence, hers should be harmony. If he descended to hell,
she should have ascended to heaven, or, as we are more prone to say today, if
he reverted to the unconscious, she must have been transformed into spirit.
Water, silence, hell; air, harmony, heaven: that is what the symbols seem to
call for. But this is the merest fancy unless there is warrant for it in the text.
Tese are castles in the air unless there is a Shakespearean foundation to put
under them.
We have noted over and over Shakespeare’s habit of concealing, in what seem
like brief digressions or superfluous scenes, clues to the over- and undermeanings
of his plays—as in the garden scene in Richard II, the dawn passage in Julius
Caesar, or the one in Hamlet where the Prince teases Polonius about the cloud.
If readers of Othello were asked to select the most supererogatory passage
in the play, they would probably be unanimous, unless some forgot its very
existence, in picking the opening of Act III where Cassio comes in with some
musicians who are prepared to play but are peremptorily dismissed by the Clown
(for there is a clown in Othello):
Clown: Ten put up your pipes in your bag, for I’ll away. Go; vanish into
air, away! (Exeunt Musicians)
Tis brief overture to what is admittedly one of the greatest acts Shakespeare
ever wrote is a tolerably obvious allegory of that sudden interruption of the music
of Othello’s love which is to be the subject of the act—a fact that in itself justifies
us, apart from its very inconsequentiality, in searching it for other clues.
Te passage emphasizes the fact that it is upon wind instruments that the
musicians are prepared to play, and the Clown himself plays on that idea when
he tells them to “vanish into air.” Vanish into your proper element, he might have
said. Te other thing stressed is the idea of inaudible music:
Clown: But, masters, here’s money for you: and the general so likes your
music, that he desires you, for love’s sake, to make no more noise with it.
First Mus.: Well, sir, we will not.
Clown: If you have any music that may not be heard, to’t again: but, as
they say, to hear music the general does not greatly care.
First Mus.: We have none such, sir.
Tis sounds like the idlest fooling, and on the surface it is just that. But when
we remember Keats’s
Othello in the Twentieth Century 217
Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard
Are sweeter; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on;
Not to the sensual ear, but, more endear’d,
Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone,
we see that, so far from mere fooling, this idea of inaudible music is the idea of
poetry itself brought down by the Clown to the level of burlesque and parody.
Te quintessence of a poem is precisely its music that may not be heard. May
not, notice, nor cannot.
Where, audible or inaudible, is there music in Othello? Where, especially, if
anywhere, is there wind music?
We think immediately of the storm off Cyprus. Tere the gale roared
until Montano cried, “Te wind hath spoke aloud.” Tere it tossed water
on the very stars, bringing a chaos of the elements that forecasts the chaos
that “is come again” in Othello’s soul when Iago loosens the moral hurricane
that parts the Moor from his wife more violently than ever the physical
tempest did. Te Turks go down in the first storm. Turk-Iago goes down in
the second one. Othello and Desdemona were parted by the first storm, but
were reunited after it. Tey were parted by the second one. Was there a Second
Cyprus?
If Shakespeare carries his symbolism through with Iago, is it inconceivable
that he may have done the same with Desdemona and Othello? Here, if
anywhere, it would be natural to seek the poetry of this poem, the music in this
play that may not be heard.
A scientist gets his hypothesis from he does not always know where. He
subjects it to the test of facts, and accepts it or rejects it accordingly. So it
should be with the interpretation of a work of literary art. Where a suggested
reading comes from is not the important question. Te important question
is whether it can pass the test of the text. If not, however alluring, it must be
dismissed.
Let us look at the storm scene for a third time.
A Sea-port in Cyprus. An open place near the quay. (Cyprus, remember, is an
island, and we know what an island came to mean to Shakespeare near the end
of his life.)
Tree figures with wind-blown garments and spray-spattered hair are gazing
out over mountainous waves toward a misty horizon:
What from the cape can you discern at sea?
Nothing at all: it is a high-wrought flood.
I cannot, ’twixt the heaven and the main,
Descry a sail.
Othello 218
Methinks the wind hath spoke aloud at land;
A fuller blast ne’er shook our battlements.
If it hath ruffian’d so upon the sea,
What ribs of oak, when mountains melt on them,
Can hold the mortise? What shall we hear of this?
A segregation of the Turkish fleet.
For do but stand upon the foaming shore,
Te chidden billow seems to pelt the clouds;
Te wind-shak’d surge, with high and monstrous mane,
Seems to cast water on the burning Bear
And quench the guards of the ever-fixed pole:
I never did like molestation view
On the enchafed flood.
A storm that assaults heaven itself! Which storm is this? Te storm in which
the Turks went down, or the storm for which Othello prayed?—
May the winds blow till they have waken’d death!
And let the labouring bark climb hills of seas
Olympus-high, and duck again as low
As hell’s from heaven!
—a storm that did indeed awaken death and duck as low as hell:
Whip me, ye devils, . . .
Blow me about in winds! roast me in sulphur!
Wash me in steep-down gulfs of liquid fire!
What place in the story have we reached? On which side of death are we?
And now, suddenly, there is a fourth speaker on the shore. “Our wars are done.”
A ship has made port, he announces, bringing one Michael Cassio. Te Turks are
drowned. And while that thought, the messenger declares, comforts Cassio,
yet he looks sadly
And prays the Moor be safe, for they were parted
With foul and violent tempest.
And like an echo from some remote region of
old, unhappy, far-off things,
And battles long ago,
Othello in the Twentieth Century 219
we hear a voice saying,
Dear general, I never gave you cause.
But the confusion—or is it the clarity?—increases. Here is Cassio himself! And
as he joins the others on the shore, he cries,
O, let the heavens
Give him defence against the elements,
For I have lost him on a dangerous sea.
You have indeed, Cassio, and on a vaster sea than any Mediterranean.
“Is he well shipp’d?” a voice inquires.
Cas.: His bark is stoutly timber’d, and his pilot
Of very expert and approv’d allowance;
Terefore my hopes, not surfeited to death,
Stand in bold cure.
In spite of all, Cassio has kept faith.
And now there is a sudden cry within, “A sail, a sail, a sail!”
Te town is empty; on the brow o’ the sea
Stand ranks of people, and they cry, “A sail!”
We see them gazing out with tense faces over the gray oncoming waves. But
who are they? Whom are they awaiting? What town have they left empty?
And for a second we remember another unidentified little town that was left
similarly desolate:
What little town by river or sea shore,
Or mountain-built with peaceful citadel,
Is emptied of this folk, this pious morn?
And, little town, thy streets for evermore
Will silent be; and not a soul to tell
Why thou art desolate, can e’er return.
Perhaps these watchers for a sail, likewise, will never return to their homes.
But the ship is in. And whom has it brought?
Tempests themselves, high seas, and howling winds,
Othello 220
Te gutter’d rocks and congregated sands,
Traitors ensteep’d to clog the guiltless keel,
As having sense of beauty, do omit
Teir mortal natures, letting go safely by
Te divine Desdemona.
Desdemona? Ten she escaped the traitors? She survived the storm? It cannot
be. But it is—for here she is herself:
O, behold,
Te riches of the ship is come on shore! . . .
Hail to thee, lady! and the grace of heaven,
Before, behind thee, and on every hand,
Enwheel thee round!
Heaven again? We were told it was Cyprus. But wherever she is she acknowledges
the welcome. Her brow, however, shows she is troubled.
Des.: What tidings can you tell me of my lord?
Cas.: He is not yet arriv’d . . . .
Des.: O! but I fear—How lost you company?
Cas.: Te great contention of the sea and skies
Parted our fellowship.
Will her fears, this time, be justified?
Again there is a cry: “But hark! a sail” that is echoed from within. “A sail, a
sail!”
Again it cannot be. But again it is. Othello has come to port. Tere is an
interlude. Ten he enters and takes Desdemona in his arms:
O my fair warrior!
My dear Othello!
It gives me wonder great as my content
To see you here before me. O my soul’s joy!
If after every tempest come such calms . . . .
And in a kind of divine confusion we ask:
After which storm?
Tis is what I have long been in the habit of calling Te Sixth Act of Othello.
Here is music played on the wind instruments of the storm, which, like the storm
itself, reaches the stars. Here, as surely as music is harmony, is music that may not
be heard. Here is form that, like the form of Keats’s urn, does
Othello in the Twentieth Century 221
tease us out of thought
As doth eternity.
Like a face in the embers, it is there for those who see it, not there for those who
do not.
Bradley speaks of Othello as having less cosmic sweep than the other
Tragedies. “We seem to be aware in it,” he says, “of a certain limitation, a partial
suppression of that element in Shakespeare’s mind which unites him with the
mystical poets and with the great musicians and philosophers.” It is true that
the atmosphere of Othello is more realistic and “modern” than that of the other
Tragedies. But that is precisely what makes such effects as his use of the storm
in this play the more miraculous. It is the virtue of Othello that—like the poetry
of Emily Dickinson—it synthesizes the domestic and the cosmic.
“But you have forgotten one thing,” someone can be counted on to object just
here. “Iago, too, survived the storm off Cyprus. It was he, indeed, under whose
conduct Desdemona came safely through!” And the tone of triumph implies,
“What can you say to that?”
How fortunate that there are prose and reason in the world to keep the poetry
straight! Why not go even further and point out that this whole play is obviously
rubbish because all the Italians in it speak English?
But the objection about Iago is overruled even on its own premise. Te Turk
goes down. And if Desdemona reaches heaven after the Second Storm, it is
partly because of the very tempest through which Iago led her. Here Shakespeare
plumbs the very depths of evil. Tere were two Iagos: the one who went down,
and the “good Iago” whom Desdemona trusted and who drew the picture of her
on the quay.
Here, if ever, we see the difference between logic and imagination, between
factual and poetical truth. To the intellect this diagram is what it is, no more,
no less:

But the eye inevitably supplements it by drawing two lines parallel to the right-
hand sides of the inner figure, completing the outer one. To the reason, the fact
that Othello and Desdemona were parted by a physical tempest, then reunited,
then parted by a moral one, sets up no presumption whatever that they will again
be reunited. Te opposite assumption is just as logical, and probably even more
convincing to the intellect, which is skeptical by nature. But, to the imagination,
what may be called the transcendental reunion of Othello and Desdemona is
as irresistible as the completion of the geometrical diagram is to the eye. For, as
Blake is continually reminding us, imagination is more analogous to sensation
Othello 222
than to thought. Imagination is spiritual sensation—“Tat most pure spirit of
sense.” It is its own evidence.
Beauty itself doth of itself persuade,
says Shakespeare in Lucrece. As Longinus saw, long ago, it does not convince by
logic, it takes captive. What happens after death is strictly an unknown quantity
to reason. But as certainly as the value of x in an equation can be calculated
if the other quantities are known, so certainly can the imagination “calculate”
the unknown factors in life from the known ones. Poetry is the art of spiritual
mensuration. Its validity or lack of validity can be referred to no standard
outside itself and us. It depends solely on its impact on our imaginations. So
with such creations of the Imagination as heaven and hell. Whether they are
true or not is the most important thing in the world. Whether or not they exist
is a senseless question. “He who has never hoped shall never receive what he
has never hoped for.”
XII
Whoever is content to see Iago go down under water with the Turks and does
not “hope,” in this high Heracleitean sense, to behold Desdemona “vanish into
air” or catch a glimpse of her in heaven will be compelled to admit at any rate
that she is alive after death, on earth, both within the play and without it. Cassio,
near the end, tells how, in a letter found in the slain Roderigo’s pocket, there is a
revelation of Iago’s original plan to have Roderigo brave Cassio upon the watch
after Iago has made him drunk.
. . . even but now he spake,
says Cassio, wondering as if at a miracle,
After long seeming dead.
But if Roderigo spoke after death, Desdemona not only spoke but, in the words
of Wordsworth’s great sonnet, lived, and acted, and served the future hour. Tat
which acts is actual, and it is Desdemona who effects the final transformation in
Othello that imparts to his last words their preternatural calm. In that last speech
he describes himself as one who
Like the base Judean, threw a pearl away
Richer than all his tribe.
Othello in the Twentieth Century 223
It is strange that nearly all editors have preferred to this reading of the Folio that
of the Quarto,
Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away . . .
in the face of Othello’s “I kiss’d thee ere I kill’d thee” a moment later, which is
as clear an identification of the murderer-Othello with Judas as could be asked.
(Te Othello who now kisses her is another man.)
Who the pearl was the base Judean threw away all the world knows, final
proof, were it needed, that just as the poet ties Iago and war together in
this play, so he links Desdemona with the spirit that brings war to an end.
“Solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant,” cried Tacitus, compressing into one of
the compactest sentences ever written the fatal error we make in confusing the
end of war and what ends war. At the end of war, if there is not a “solitude,”
then there is a truce, a fresh balance of power, or an imposed reign of order
(“order,” the counterfeit of peace) which holds until the old conflict breaks out
anew. And meanwhile men go on seeking some law, or formula, or system that
will end the rule of Mars. Only the simple way, that is at once the easiest and
the hardest, is not tried. “Here you are teaching all the time,” says a character
in Chekhov, “fathoming the depths of the ocean, dividing the weak from the
strong, writing books and challenging to duels—and everything remains as
it is; but, behold! some feeble old man will mutter just one word with a holy
spirit, . . . and everything will be topsy-turvy, and in Europe not one stone
will be left standing upon another.” One word with a holy spirit. It was such
a word that Desdemona spoke. She is what the greatest sages from Laotse to
Tolstoy have taught. She shows that to be is better than to act, for through
whoever is the gods themselves act.
Te secret of social and political strife, of conflict between nations, is
only that of individual and domestic strife writ large. War and peace, says
Othello, confirming Hamlet and carrying the thought from its negative to its
positive phase, are states of the soul. War in the military sense is the outer
manifestation of war in the psychological sense preexisting in the inner worlds
of its fomenters and participants. Tat is not saying that outer conditions have
nothing to do with the production of war. But it is only as those conditions first
produce a military state of the soul that they secondly produce war in its more
generally accepted sense. And, no matter how adverse, they do not necessarily
produce a military state of the soul, as Desdemona shows; on the contrary, as
Iago shows, that state is a most potent producer of those very conditions. It was
to demonstrate this double truth that Dostoevsky wrote Crime and Punishment.
Othello demonstrates it even more compactly.
Òthcllo 224
NOTES
1. Scc thc chaptcr on Hamlet.
2. All this is rcmarkably conlirmcd by a drcam ol a young thcological studcnt
that Jung rccords. Thc drcamcr saw a magician drcsscd wholly in black who,
hc ncvcrthclcss kncw, was thc whitc magician. Prcscntly thc ligurc was joincd
by anothcr, thc black magician, drcsscd wholly in whitc. !t was obviously at thc
momcnt Cinthio’s talc activatcd, as thc psychologists say, thc samc anccstral
imagcs in Shakcspcarc’s mind that Òthcllo and !ago wcrc conccivcd. Thcrc could
scarccly bc bcttcr prool that hc who takcs Òthcllo as just “chcatcr,” just rcalism, or
cvcn as just drama, is missing somcthing. Anothcr conlirmation ol this imagcry is
to bc lound in 8lakc’s “Thc Littlc 8lack 8oy” with its linc: “And ! am black, but
Ò! my soul is whitc.”
3. !t is ol intcrcst that Ðostocvsky proposcd to this woman through thc mcdium
ol an invcntcd story, just as Òthcllo woocd Ðcsdcmona through storics into which
a considcrablc clcmcnt ol unconscious invcntion undoubtcdly cntcrcd.
4. Vhcn ¡milia suggcsts that somc cozcning slavc is thc author ol this slan
dcr, !ago turns it oll with a “Fic, thcrc is no such man.” Vhcrcupon Ðcsdcmona
cxclaims, “!l any such thcrc bc, Hcavcn pardon him.” “A haltcr pardon him! and
hcll gnaw his boncs!” crics ¡milia. Òur cmotional rcsponscs to thcsc two lincs
mcasurc thc rcspcctivc amounts ol Ðcsdcmona and ¡milia thcrc arc in our own
naturcs. ¡milia is thc Gratiano—on an immcnscly highcr planc—ol this sccnc.
Shc is a salcty valvc lor thc crowd’s lcclings.
QQQ
1951—Kenneth Burke. “‘Othello’: An Essay
to Illustrate a Method,” from The Hudson Review
Kenneth Burke, a literary critic and theorist of rhetoric, taught at
Bennington College. Kenneth Burke on Shakespeare is a collection of his
writings on the playwright. His other books include The Philosophy of
Literary Form and Language as Symbolic Action.
Othello. Vill you, ! pray, dcmand that dcmidcvil
Vhy hc hath thus cnsnarcd my soul and body:
Iago. Ðcmand mc nothing: what you know, you know:
From this timc lorth ! ncvcr will spcak word.
Lodovico. Vhat! not to pray:
Gratiano. Tormcnts will opc your lips.
I
Iago as Katharma
Ò:nviio: ~c: v, scvxv ii. Ðcsdcmona, latcd crcaturc, markcd lor a tragic cnd by
hcr vcry namc (Ðcsdcmona: “moandcath”) lics smothcrcd. Òthcllo, just altcr thc
Othello in the Twentieth Century 225
words cited as our motto, has stabbed himself and fallen across her body. (Pattern
of Othello’s farewell speech: How he spoke of a “base Indian”, and we knew by
that allusion he meant Othello. When it was told that he “threw a pearl away”,
for “threw away” we substituted “strangled”, and for the pearl, “Desdemona”.
Hearing one way, we interpreted another. While he was ostensibly telling of
a new thing, thus roundabout he induced us to sum up the entire meaning of
the story. Who then was the “turban’d Turk” that Othello seized by the throat
and smote? By God, it was himself—our retrospective translation thus suddenly
blazing into a new present identity, a new act here and now, right before our eyes,
as he stabs himself.) Iago, “Spartan dog, / More fell than anguish, hunger, or the
sea”, is invited by Lodovico to “look on the tragic loading of this bed.” Exeunt
omnes, with Iago as prisoner, we being assured that they will see to “the censure
of this hellish villain, / Te time, the place, the torture.” Tus like the tragic bed,
himself bending beneath a load, he is universally hated for his ministrations. And
in all fairness, as advocatus diaboli we would speak for him, in considering the
cathartic nature of his role.
Reviewing, first, the definition of some Greek words central to the ritual
of cure:
Katharma: that which is thrown away in cleansing; the off-scourings,
refuse, of a sacrifice; hence, worthless fellow. “It was the custom at Athens,”
lexicographers inform us, “to reserve certain worthless persons, who in case of
plague, famine, or other visitations from heaven, were thrown into the sea,” with
an appropriate formula, “in the belief that they would cleanse away or wipe off
the guilt of the nation.” And these were katharmata. Of the same root, of course,
are our words cathartic and catharsis, terms originally related to both physical and
ritual purgation.
A synonym for katharma was pharmakos: poisoner, sorcerer, magician; one
who is sacrificed or executed as an atonement or purification for others; a
scapegoat. It is related to pharmakon: drug, remedy, medicine, enchanted potion,
philtre, charm, spell, incantation, enchantment, poison.
Hence, with these terms in mind, we note that Iago has done this play some
service. Othello’s suspicions, we shall aim to show, arise from within, in the sense
that they are integral to the motive he stands for; but the playwright cuts through
that tangle at one stroke, by making Iago a voice at Othello’s ear.
What arises within, if it wells up strongly and presses for long, will seem
imposed from without. One into whose mind melodies spontaneously pop,
must eventually “hear voices”. “Makers” become but “instruments”, their acts
a sufferance. Hence, “inspiration”, “afflatus”, “angels”, and “the devil”. Tus,
the very extremity of inwardness in the motives of Iago can make it seem
an outwardness. Hence we are readily disposed to accept the dramatist’s
dissociation. Yet villain and hero here are but essentially inseparable parts of
the one fascination.
Othello 226
Add Desdemona to the inseparable integer. Tat is: add the privacy of
Desdemona’s treasure, as vicariously owned by Othello in manly miserliness
(Iago represents the threat implicit in such cherishing), and you have a tragic
trinity of ownership in the profoundest sense of ownership, the property in
human affections, as fetishistically localized in the object of possession, while
the possessor is himself possessed by his very engrossment (Iago being the
result, the apprehension that attains its dramatic culmination in the thought
of an agent acting to provoke the apprehension). Te single mine-own-ness
is thus dramatically split into the three principles of possession, possessor, and
estrangement (threat of loss). Hence, trust and distrust, though living in each
other, can be shown wrestling with each other. La propriété, c’est le vol. Property
fears theft because it is theft.
Sweet thievery, but thievery nonetheless. Appropriately, the first outcry in
this play was of “Tieves, thieves, thieves!” when Iago stirred up Desdemona’s
father by shouting: “Look to your house, your daughter, and your bags! / Tieves!
thieves!”—first things in a play being as telltale as last things. Next the robbery
was spiritualized: “You have lost your soul.” And finally it was reduced to imagery
both lewd and invidious: “An old black ram is tupping your white ewe,” invidious
because of the social discrimination involved in the Moor’s blackness. So we have
the necessary ingredients, beginning from what Desdemona’s father, Brabantio,
called “the property of youth and maidenhood.” (Nor are the connotations of
pharmakon, as evil-working drug, absent from the total recipe, since Brabantio
keeps circling about this theme, to explain how the lover robbed the father of
his property in the daughter. So it is there, in the offing, as imagery, even though
rationalistically disclaimed; and at one point, Othello does think of poisoning
Desdemona.)
Desdemona’s role, as one of the persons in this triune tension (or “psychosis”),
might also be illuminated by antithesis. In the article on the Fine Arts (in the
eleventh edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica), the elements of pleasure “which
are not disinterested” are said to be:
the elements of personal exultation and self-congratulation, the pride of
exclusive possession or acceptance, all these emotions, in short, which
are summed up in the lover’s triumphant monosyllable, “Mine.”
Hence it follows that, for Othello, the beautiful Desdemona was not an
aesthetic object. Te thought gives us a radical glimpse into the complexity of
her relation to the audience (her nature as a rhetorical “topic”). First, we note
how, with the increased cultural and economic importance of private property, an
aesthetic might arise antithetically to such norms, exemplifying them in reverse,
by an idea of artistic enjoyment that would wholly transcend “mine-own-ness”.
Te sharper the stress upon the meum in the practical realm, the greater the
invitation to its denial in an aesthetic nostrum.
Othello in the Twentieth Century 227
We are here considering the primary paradox of dialectic, stated as a maxim
in the formula beloved by dialectician Coleridge: “Extremes meet.” Note how,
in this instance, such meeting of the extremes adds to our engrossment in the
drama. For us, Desdemona is an aesthetic object: we never forget that we have
no legal rights in her, and we never forget that she is but an “imitation”. But
what is she imitating? She is “imitating” her third of the total tension (the
disequilibrium of monogamistic love, considered as a topic). She is imitating
a major perturbation of property, as so conceived. In this sense, however aloof
from her the audience may be in discounting her nature as a mere playwright’s
invention, her role can have a full effect upon them only insofar as it draws
upon firm beliefs and dark apprehensions that not only move the audience
within the conditions of the play, but prevail as an unstable and disturbing
cluster of motives outside the play, or “prior to” it. Here the “aesthetic,” even in
negating or transcending “mine-own-ness,” would draw upon it for purposes
of poetic persuasion. We have such appeal in mind when speaking of the
“topical” element. You can get the point by asking yourself: “So far as catharsis
and wonder are concerned, what is gained by the fact that the play imitates this
particular tension rather than some other?”
1
In sum, Desdemona, Othello, and Iago are all partners of a single
conspiracy. Tere were the enclosure acts, whereby the common lands were
made private; here is the analogue, in the realm of human affinity, an act of
spiritual enclosure. And might the final choking be also the ritually displaced
effort to close a thoroughfare, as our hero fears lest this virgin soil that he
had opened up become a settlement? Love, universal love, having been made
private, must henceforth be shared vicariously, as all weep for Othello’s loss,
which is, roundabout, their own. And Iago is a function of the following
embarrassment: Once such privacy has been made the norm, its denial can be
but promiscuity. Hence his ruttish imagery, in which he signalizes one aspect
of a total fascination.
So there is a whispering. Tere is something vaguely feared and hated. In
itself it is hard to locate, being woven into the very nature of “consciousness”;
but by the artifice of Iago it is made local. Te tinge of malice vaguely diffused
through the texture of events and relationships can here be condensed into a
single principle, a devil, giving the audience as it were flesh to sink their claw-
thoughts in. Where there is a gloom hanging over, a destiny, each man would
conceive of the obstacle in terms of the instruments he already has for removing
obstacles, so that a soldier would shoot the danger, a butcher thinks it could be
chopped, and a merchant hopes to get rid of it by trading. But in Iago the menace
is generalized. (As were you to see man-made law as destiny, and see destiny as
a hag, cackling over a brew, causing you by a spell to wither.)
In sum, we have noted two major cathartic functions in Iago: (1) as regards
the tension centering particularly in sexual love as property and ennoblement
Othello 228
(monogamistic love), since in reviling Iago the audience can forget that his
transgressions are theirs; (2) as regards the need of finding a viable localization
for uneasiness (Angst) in general, whether shaped by superhuman forces or by
human forces interpreted as super-human (the scapegoat here being but a highly
generalized form of the over-investment that men may make in specialization).
Ideally, in childhood, hating and tearing-at are one; in a directness and simplicity
of hatred there may be a ritual cure for the bewilderments of complexity; and
Iago may thus serve to give a feeling of integrity.
Tese functions merge into another, purely technical. For had Iago been
one bit less rotten and unsleeping in his proddings, how could this play have
been kept going, and at such a pitch? Until very near the end, when things can
seem to move “of themselves” as the author need but actualize the potentialities
already passed, Iago has goaded (tortured) the plot forward step by step, for
the audience’s villainous entertainment and filthy purgation. But his function
as impresario takes us into matters that must be considered rather in terms of
internal development.
II
Ideal Paradigm
As regards internal relations, let us propose the following ideal paradigm for a
Shakespearean tragedy:
Act I: Setting the situation, pointing the arrows, with first unmistakable
guidance of the audience’s attitude towards the dramatis personae, and with
similar setting of expectations as regards plot. Tus we learn of Cassio’s
preferment over Iago, of Iago’s vengeful plan to trick Othello (“I follow him
to serve my turn upon him . . . . But I will wear my heart upon my sleeve / for
daws to peck at: I am not what I am.”) Also we learn of Desdemona as the likely
instrument or object of the deception. Usually, in this act, various strands that are
later to be interwoven are introduced in succession, with minimum relation to
one another, though an essential connection is felt: for instance, the incidents in
the Council Chamber of Scene III will set up, in Othello’s departure for battle,
such conditions as, the audience already realizes, are suited to Iago’s purposes (the
situation thus implicitly containing his act).
Act II: Perhaps the most nearly “novelistic” act of a Shakespearean play?
While events are developing towards the peripety, the audience is also allowed
to become better acquainted with a secondary character much needed for the
action. “Humanization”, even possibly character-drawing for its own sake, as
the second act of Hamlet might be entitled “Polonius” (the five being: “Te
Ghost”, “Polonius”, “Te Play-within-a-Play”, “Ophelia Pitiful”, and “Te
Duel”). If Act I of Othello could be called “Iago Plans Vengeance”, Act II
would be “Cassio”, or better, “Cassio Drunk”, since his use in sharpening our
understanding of all the relationships must also be eventful in itself, as well
Othello in the Twentieth Century 229
as performing some function that will serve as a potential, leading into the
third act.
Or might the best way to approach the second act be to treat it as analogous
to the introduction of the second theme in the classical sonata-form? Perhaps
the most revealing example of the second act, thus considered, is in Corneille’s
Cinna. In the first act we have seen Cinna plotting against the life of the
Emperor (Auguste). Te woman whom he loves has demanded that he lead
this conspiracy. Te Emperor had mistreated her father, and she would have
vengeance, though the Emperor has sought to make amends by being kind
and generous to her personally. Hence, her lover, to prove himself “worthy”
of her (what could a Cornelian tragedy do without that word, digne!) must
conspire against the Emperor, with whom he stands in good favor. He plans the
assassination for love. When officiating at a public sacrifice, he will make the
Emperor the victim instead. Just before the first act ends, one of the conspirators
enters with the news that Cinna and the other main conspirator, Maxime, have
been summoned by the Emperor. Te act ends on general consternation among
the conspirators. Tey fear that their plot has been discovered.
In Act II, however, the plot is moved forward by a startling development.
Auguste, who has not appeared in the first act at all, now confides to Cinna and
Maxime that he is weary of rule. He would lay down his office, turning it over to
Cinna and Maxime. (And to complete the irony of the situation, he also talks of
plans for having Cinna marry Emilie, the very woman for whose love Cinna has
vowed to slay him.) He “aspires to descend” (aspire a descendre), a good variant
of the “mounting” theme which we always watch incidentally in our search for
motives. Tus, one editor quotes Louis Racine, in his Mémoires: “‘Note well that
expression,’ my father said with enthusiasm to my brother. ‘One says aspire to rise
(aspirer à monter); but you must know the human heart as well as Corneille did,
to be able to say of an ambitious man that he aspires to descend.’ ”
Te Emperor’s unexpected decision, in all simplicity and affection, to make
the conspirators rulers in his stead, is a second theme of the most startling sort. As
contrasted with the expectations established at the end of Act I (the conspirators’
fears that their conspiracy had been discovered), this development is so abrupt as
almost to be a peripety. And the situation is so set up that, whereas Cinna and
Maxime had, heretofore, been united despite a divergency of motives, they are
now put at odds. Maxime would now abandon the conspiracy; but Cinna would
carry it through regardless, since it is the price of his marriage to vengeance-
minded Emilie.
In this kind of drama, almost each scene discloses something that jerks
the characters into a new relationship (somewhat as, with the slow turning
of a kaleidoscope, there is a succession of abrupt changes, each time the
particles fall suddenly into a new design). But the change from the
conspiracy theme of the first act to the abdication theme of the second is so
Othello 230
exceptionally marked that it illustrates our point about the second theme even
to excess.
Incidentally, as regards Shakespearean forms generally, we suppose that the
relation between “second theme” and “double plot” should best be studied along
the lines of Mr. Francis Fergusson’s speculations about “analogy” in drama, in his
recently published Idea of a Teater.
Act III: Te peripety. In Act II, after Cassio had been established unmistakably
as chivalrous in the extreme towards Desdemona, Iago had promised us in an
aside: “He takes her by the palm; ay, well said, whisper; with as little a web as this
I will ensnare as great a fly as Cassio. Ay, smile upon her, do; I will gyve thee in
thine own courtship.” Accordingly, we might call Act III “Te Trap Is Laid.” Or
perhaps, “Te Mock Disclosure”, since here Iago causes Othello to see with his
own eyes things that are not—and with this diabolic epiphany the play rises to
a new level of engrossment.
Iago’s manipulations of Othello’s mind are like the catechizing of him in a
black mass, as the pace of the play increases through their raging stichomythia;
and in the handkerchief the solemn enunciation of the false doctrine has its
corresponding revelation of the “sacred object.”
Note, incidentally, how cautiously the dramatist has released the incidents
of his story. Before Iago works on Othello as regards Desdemona, we have seen
him duping Cassio, then Montano, and even to some extent his confederate
Roderigo; also we have seen him moulding Othello’s misjudgment of Cassio;
and only then do the direct attacks upon Othello’s confidence in Desdemona
begin. Tus, through seeing Iago at work, the audience has been led carefully,
step by step, to believe in the extent of his sinister resources, before the fullest
dramaturgic risks (with correspondingly rich rewards) are undertaken. Only now,
presumably, the dramatist feels that he has prepared the audience to accept the
possibility of Othello’s ensnarement.
References to the Cornelian structure might also assist us here. One
Corneille editor who sums up the structure of the five acts could be translated
freely thus:
Te first act makes clear the location of the action, the relations among
the heroic figures (their situation), their interests, their characteristic
ways, their intentions.
Te second gets the plot under way (commence l ’intrigue).
In the third, it reaches its full complication (literally, “it ties itself ”).
Te fourth prepares the untying (dénouement).
And in the fifth act this resolution is completed.
Te formula does not quite fit the particulars of Cinna. We do not know of
Auguste’s intentions until the second act; and we do not know until the third
Othello in the Twentieth Century 231
that Maxime is secretly in love with Emilie. So some of the development is got
by gradual revelation of the character’s designs.
However, the paradigm can help us glimpse a difference, in the third act,
between a Cornelian “tying” and a Shakespearean “peripety”. After all the
workings at cross-purposes, the discovery that Maxime is in love with Emilie
does serve to add the final complication. But this is hardly a reversal, such as
we underwent at the beginning of Act II. Rather it is more like putting on
“the last straw”, by taking the final step in the directions already indicated. In
contrast, recall the great peripety scene in Julius Caesar, Antony’s speech to the
mob. Here no such timely releasing of information is involved: as against the
Cornelian transformation-by-information, we watch the transformations taking
place before our eyes while we follow the effects of Antony’s ingenious oratory.
Similarly in Othello, the great scene in the third act where Iago finally springs the
trap, involves no new disclosures, so far as the audience is concerned. We simply
witness (with a pleasurable mixture of fear and admiration) a mounting series of
upheavals, as Iago works his magic on the Moor.
Act IV: “Te Pity of It.” Indeed, might we not, even as a rule, call this station
of a Shakespearean tragedy the “pity” act? Tere can be flashes of pity wherever
opportunity offers, but might the fourth act be the one that seeks to say pity-
pity-pity repeatedly? Tus, after the terror of Gloucester’s eyes being torn out
in Act III of King Lear, there is the pity of his blindness in Act IV, while the
audience is likewise softened by the sweet tearfulness of Lear’s reunion with
Cordelia (father and daughter meeting like child and mother). In the same act
of Measure for Measure, Mariana is pensively silent while the boy sings “Take,
O take those lips away.” In Hamlet, the corresponding stage is Ophelia’s fatal
bewilderment. In Macbeth, it is the killing of Macduff’s son. And so on. Here,
when Desdemona says to Othello, who has just struck her, “I have not deserved
this,” she almost literally repeats the Aristotelian formula for pity (that we pity
those who suffer unjustly). And, after the slight flurry of hope when Othello,
talking with Emilia, gets a report of Desdemona not at all like the one Iago had
led him to expect, Desdemona’s “willow” song is particularly sad because, in her
preparations for Othello’s return (“He says he will return incontinent”) there
are strong forebodings (making her rather like a victim going willingly towards
sacrifice). She seems doubly frail, in both her body and her perfect forgiveness—
an impression that the audience will retain to the end, so that the drama attains
maximum poignancy when Othello, hugely, throttles her.
In Cinna, it is in the fourth act that Auguste learns of the treachery. Pity here
takes the modified form of manly grief, as he in a great soliloquy first accuses
himself, then gradually moves towards a monarchic resolution (“O Romains, ô
vengeance, ô pouvoir absolu . . .”). Ten it undergoes another modification, as the
Empress begs Auguste to treat the conspirators with mercy. And in this tragedy,
too, I believe, we might select the fourth as the “pity act.”
Othello 232
Te reference to modifications in Cinna also reminds us that sometimes the
pity can be used purely as a device to “soften up” the audience. Te pity we feel
for Desdemona singing the willow song is of this sort. At other times it can be
used to motivate some act of vengeance on the part of some character in the play,
as with Macduff on hearing of his son’s death.
Act V is, of course, the bringing of all surviving characters to a final relationship,
the resolution, in accordance with the original pointing of the arrows, arrows
pointed both rationalistically, by intrigue, and through a succession of ideas and
images (topics) that direct the play into one channel of associations rather than
another, thereby “setting the tone”, and getting new implications from the sum
of the many passing explicit references. When Othello says, “Put out the light,
and then put out the light,” is he but making the scene for the act, hence finding
a device for killing her three times (for even without this, she dies twice, as were
the second time a weak nervous twitch following a previous strong expulsion)?
Or is this, ritually, a double darkness, imaginally saying that his enclosed mind is
now engrossed with still narrower enclosure?
Tis analysis of the form does not cover all the important fields of
investigation, even as regards the succession of acts (or succession of stages,
insofar as the present explicit division into five acts may have been the work
of editors, rather than of the playwright). Tere is a kind of ritualistic form
lurking behind a drama, perhaps not wholly analyzable in terms of the
intrigue. Tat is, the drama (like such a Platonic dialogue as the Phaedrus)
may be treated formally as a kind of “initiation into a mystery”—and when
approached exclusively in such terms, the analysis of the intrigue alone is
not adequate. Te mythic or ritual pattern (with the work as a viaticum for
guiding us through a dark and dangerous passage) lurks behind the “rational”
intrigue; and to some degree it requires a different kind of analysis, though
ideally the course of the rational intrigue coincides with the course of the
work, considered as viaticum.
Viewed in these terms, the first act would be “the way in”. It states the primary
conditions in terms of which the journey is to be localized or specified this time.
Te same essential journey could be taken in other terms; hence, there must be a
point at which we glimpse the essence of the mystery as it lies beyond all terms;
but this point can be reached only by going thoroughly into some one structure
of terms. For though the ritual must always follow the same general succession
of stages regardless of the intrigue, this course is repeated each time in the details
proper to a particular intrigue. Tere is perhaps nothing essentially “irrational”
about the stages of initiation; however, they may seem so, as contrasted with the
rationality of the intrigue (with its need to present the natural development in
terms of probability and necessity).
Te second act (the introduction of the “second theme”) would seem
analogous to the definite pushing-off from shore. Of course, the very opening of
Othello in the Twentieth Century 233
the play was, in one sense, a pushing-off from shore, the abandoning of one realm
for another. But once this decision has been taken, within its own internality
there is another kind of departure when the second theme has entered, and
we now do indeed feel ourselves under way (as though the bark had suddenly
increased its speed, or suggested a further certainty in its movements).
In the peripety of the third act, the principle of internality confronts its very
essence. Here is the withinness-of-withinness. It corresponds to the moment
in the Phaedrus where Socrates has talked ecstatically of the soul as self-moving,
as the “fountain and beginning of motion,” and of a wing (a most unwinglike
wing, by the way, with capacities that would also lend themselves well to
psychoanalytic interpretation); and precisely following these topics, he arrives
at “the heaven above the heavens” (the hyperouranion, which, by our notion,
would figure the withinness-of-withinness); and he now comes forward with
the enunciation of the principle that has been secretly directing our voyage:
“Tere abides the very being with which true knowledge is concerned; the
colourless, formless, intangible essence, visible only to mind, the pilot of the
soul.” (Before moving on from his principle of oneness to his doctrine of the
hierarchic order which he would deduce from this principle, he further drives it
home imaginally by talk of an ultimate feasting “in the interior of the heavens.”
He has thus brought together, and fused with his rational principle of oneness:
flight in the sense of betterment; flight in the sense of sexual exaltation; and
the notions of substantial contact that draw upon suggestions of feasting for
many reasons both normal and perverse, the basic normal reason doubtless
being the latent memory of the infant’s sense of wholly joyous contact while
feeding at the breast.)
Reverting now to the drama: In the third act, containing the peripety in a
five-part form, we should arrive at some similar principle of internality. Te
principle is revealed at its best, perhaps, in Hamlet, since the play-within-
a-play of the third act so clearly figures the withinness-of-withinness that
we have in mind. Te design is almost as clearly revealed in Julius Caesar,
for Antony’s speech before the Roman populace is similarly a kind of play-
within-a-play. And to say as much is to see how the same principle informs
the third act of Othello, with Iago here taking the role of Antony and Othello
the role of the mob moved by his eloquence. However, as contrasted with the
ecstatic moment of internality in the Phaedrus, here we confront a monstrous
mock-revelation, in accordance with Iago’s promise, at the end of Act I: “Hell
and night / Must bring this monstrous birth to the world’s light.” (“O it is
monstrous! monstrous!” exclaims Alonso a few lines before the end of the
third act in Te Tempest, a play so greatly unlike Othello in attitude, since the
destinies there are all in the direction of easement, but so greatly like it in one
notable dramaturgic respect, since Prospero is even more influential than Iago
in overseeing the development of the plot.)
Othello 234
What of the rite from here out? I take it that, from this point on, we are
returning. We shall get back to the starting point, though with a difference,
somewhat as with a child who, having gone the magic circle in the Old Mill at
the amusement park, steps from the boat, walks past the same ticket booth that
he had passed before entering: everything is literally the same as it was before,
yet somehow everything is, in essence, altered.
Tere is presumably to be some kind of splitting, a “separating out.”
Something is to be dropped away, something retained, the whole history
thereby becoming a purification of a sort. Seen from this point of view, the
“pity act” reveals further possibilities. From the standpoint of intrigue, we
noted how it might serve to motivate vengeance in one of the dramatis personae,
or how it might serve to “soften up” the audience so that they would be more
thoroughly affected by the butchery still to come. But from the standpoint of
the “initiation,” the pity may be viewed as one aspect of the “separating out,”
preparing us, in one way or another, to relinquish those figures who are to die
for our edification.
Te last act would complete this process. And it would “release” us in the
sense that it would transform the passion into an assertion. For in a tragedy of
sacrifice, the assertion need not be got through the rescuing of a character; more
often it comes through the playwright’s felicity in making sure that the character
“dies well” (within the conditions of the fiction)—or, as regards the “separating
out,” the character whom we would disclaim must in some ultimate sense be
destroyed, threatened, or branded. But, all told, the rite is complete when one
has become willing to abandon the figures who vicariously represent his own
tension. Te work thus parallels what we have elsewhere cited a sociologist as
terming a “ritual of riddance.” It is a requiem in which we participate at the
ceremonious death of a portion of ourselves. And whatever discomforts we may
have experienced under the sway of this tension in life itself, as thus “imitated”
in art it permits us the great privilege of being present at our own funeral. For
though we be lowly and humiliated, we can tell ourselves at least that, as a corpse,
if the usual rituals are abided by, we are assured of an ultimate dignity, that all
men must pay us tribute insofar as they act properly, and that a sermon doing the
best possible by us is in order.
III
Dramatis Personae
First, as regards the rationality of the intrigue, the dramatis personae should be
analyzed with reference to what we have elsewhere called the agent-act ratio.
Tat is, the over-all action requires contributions by the characters whose
various individual acts (and their corresponding passions) must suit their
particular natures. And these acts must mesh with one another, in a dialectic of
cooperative competition. So, in filling out the analysis of the dramatis personae,
Othello in the Twentieth Century 235
we should look for the acts, attitudes, ideas, and images that typify each of the
characters (citing from the text, and discounting with regard to the role of the
person that makes the statement). By the principle of the agent-act ratio, the
dramatist prepares for an agent’s act by building up the corresponding properties
in that agent, properties that fit him for the act. Often, Shakespeare’s great
economy in attributing to a character only the traits needed for his action has
led to misunderstanding about his methods: he is praised as though he aimed
at “character-drawing” in the more novelistic sense. His characters’ “life-like”
quality, the illusion of their being fully rounded out as people, really derives from
his dramaturgic skill in finding traits that act well, and in giving his characters
only traits that suit them for the action needed of them. Often, purely situational
aids are exploited here. Tus, much of Lucio’s saliency in Measure for Measure
derives from his ironic situation in forever slandering the Duke, or telling the
Duke lies about his relations to the Duke, not knowing (as the audience does
know) that he is talking to the Duke.
If the drama is imitating some tension that has its counterpart in conditions
outside the drama, we must inquire into the dramatic analysis of this tension,
asking ourselves what it might be, and how the dramatist proceeds to break down
the psychosis into a usable spectrum of differentiated roles. Tat is, we must ask
how many voices are needed to provide a sufficient range of “analogies” (with
the overall tension being variously represented in each of them). Tough Iago-
Othello-Desdemona are obviously the major trio here, a complete analysis would
require us also to ask how each of the minor characters reflects some fragment of
the tension (while serving, from the standpoint of the intrigue, to help the three
major persons dramatically communicate with one another).
Tus, briefly, Brabantio is handy in relating the tension to an earlier stage,
when Desdemona was her father’s property. We follow a change from father-
daughter to husband-wife—and this history also supplies a kind of tragic flaw
for Desdemona, a magic mark against her, and one that Iago will use likewise, to
further the intrigue. For the first suspicion of Desdemona had been uttered by
none other than her own father:
Look to her, Moor, if thou hast eyes to see:
She has deceiv’d her father, and may thee.
Dramaturgically speaking, there had been this one false note, as regards
Desdemona. Even if it had escaped the notice of the audience, the dramatist
reconstructs it when Iago says to Othello: “She did deceive her father, marrying
you . . .” etc.
Te Duke, besides his convenience for details of the plot, provides ways for
better identifying the psychosis, or tension, with matters of State (a dignification
that, as we shall show later, is particularly important in this play).
Othello 236
Roderigo (marked by Iago’s line, “put money in thy purse”), helps build up
by contrast Desdemona’s spirituality of property. (Emilia’s coarseness similarly
contributes, as does Bianca’s disreputableness.) Roderigo is also handy in
providing Iago with a confidant (and thereby allowing for a further mark against
Iago, who is seen to be deceiving even him).
Cassio’s role as “second theme” is obvious. We should also note how he bridges
the high motives and the low, as his reverence for Desdemona is matched by his
cynical attitude towards Bianca. Tough we shall not here study the relations
and functions of the minor characters in detail, perhaps we could most quickly
indicate what we are here aiming at, if we noted two possible directly contrasting
ways of dealing with Cassio.
In accordance with what we might call the “novelistic” approach to the dramatis
personae (as a set of character-portraits), one might remark that, although Cassio
was in many ways an admirable man, unfortunately he could not hold his liquor.
Ten one might remark that Iago, who happened to be a scheming wretch, took
advantage of Cassio’s weakness, to set him at odds with Othello.
But for our purposes the observations should be reversed thus: If Iago is
to set Cassio at odds with Othello, the playwright must provide for Iago some
plausible way of getting a hold on Cassio. And he can provide such a hold by
endowing Cassio with this weakness (whereby Cassio’s necessary befuddlement
will be “characteristic” of him, while the playwright can further motivate the
development situationally by staging the scene at a time of general revelry, when
Cassio might be most likely, in the audience’s opinion, to take a drink against his
better judgment, at Iago’s prodding).
It has been suggested that Othello’s motives might have been explained on
the basis of his status as a parvenu. By antithesis, this notion serves excellently
to indicate the sort of approach we think should be employed in this section of
the dramatis personae. Te notion gains further credence from the fact that Iago
himself discusses such a condition with relation to his disgruntlement with Cassio:
“Preferment goes by letter and affection, / And not by the old gradation, where
each second / Stood heir to the first.” (I, i, 36). And though such unsettlement
is certainly to be considered always, as a possible motive complicating the magic
of class relationships in Elizabethan times, for our purposes we should turn the
matter around, putting it thus:
One notable aspect of the tension Shakespeare is exploiting is the lover’s
sense of himself as a parvenu. For ennoblement through love is a new richness
(a notable improving of one’s status, a destiny that made love a good symbol
for secretly containing the political aspirations of the bourgeois as novus homo).
Hence, in breaking the proprieties of love into their components, in dramatically
carving this idea at the joints, we should encounter also in Othello as lover the
theme of the newly rich, the marriage above one’s station. And misgivings (which
could be dramatized as murderous suspicions) would be proper to this state,
Othello in the Twentieth Century 237
insofar as the treasured object stands for many things that no human being could
literally be. So, in contrast with the notion of the play as the story of a black (low-
born) man cohabiting with (identified with) the high-born (white) Desdemona,
we should say rather that the role of Othello as “Moor” draws for its effects upon
the sense of the “black man” in every lover. Tere is a converse ennoblement
from Desdemona’s point of view, in that Othello is her unquestioned “lord”.
And could we not further say that such categorical attributing of reverence to
the male (in a social context of double sexual standards) necessarily implies again
some suspicions of inadequacy. Te very sovereignty that the male absolutely
arrogates to himself, as an essential aspect of private property in human affection,
introduces a secret principle of self-doubt—which would be properly “imitated”
in the ascribing of “inferior” origins to Othello, even in the midst of his nobility.
And though the reader might not agree with this explanation in detail, it can
serve in principle to indicate the kind of observation we think the analysis of the
dramatis personae requires. For, in contrast with the novelistic “portrait gallery”
approach to Shakespeare’s characters, so prevalent in the nineteenth century, one
should here proceed not from character-analysis to the view of the character in
action, but from the logic of the action as a whole, to the analysis of the character
as a recipe fitting him for his proper place in the action (as regards both the
details of the intrigue and the imitating of the tension by dramatic dissociation
into interrelated roles).
Since A. C. Bradley was one of the best critics who tended to approach
Shakespeare “novelistically”, we might develop our position best by commenting
on some of his comments. Tus, when Bradley writes, “Desdemona’s sweetness
and forgiveness are not based on religion,” I can think of no remark better fitted
to deflect attention from the sort of approach I have in mind. To arouse our pity
here, Shakespeare places Desdemona in a sacrificial situation wherein she gives
herself up as a gentle victim, with malice towards none. We have mentioned
Aristotle’s formula, that men pity those who suffer unjustly. But Shakespeare’s
usage involves a further motive. For pity is extracted most effectively from the
spectacle of suffering if the tormented, at the very height of the torment, forgives
the tormentor. Te scene in which she sings the willow song casts her perfectly
in the role of one preparing meekly for sacrifice. And her sorrow is in the same
mode when, having been fatally attacked by her husband, she speaks as her
parting words: “Commend me to my kind lord. O! farewell!” Here Shakespeare
goes as far as he can towards making her conduct Christlike. And this exploiting
of a religious pattern as a part of the playwright’s design upon the audience’s
sympathies is a much more important detail about Desdemona as a character-
recipe than the fact that, literally, she is not strong on theological references.
On the other hand, the playwright is always careful to see that, however
austere the perfectly piteous offering may be, the audience is not confined to
such exacting responses. Tere are others in the play who will help the audience
Othello 238
to have its vengeance straight. Te “hellish villain” is excoriated before their very
eyes by his own wife. And he is to be tortured: it is a promise. Similarly, in King
Lear, even as the pitiful burdens of the old man’s helplessness begin to mount
upon us, the audience is audibly gratified, murmuring contentedly, when Kent
lets loose his manly invective against Oswald.
But Bradley does make a remark usable for our purposes when he says of
Emilia: “From the moment of her appearance after the murder to the moment
of her death she is transfigured; and yet she remains perfectly true to herself,
and we would not have her one atom less herself. She is the only person who
utters for us the violent emotions which we feel, together with those more
tragic emotions which she does not comprehend.” To be sure, Bradley is here
still talking as though there had been some surprising change in her character,
whereas we would have him approach such matters more directly, in terms of a
transfiguration in her role. Because of her relation to Iago within the conditions
of the play, because of the things she alone knows, she is in the best position to
take over the vindictive role we eagerly require of someone at this point. Or, you
could state it thus: Some disclosures are due, she is in a position to make them,
and if she makes them venomously, she will do best by our pent-up fury, a fury
still further heightened by the fact that Desdemona died Christlike.
But when Bradley writes of Emilia, “What could better illustrate those
defects of hers which make one wince, than her repeating again and again
in Desdemona’s presence the word Desdemona could not repeat . . .”, here is
sheer portraiture, and done in a way that conceals the functioning of the play.
Te dramatist must continually keep vibrant with the audience, as an essential
element in the psychosis, the animal words for sexuality. Iago, of course, carries
the main burden of this task. But when he is not about, others must do it for
him. It is important that the audience simultaneously associate Desdemona
with such motives, and dissociate her from them. Here is the very centre of
the tension. Iago does not often speak to Desdemona; and even when he does,
within the conditions of the play he could not plausibly speak to her thus,
without lowering her in our esteem. But Emilia is perfectly suited to maintain
this general tenor of the imagery, so necessary for retaining the exact mixture
of pudency and prurience needed for exploiting the tension. And besides thus
keeping the motive vigorous, Emilia’s use of such terms gives Desdemona’s
avoidance of them a positive or active character—and activation, actualization,
is sought for always.
At first glance, one might expect us to welcome Tomas Rhymer’s notion
that Emilia’s remarks, after the willow scene, are designed merely as relief (“that
we may not be kept too long in the dumps, nor the melancholy Scenes lye too
heavy, undigested in the Stomach”). But the theory of “comic relief ” has been
repeated too often to be trustworthy. And at the very least, we might look at it
more closely. In one sense a tragic playwright should have no interest in giving
Othello in the Twentieth Century 239
his audience “comic relief ”. At least, we’d expect him to be as overwhelmingly
and protractedly tragic as he could, without risk that the audience might rebel.
In forms such as Cornelian tragedy, “comic relief ” was ruled out by the
conditions of the game. Te conventions required that the ceremonious gesture
be sustained throughout. So-called “comic relief ”, on the other hand, allows
for a shift in tonality that permits the dramatist to relax the tension without
risking the loss of the audience’s interest. He can turn suddenly to a different
mode, which allows him later to start building anew from a lower intensity.
In this respect, the device at least gives relief to the dramatist. But we would
suggest this possibility: Rather than treating such a device merely as “comic
relief ”, might one discern in it a subtler diplomacy? When the audience is
carried beyond a certain intensity, it threatens to rebel, for its own comfort.
But the playwright might engage it even here too, by shifting just before the
audience is ready to rebel. However, he will shift in ways that subtly rebuke the
audience for its resistance, and make it willing afterwards to be brought back
into line. For in the “comic relief ”, he makes sure that the rebellion is voiced by
“inferior” characters, as when Emilia, very nearly at the end of the fourth act,
throws doubt on the entire system of “values” motivating Othello, Desdemona,
and Iago, all three.
Desdemona has said, “Wouldst thou do such a deed for all the world?”—and
Emilia answers, “Te world is a huge thing; ’tis a great price / For a small vice.”
She continues in this vein, and as the act ends, this motive is strong with us. Yet
she here utters the basic heresy against the assumptions on which this play is
built. What of that? We would explain the tactics thus:
A tragic plot deals with an excessive engrossment. Hence, many average
members of the audience might be secretly inclined to resist it when it becomes
too over-wrought. Accordingly, one might think it unwise of the dramatist to let
their resistance be expressed on the stage.
However, Emilia is present among the big three as an average mortal among
the gods. Tus, though in her role she represents a motivation strong with the
audience, she is “low” while tragedy is “high”. Hence in effect she is suggesting
that any resistance to the assumptions of the tragedy are “low”, and that “noble”
people will choose the difficult way of Desdemona. And since, by the rules
of the game, we are there for elevation, her voicing of our resistance protects,
rather than endangers, the tragic engrossment. For the members of the audience,
coming here to be ennobled, would bear witness to their high spiritual state by
fearing the right things, as Aristotle in the Nichomachaean Ethics reminds us that
there is a nobility in fear when we fear properly.
But let us return to Bradley. When discussing the contrast between Iago’s
“true self and the self he presented to the world in general”, Bradley writes: “It is
to be observed . . . that Iago was able to find a certain relief from the discomfort
of hypocrisy in those caustic or cynical speeches which, being misinterpreted,
Othello 240
only heightened confidence in his honesty. Tey acted as a safety-valve, very
much as Hamlet’s pretended insanity did.”
Just as I was trying to make clear why I think these remarks malapropos,
Bradley helped me by bringing in this reference to Hamlet’s “pretended
insanity”. Passing over the fact that Hamlet’s use of insanity as a ruse, while
playing for time to avenge the murder, was part of the traditional story from
which Shakespeare presumably adapted his own play, we would note other kinds
of tactical considerations here.
Tus, when analyzing the plays of Shaw, we have noticed that, by introducing
the use of a cantankerous character among the dramatis personae, Shaw could
always guaranty himself a certain minimum of flurry on the stage. If nothing
else was going on, he could let this character exercise for a while, in spirited
Shavian fashion, until the plot was ready to resume. In Te Cocktail Party, Eliot
gets a similar effect by a situational device. It is doubtful whether his personal
temperament includes the kind of spirited character that came easy with Shaw.
But within his means, he could get an equivalent effect situationally, by vexations,
as characters enter at the wrong moment, return suddenly when they are
supposed to have left for good, phone or call from the other room inopportunely,
the whole adding up to a series of interruptions that is a secular equivalent of
mortification, and contrives at the very least to keep things amusingly stirred
up. Now, why could we not similarly note that Hamlet’s malingering is an
excellent device for maintaining a certain minimum of dramatic tension? And
the device could serve further to give his utterances an oracular tone. For oracles
traditionally speak thus ambiguously; hence the tomfoolery, combined with
Hamlet’s already established solemnity, could well help place his remarks under
the sign of a fate-laden brooding.
Te device also aided well in covering up one great embarrassment of the
work. For the job of delaying Hamlet’s vengeance until the fifth act, whereas
he was so clearly in a physical position to kill the king in the first, and had
unmistakably established the king’s guilt in the third, threatened to arouse the
audience’s resentment. But the problematical aspect of Hamlet (made picturesque
and convincing by the gestures of madness) could be of great assistance to the
playwright. And only insofar as the tactics of delay were acceptable would the
continuation of the play be possible. On the other hand, if it was necessary to
explain Hamlet’s pretended insanity as a “safety-valve”, why did not so articulate
a playwright as Shakespeare stress the point?
Bradley says of Iago: “Next, I would infer from the entire success of
his hypocrisy—what may also be inferred on other grounds, and is of great
importance—that he was by no means a man of strong feelings and passions,
like Richard, but decidedly cold by temperament. Even so, his self-control was
wonderful, but there never was in him any violent storm to be controlled.”
Othello in the Twentieth Century 241
Here again, looking at the matter from the standpoint of the principle we
would advocate, we note rather that Shakespeare has no need for a turbulent
figure like Othello here. Iago is properly the principle of steely suspicion that
works upon the passions. And if he already has a complete function to perform
in accordance with such a character, why should Shakespeare shower irrelevant
traits upon him?
Shakespeare is making a play, not people. And as a dramatist he must know
that the illusion of a well-rounded character is produced, not by piling on traits
of character, until all the scruples of an academic scholar are taken care of, but
by so building a character-recipe in accord with the demands of the action that every
trait the character does have is saliently expressed in action or through action. Here
is the way to get “actualization”. And such dramatic perfection of expression,
whereby the salient traits are expressed in action, may then induce us to fill in
(by inference) whatever further traits we may consider necessary for rounding
out the character. Te stress upon character as an intrinsic property, rather than
as an illusion arising functionally from the context, leads towards a non-dramatic
explanation. And one can end by attributing to a character certain traits, or
trends of thought, for which no line of text can be directly adduced as evidence.
I do not object categorically to such impressions. I would merely suggest that
the line of inquiry with relation to them should be altered. Tey are the preparatory
material for critical analysis, not the conclusions. If the critic feels that the spectacle
of the character in action leads him spontaneously to round out the character,
in his own mind, by inferences that Shakespeare has not explicitly sought to
establish as motives in the play, then his job should be not just to show that he
makes such inferences, nor just to record his exaltation in the contemplation of
them; but rather he should aim to explain how, by the few traits which are used
for the actualizing of a role, the playwright can produce the illusion of a rounded
character.
Whereas it has become customary to speak of Shakespeare’s figures as
of living people, the stupidest and crudest person who ever lived is richer in
motivation than all of Shakespeare’s characters put together—and it would be
either a stupidity or a sacrilege to say otherwise. It is as an artist, not as God, that
he invents “characters”. And to see him fully as an artist, we must not too fully
adopt the Coleridgean view of art as the “dim analogue of creation”.
Te risk in “portraiture” of the Bradleyan sort (and Samuel Johnson has done
it admirably too, also with reference to Othello) is that the critic ends where he
should begin. As Jimmy Durante has so relevantly said, “Everybody wants to get
into the act.” In this sense, impressionistic criticism would write the work over
again. Let the critic be as impressionistic as he wants, if he but realize that his
impressions are the beginning of his task as a critic, not the end of it. Indeed, the
richer his impressions the better, if he goes on to show how the author produced
Othello 242
them. But the great risk in “conclusive” statements about a work is that they give
us the feeling of conclusions when the real work of analysis still lies before us.
Bradley even asks us to “look more closely into Iago’s inner man.” Te
expression almost suggests that Iago is so real, one might profitably hire a
psychoanalyst to get at the roots of him. And in the same spirit, after noting that
“Shakespeare put a good deal of himself into Iago”, Bradley continues: “But the
tragedian of real life [sic! ] was not the equal of the tragic poet. His psychology,
as we shall see, was at fault at a critical point, as Shakespeare’s never was. And so
his catastrophe came out wrong, and his piece was ruined.”
When Bradley says of Iago, “He was unreasonably jealous; for his own
statement that he was jealous of Othello is confirmed by Emilia herself, and must
therefore be believed (IV, ii, 145),” here we would offer another kind of purely
poetic consideration, in contrast with Bradley’s novelistic portraiture. In line with
Francis Fergusson’s discussion of “analogy” in his analysis of Hamlet (Idea of a
Teater), we would note that Iago is here placed in a position analogous to that
which is finally forced upon Othello. Such analogy at the very least gives greater
consistency to a work, carrying out the principle of repetitive form, by varying
a theme. But it does more. For the area of similarity between Iago and Othello
here serves also to point up the great difference between them. (Coleridge
reminds us dialectically that rivales are opposite banks of the same stream.)
Hence, Iago’s ignoble suspicions by contrast make Othello’s suspicions seem more
noble, thereby helping induce us to believe that he killed Desdemona not just in
jealousy, but for the sake of “honour”. Or, otherwise put: here is the principle of
the “reflector”, discussed in one of Henry James’s prefaces. If you have several
characters all looking at the same object, you can thereby point up the differences
in their perceiving of it. And in attributing to Iago a suspicion analogous to the
one he would arouse in Othello, the poet thus is in his way using the “reflector”
principle. Also, at the very least, Iago’s suspicion helps motivate his vindictiveness,
and “rationally”. For in situations where “honour” is taken as a primary motive, it
usually follows that vengeance can serve as “rational” motivation of an act (a point
to be remembered always, when considering motivations purely on the level of
the intrigue).
But let us, in concluding this section, make sure that we do not take on more
burdens than we must. To read Stanislavsky’s notes on the staging of Othello is
to realize that, in our novel-minded age at least, the actor is helped in building
up his role by such portraiture as Bradley aims at. We will hypothetically grant
that the novelistic method may be best for aiding the actor to sink himself in
his role. Give him a “physical task”, such as Stanislavsky looks for, to make
sure that in each scene he can operate on something more substantial and
reliable than his mood and temperament. Ten, once you have made sure of
this operational base, allow for as much novelistic improvising as can give
the actor a sense of fullness in his role. Maybe so. But we would still contend
Othello in the Twentieth Century 243
that, so far as the analysis of the playwright’s invention is concerned, our proposed
way of seeing the agent in terms of the over-all action would be required by a
dramaturgic analysis of the characters.
IV
Peripety
Tis section, to be complete, should trace the development of the plot, stressing
particularly the ways in which the playwright builds up “potentials” (that is, gives
the audience a more or less vague or explicit “in our next” feeling at the end of
each scene, and subsequently transforms such promises into fulfilments). Te
potentialities of one scene would thus become the actualizations of the next,
while these in turn would be potentials, from the standpoint of unfoldings still
to come.
Bradley’s remark, “Iago’s plot is Iago’s character in action,” is excellent, unless
it tempts us, as it did him, to reverse the order of our inquiry, looking at Iago’s
conduct as though it were the outgrowth of his character, rather than looking
at his character as having been so formed by the playwright that it would be a
perfect fit for the kind of conduct the play required of him. But in any case, since
Iago’s schemings are to be appreciated as such, and since they form the plot itself,
the audience is somewhat invited to watch the plot as plot.
However, we shall here confine ourselves mainly to the peripety, Act III,
scene iii.
Iago has promised so to manipulate the meaning of events that Othello will
be led to misinterpret what goes on before his very eyes (and the eyes of the
audience, who know exactly the nature of his errors). Iago now faithfully fulfils
his promise; and after proper preparation of the audience under the guise of
preparing Othello, he finally becomes like a fiend goading an elephant, making
the ungainly beast rear on its hind legs, thrash in bewilderment, and trumpet in
anguish. As the scene begins, no suspicion of Desdemona has crossed Othello’s
mind (unless you except the warning of Brabantio’s which at least had brought
up the topic, as ambiguous foreshadowing, in Othello’s presence).
In the first scene of the third act, after mild horseplay with clown and
musicians, a strong potential was established: Iago got his wife to arrange for
Cassio’s meeting with Desdemona. Never missing an opportunity to keep the
innuendoes vibrant, the playwright has Emilia tell Cassio of Othello’s desire
“To take the saf ’st occasion by the front” for reinstating Cassio. Tus with the
assurance that Cassio will be where we need him, there follows a brief scene of
seven lines, wherein the playwright helps Iago help the playwright get Othello
properly placed. Ten, along with the usual references to Iago as “honest” (which,
since they call for an easy kind of translating, thereby also help induce the
audience to collaborate in the making of the play) we hear Desdemona assuring
Cassio that she will importune Othello in his behalf. (For potential, as regards
Othello 244
“Cassio’s suit”, she states her intentions fatally: “Ty solicitor shall rather die /
Tan give thy cause away.”) We are now ready for the grand interweavings, as
Othello and Iago enter at a distance, Cassio leaves, and Iago mutters, “Ha! I like
not that.”
Othello. What dost thou say?
Iago. Nothing, my lord: or if—I know not what.
Othello. Was not that Cassio parted from my wife?
Iago. Cassio, my lord? No, sure, I cannot think it
Tat he would steal away so guilty-like
Seeing you coming.
Othello. I do believe ’twas he.
Desdemona. How now, my lord!
I have been talking with a suitor here,
[“suitor”—ill-starred word!]
A man that languishes in your displeasure.
Othello. Who is’t you mean?
Desdemona. Why, your lieutenant, Cassio
[who, we vibrantly learn, “has left part of his grief ” with her.]
Tus, by his stutterings, Iago has taken an incident actually neutral, and made
it grim for Othello. Te audience now has a pattern for creating vigorously:
translating (the inducement to an audience’s self-persuasion that resides in the
use of dramatic irony). Desdemona continues to importune (and the playwright
helps her help Iago by having her, in the course of remarks, say to Othello: “What!
Michael Cassio, / Tat came a wooing with you, and so many a time, / When I
have spoke of you dispraisingly, / Hath ta’en your part”). After Desdemona has
left, Othello sums up the motivations perfectly: “Excellent wretch! Perdition
catch my soul, / But I do love thee! and when I love thee not, / Chaos is come
again.” Whereupon, Iago resumes his pattern, making non-committal remarks
that invite Othello to do the committing for himself:
Iago. My noble lord,—
Othello. What dost thou say, Iago?
Iago. Did Michael Cassio, when you woo’d my lady,
Know of your love?
[We now see the full dramatic utility of Desdemona’s reference to Cassio “a
wooing.”]
Othello. He did, from first to last: why dost thou ask?
Iago. But for a satisfaction of my thought;
No further harm.
Othello. Why of thy thought, Iago?
Othello in the Twentieth Century 245
Iago. I did not think he had been acquainted with her.
Othello. O! yes; and went between us very oft.
Iago. Indeed!
Othello. Indeed! ay, indeed; discern’st thou aught in that?
Is he not honest?
[Fatal word. If the devil Iago is honest, then Cassio and Desdemona, being
honest, will be devils.]
Iago. Honest, my lord?
Othello. Honest! ay, honest.
Iago. My lord, for aught I know.
Othello. What dost thou think?
Iago. Tink, my lord!
Othello. Tink, my lord!
By heaven, he echoes me.
As if there were some monster in his thought
Too hideous to be shown. Tou dost mean something:
I heard thee say but now, thou lik’st not that,
And when I told thee he was of my counsel
In my whole course of wooing, thou criedst, ‘Indeed!’
As if thou then hadst shut up in thy brain
Some horrible conceit. If thou dost love me,
Show me thy thought.
Here the Moor’s magnificent upsurge is built around his own description
of Iago’s tactics. Tus not only is the device used, but in a dramatized way the
audience is informed that it is being used, and what its nature is.
Tence to a new device: Iago, to bring up the theme of jealousy, doubts
himself, blames himself, begs Othello to make due allowances: “As, I confess, it
is my nature’s plague / To spy into abuses, and oft my jealousy / Shapes faults
that are not.” Te topic is thus introduced, under the guise of asking that it be
avoided. A drastic variant of the praeteritio, and one that will soon be developed
further, as Iago proves himself a master of the “Say the Word” device whereby
the important thing is to see that the summarizing word, the drastically relevant
motivating title is spoken. For in its nature as imagery, inviting one to make
oneself over in its image, no “no” can cancel it; it could only be abolished by
another image—not by a negative, but by a still stronger positive, and the only
stronger one, as we shall see later, will not overwhelm it, but will serve as the
ultimate reënforcement of it.
Meanwhile, after some near-puns on treasure (“Who steals my purse steals
trash,” etc. . . . “but he that filches from me my good name,” etc.), near-puns,
since they half suggest other kinds of repository, likewise to be conceived in
association with one’s good name—next Iago can exploit directly the topic that
Othello 246
he had introduced roundabout: “O! beware, my lord, of jealousy; / It is the green-
ey’d monster which doth mock / Te meat it feeds on.” But now he is gathering
momentum, and he rounds out his statement by adding another term, “cuckold”,
just as a topic, not yet explicitly pointed. And he contrives to Say the Word by
another route: “Good heaven, the souls of all my tribe defend / From jealousy!”
Ten, as regards the audience, Othello makes the next important contribution:
“Tink’st thou I’d make a life of jealousy, / To follow still the changes of the moon/
With fresh suspicions?” Te involvements of property here take a momentous
step forward. By the catamenial theme, time and the very motions of the heavens
begin to interweave themselves with Othello’s endangered treasure; or, otherwise
put, the personal and social nature of such property now begins to move towards
ultimate transmogrification, made part of nature, and cosmologized.
But now a new tack is needed. Othello must show strong resistance,
too. Otherwise, this bullfight will not be spectacle enough. So after himself
introducing the topic of “goat”, which Iago will exploit later, he swings into revolt
against these ingeniously inculcated obsessions, ending on a demand for proof.
During the discussion of proof, Iago adopts the role of one who is himself
looking for proof. Iago is not arguing with Othello ever (quite as a good
dramatist would never think of arguing with his audience). Rather, he takes the
role of one who is joining with Othello to get the matter clear, and would himself
rejoice if his suspicions were proved wrong. But, as if half grudgingly (after
having talked of feminine deception generally), he does recall how Desdemona
had once deceived her father. He glancingly suggests that Othello is not “Of her
own clime, complexion, and degree.” He contrives to keep the theme going by a
hint of a pun his author was much given to, as he speaks of “her country forms”.
Ten he leaves the stage (whereat Othello can sum up by musing, “Tis honest
creature, doubtless, / Sees and knows more, much more, than he unfolds”); then
returns to make a special point of the plot potential, in asking that Othello leave
Desdemona free to meet with Cassio.
Left alone this time, Othello muses on the problems of his sweet property: “O
curse of marriage! Tat we can call these delicate creatures ours, / And not their
appetites. I had rather be a toad, / And live upon the vapour of a dungeon, / Tan
keep a corner in the thing I love / For others’ uses.” And as Iago had previously
told Roderigo that “they say base men being in love have then a nobility in their
natures more than is native to them,” so Othello here likewise considers love in
hierarchic terms: “Yet, ’tis the plague of great ones; / Prerogativ’d are they less
than the base.”
Ten, after Desdemona has made her invaluable contribution to the plot by
losing her handkerchief, (“Your napkin is too little,” Othello had said), and Iago
has come into possession of it (informing the audience that he will “in Cassio’s
lodging lose this napkin, / And let him find it”), Othello sums up the major
cluster of his motives, yielding now frankly to his suspicions:
Othello in the Twentieth Century 247
O! now, for ever
Farewell the tranquil mind; farewell content!
Farewell the plumed troop and the big wars
Tat make ambition virtue! O, farewell!
Farewell the neighing steed, and the shrill trump,
Te spirit-stirring drum, the ear-piercing fife,
Te royal banner, and all quality,
Pride, pomp, and circumstance of glorious war!
And, O you mortal engines, whose rude throats
Te immortal Jove’s dread clamours counterfeit,
Farewell! Othello’s occupation’s gone.
In accordance with our method, we cannot lay too much stress upon
this speech. For the audience is here told explicitly what the exclusive
possession of Desdemona equals for Othello, with what “values” other than
herself she is identified. Here they are listed: Ambition, virtue, quality, pride,
pomp, circumstance, glory, and zest in his dangerous occupation. Within the
magnificently emotional utterance, there is thus an almost essay-like summary.
Over and above what she is, Othello tells us in effect, here are the things she stands
for. All these non-sexual elements are implicit in her sex, which is enigmatically,
magically, by the roundabout route of courtly mystery, the emblem of them.
For such reasons as this, he could later call himself “an honourable murderer”,
saying that he did “all in honour” in slaying the charismatic figure who once had
announced her intention “to preserve this vessel for my lord.” (In the fourth act,
a similar identification will be mentioned briefly: “O, the world has not a sweeter
creature; she might lie by an emperor’s side, and command him tasks.”)
When he threatens to turn his fury against Iago, as he spasmodically doubts
his own torrents of doubt, Iago now lets loose upon the audience Shakespeare’s
best rhetoric of enargeia, in bringing the particulars of infidelity before Othello’s,
and thus the audience’s very eyes, first obliquely, then finally by his lie that
implicates Desdemona in the lascivious movements and treacherous mutterings
attributed to Cassio in his sleep.
Now is the time for the materializing of these fatal errors, concentrated in the
handkerchief as their spirit made manifest. Iago: “But such a handkerchief— / I
am sure it was your wife’s—did I today / See Cassio wipe his beard with.” Within
the explicit conditions of the plot, it has been charged with fatal implications—
whereat the scene, like the raging Pontick which Othello likens to himself (no
ebb tide, all flood), now takes its “compulsive course”, with “violent pace”, while
amidst shouts of “black vengeance”, “hollow hell”, “aspics’ tongues” and “bloody
thoughts”, Iago and Othello come to kneel together, swearing vengeance and
loyalty in vengeance and then, finally, once more, a variant of the Say the Word
device, introducing the theme while ostensibly speaking against it:
Othello 248
Iago. My friend is dead; ’tis done at your request:
But let her live.
Othello. Damn her, lewd minx! O, damn her!
Come, go with me apart; I will withdraw
To furnish me with some swift means of death
For the fair devil.
Kneeling together, and well they should, for they are but two parts of a single
motive—related not as the halves of a sphere, but each implicit in the other.
2
V
“Te Wonder”
“So much ado, so much stress, so much passion about an
Handkerchief! Why was not this call’d the Tragedy of the
Handkerchief? . . . We have heard of Fortunatus his Purse, and of
the Invisible Cloak, long ago worn threadbare, and stow’d up in
the Wardrobe of obsolete Romances: one might think, that there
were a fitter place for this Handkerchief, than that it, at this time
of day, be worn on the Stage, to raise every where all this clutter
and turmoil. Had it been Desdemona’s Garter, the Sagacious
Moor might have smelt a Rat: but the Handkerchief is so
remote a trifle, no Booby, on this side Mauritania, cou’d make
any consequence from it.”
“Desdemona dropt her Handkerchief; therefore she must be
stifl’d.”
“Here we see the meanest woman in the Play takes this
Handkerchief for a trifle below her Husband to trouble his head
about it. Yet we find, it entered into our Poet’s head, to make a
Tragedy of this Trifle.”
—Tomas Rhymer
“Sure, there’s some wonder in this handkerchief,” Desdemona had confided
to Emilia; “I am most unhappy in the loss of it.” And well she might be. For
the handkerchief will sum up the entire complexity of motives. It will be public
evidence of the conspiracy which Othello now wholly believes to exist (and
which, according to our notions on the ironies of property, does exist). And
by the same token, it will be the privacy of Desdemona made public. If she is
enigmatic, emblematic, the gracious fetish not only of Othello, but of all who
abide by these principles of spiritual ownership, then her capital as a woman is
similarly representative, the emblem of her as emblem. Hence, this handkerchief
Othello in the Twentieth Century 249
that bridges realms, being the public surrogate of secrecy, it is an emblem’s
emblem—and in his belief that she had made a free gift of it to another, Othello
feels a torrential sense of universal loss. Since it stands for Desdemona’s privacy,
and since this privacy in turn had stood magically for his entire sense of worldly
and cosmological order, we can readily see why, for Othello, its loss becomes the
ultimate obscenity. But there is a further point to be considered, thus:
Aristotle has said that accidents are best accepted in a tragedy when they
are placed before the play’s beginning, unless they can be made to seem fate-
guided. Explicitly, there is no attempt here to show that the handkerchief is
lost and found by supernatural guidance. Te bluntness of the convenience is
tempered by two devices of the plot: (1) Othello, by talking about it, calls the
audience’s clear attention to it when it falls; (2) since Emilia finds it and gives it
to Iago, rather than Iago’s finding it himself after having talked of wanting it, the
addition of this intermediate step provides a certain tactful modulation between
Desdemona’s losing it and Iago’s getting it. (Also, incidentally, this roundabout
approach supplies complications that will later enable the plot to operate
somewhat “of itself ”, when things must turn against the great impresario, Iago,
Emilia having been given the information that leads to the exposing of him.)
But our main point is this: Tere is a kind of magic in the handkerchief, for
the audience as well as for Othello—and this property serves as the equivalent
of a fate-guided accident (the miraculous). It is this miraculous ingredient in
the handkerchief that makes the audience willing to accept, so late in the play,
the accident whereby Iago came into possession of it after giving notice that he
wanted it. Or we’ll state our position in modified form: Insofar as the accident
is resented, the audience has not felt the equivalent for the fate-guided that we
have in mind.
As we began with the subject of pollution (the subject of catharsis), so here,
when on the subject of wonder (the other great lure of tragedy) we must return
to it. Some psychoanalytic theorists have written of instances where, in dreams,
the various secretions of the human body may become interchangeable. “Te gist
of the matter,” Freud says, “is the replacement of an important secretion . . . by
an indifferent one.” And in accordance with this principle, we believe that some
of the “wonder” in this object derives from such ambiguities, which Othello had
been made to suggest remotely when he said to Desdemona, “I have a salt and
sorry rheum offends me. / Lend me thy handkerchief.” Perhaps we are looking too
closely; but the adjective “salt” previously appeared in Iago’s expression, “As salt
as wolves in pride,” used when first stirring Othello to jealousy. (Oxford—Pride:
mettle or spirit in a horse, 1592; sexual desire, “heat”, esp. in female animals,
1604.) A related usage appears in Act II, scene i, where Iago, lying to Roderigo
about Cassio, speaks of “his salt and most hidden loose affection.”
In any case, we can see for a certainty how Shakespeare proceeds to identify
the handkerchief at the beginning of the fourth act, where Iago shifts from talk
Othello 250
of one “naked with her friend a-bed” to talk of a hypothetical handkerchief. And
the playwright bluntly reënforces the identification by having Othello fall “into an
epilepsy” precisely from the strain of repeating, in great frenzy, this same drastic
association of ideas which Iago had imposed upon him. As with the speech that
ended, “Othello’s occupation’s gone”, a simple “essayistic” listing of associated
topics underlies the expression here too. Indeed, since the intensity of Othello’s
agitation calls properly for a disregard of syntax, the speech at the beginning and
the end does merely state the topics to be associated in our minds:
Lie with her! lie on her! We say, lie on her, when they belie her. Lie with
her! Tat’s fulsome. Handkerchief,—confessions,—handkerchief! . . .
Pish! Noses, ears, and lips. Is it possible?—Confess!—Handkerchief!—
O devil! [Falls in a trance.]
Shakespeare thus does all he can to make sure that this object be the perfect
materialization of the tension which the play is to exploit, or “imitate”. Again,
note that it has both intimate and public aspects, being sometimes tucked away,
sometimes held in full view. It thus has likewise the pontificating attributes best
suited to such an object, and to the kind of mock-revelation it is to supply.
Othello mostly carries on the work of endowing it, for the audience, with a full
range of magic properties. Tus, while speaking of it to Desdemona, in warning
her belatedly against its loss, he uses such resonant expressions as these, all turned
in the direction of the magical: “Egyptian” . . . “to my mother” . . . “charmer” . . .
“subdue my father” . . . “but if she lost it” . . . “she dying gave it me” . . . “To lose’t
or give ’t away, were such perdition / As nothing else could match” . . . “magic”
. . . “A sibyl, that had number’d in the world / Te sun to course two hundred
compasses” (one should also contrive to implicate the story meteorologically) . . .
“prophetic fury” . . . “dy’d in mummy. . . . conserv’d of maidens’ hearts”. (And, he
could add, what all these ingredients are but deflections of: Vessel now standing
for a hierarchic nest of roles; the public emblem of Desdemona’s privacy, which
principle in turn is but the concentrate of Desdemona, herself charismatically
infused, visibly, tangibly, embodying the tensions, or mysteries of property, as
thus personalized with a grace in Desdemona that sets off, and is complemented
by, the Othello–Iago grandeur).
3
Truth, too, is implicated here, terrifyingly. In ownership as thus conceived, our
play is saying in effect, there is also forever lurking the sinister invitation to an
ultimate lie, an illusion carried to the edge of metaphysical madness, as private
ownership, thus projected into realms for which there are no unquestionably
attested securities, is seen to imply also, profoundly, ultimately, estrangement;
hence, we may in glimpses peer over the abyss into the regions of pure abstract
loneliness. All this condition follows from the fact that, if Cassio had wiped his
beard with the handkerchief, as Iago lyingly said he had, then by the logic of the
emotions, by the mad-magical-metaphysical principle of falsus in uno, falsus in
Othello in the Twentieth Century 251
omnibus (particularly when the supposed falsity involved a one that itself stood
for an all), then this beard had by the same token obscenely scratched against
Desdemona’s cheek or pillow.
And, as projected absolutely, all culminated in a last despairing act of total
loneliness. Hence Othello’s suicide said, in the narrative terms for the defining
of essence, that investment as so conceived is essentially reflexive; for this great
male lover, surprisingly, goaded by a man, ends on an imagery of self-abuse, doing
himself violence as, having seized “by the throat” a “circumcised dog,” he “smote
him thus,” and thereby “threw a pearl away” that possessed a richness other
than the tribal. So Othello is “beside himself,” as he must be, for one portion of
himself to slay the other, and as he was “in principle,” when Iago had kneeled
with him in joint vows of vengeance, a posture that was a lie, when considered
rationalistically in terms of the intrigue only, but was profoundest truth, as
regards its purely ritual design.
Tereafter, the play must be brought to a close swiftly. In a summarizing
couplet, Othello will say, as regards the underlying design of the major theme:
“the kiss, the kill; the kill, the kiss.” Cassio, the second theme, will reaffirm the
hierarchic motive in its purity: “For he was great of heart.” And to Lodovico
is entrusted the job of recapitulating the connotations generally: “O bloody
period” . . . “the tragic loading of this bed” . . . “O Spartan dog” (for Iago is called
a dog only a few lines after Othello’s ingenious reference to another figure, a
“circumcised dog,” which the audience interpreted as an allusion to himself,
had terminated startlingly in a twist of sense whereby the allusion could merge
into an act here and now; and since he called this hypothetical figure a Turk, we
might properly recall that Iago earlier, in banter with Desdemona, had referred
to himself as a Turk) . . . “the fortunes of the Moor . . . succeed on you” . . . “the
censure of this hellish villain” . . . “the time, the place, the torture” . . .
Myself will straight abroad, and to the state
Tis heavy act with heavy heart relate.
NOTES
1. It will become clear, as we proceed, that we by no means confine our analysis
of appeal to such “topical” consideration. But “topics”, as discussed in Aristotle’s
Rhetoric, mark one of the points where the work, over and above the appeal of its
internal relations, appeals by reference to “non-aesthetic” factors. The “allusive”
nature of the work need have no literal bearing at all. That is, it would be “allu-
sive”, and correctly allusive, in the sense we have in mind, even though you could
prove that in all the history of Western culture no single “Blackamoor” ever arose
to such office as Othello’s, married a white woman, and as the result of jealous
misunderstandings, strangled her.
Longinus’ On the Sublime offers us the bridge we want, for getting from
the recognized use of topics in Rhetoric to their possible unrecognized presence
Othello 252
in Poetry. For on many occasions he cites instances of oratory, but treats them as
instances of poetry.
Critics systematically recognized that orators employed “topics” to “move”
audiences in the practical meaning of the word “move” (inducing them to make
practical decisions, etc.). But when they came to the analysis of poetry (with its
purely aesthetic way of being “moving”), instead of reference to “topics” they
shifted the stress to “imagery”. (Longinus himself is a good instance of this
change, as his treatise, in contrast with the low rating placed on imagination in
classical works generally, assigns to images and imagination the high place they
attain in nineteenth-century idealism and romanticism.)
“Images,” however, are but one aspect of “topics”. And the shift of terms
conceals a continuity of function. Or, otherwise put: if the topic is said to figure
in the appeal when a given line of oratory is being analyzed, what happens to such
appeal when this same line is appreciated purely as poetry? Does the topical appeal
drop out of the case entirely? Or are such considerations retained, but in disguise,
as critics focus the attention upon “imagery,” with its varying capacity for inducing
moods or forming attitudes?
2. Note that, as the scene progresses, Iago’s part in the development gradually
diminishes. And his contribution is in inverse ratio to Othello’s increasing engage-
ment. At first he must act vigorously, to set Othello into motion. But once Othello
has been fully aroused, and is swinging violently, Iago’s role is reduced to a series
of slight additional pushes, each just enough to maintain the sweeping rhythm of
Othello’s passion.
3. As for Rhymer’s assertion that the handkerchief is trivial: Shakespeare
answered it in advance when Desdemona, talking to Cassio about Othello’s agita-
tion, says that some such concern as matters of state must have “puddled his clear
spirit.” (III, iv, 140.) For in such cases (we would call them hierarchically moti-
vated) “Men’s natures wrangle with inferior things, / Though great ones are their
objects.” In thus pleading for the emblematic, she puts heroically what Rhymer
puts meanly. In effect, she says to the audience: “You, who have come here for
tragic ennoblement, remember that Othello’s tragic excess is noble.” (Incidentally,
our term “excess” here is used advisedly. The Greek word hubris, often used to
designate the hero’s “tragic f law”, is in many contexts translated “excess”. Indeed,
a river on the rampage is said to “hubrize”, whereat we might relevantly recall
Othello likening his mood to the violence of the “Pontick sea”.)
QQQ
1956—Robert B. Heilman. “Othello:
The Unheroic Tragic Hero,” from Magic in the Web:
Action and Language in Othello
Robert B. Heilman (1906–2004) was for more than 20 years the chair-
man of the English Department at the University of Washington. He
wrote and edited many books on Shakespeare and other literary topics.
Othello in the Twentieth Century 253
Te problem of character presented by Othello’s collapse before Iago’s
machinations in 3.3 is handled in three main ways. According to one view, the
problem is insoluble: Othello believes Iago only “by virtue of the convention of
the calumniator credited.” Among the analysts of character, the older tradition
is that Othello is the victim of Iago and remains pretty much the “noble Moor”
throughout; he is guilty only of being too innocent or foolish or simple or
trusting or of losing his usual self-control. According to the other main approach
through character, Othello is not the “noble Moor” at all but has serious defects
of character which cause his downfall—defects such as habitual flight from
reality and as pride. Resultant protests against the deidealizing of Othello may
in part be due to the fact that, after the long dominance of the Bradley view
of Othello, the discoverers of his flaws tend to take his virtues for granted—
courage, desire to do and be right, normal inclination to be open, the impalpable
elements summarized as “charm,” relative freedom from pettiness and duplicity.
But these virtues may coexist with serious defects. I began my study holding
the orthodox view of Othello’s “nobility” but found the impression gradually
modified by repeated readings of the lines. Tere is something in Othello’s own
rhetoric, I suspect, which can simultaneously support conflicting impressions of
his personality. Te sweep, the color, the resonance, the spontaneity, the frequent
exoticism of the images—all this magniloquence suggests largeness and freedom
of spirit, and it is at first easy to forget that self-deception, limitedness of feeling,
and egotism may also inhabit this verbal expansiveness. If there is this ambiguity
in the style, then the style is a fitting instrument for a complexity of character
that we may subconsciously resist because of the obvious elements that have
nourished the long tradition of calling Othello “simple.” Tere is no master
term for Othello—“nobility” or “simplicity” or “passionateness under control”
or “pride” or “romantic idealism.” In following his role one needs a number of
different terms, as different facets of his personality come to the fore, or as one
is attempting to name a moral quality or a secret impulse. In trying to trace a
kind of weakness that leads to the quest for what, though neither satisfied with
the term nor able to hit on an equally compact alternative, I call “positional
assurance,” I also use such terms as “puritanism,” “stoicism,” “self-love,” “self-
deception,” and so on. Whatever the cost in uniformity, some such plurality of
terms cannot be avoided, I believe, without imposing schematic readings.
Te arguments that Othello’s yielding to Iago in 3.3 is explicable in terms of
his character usually turn on such points as these: Iago’s irresistible technique
and his long reputation for honesty; Othello’s fine but simple “extrovert” nature,
suited for action but not for perception and reflection; his deeply passionate
nature, at best held under precarious control; his submerged sexuality, likely
under stress to break out in violence; his unfamiliarity with Venetian ways;
a “racial” self-consciousness, inferiority, and perhaps savagery. It is possible
that Othello’s characteristic quest for assurance of position may reflect in
Othello 254
part an ethnic anxiety; once or twice he speaks in terms that may imply an
alien’s special doubt. Yet such passages are few and incidental; the ideas do not
come up again and again as they would do if they were naggingly present in
his mind. Tough Iago takes some trouble to work on Othello as an outsider
and to arouse the suspicions of the foreigner, Othello’s passions simply do not
mature according to this mold. He thinks of himself as the victim of women
generally (“these delicate creatures . . . / . . . their appetites”—3.3.269–270),
as the victim of marriage in high life (273ff.), as the “horned man” (4.1.63),
rather than, let us say, as the “despised Moor.” (Cf. Shylock’s awareness of
being a Jew.) Shakespeare strives, not for a particularist vulnerability and
rancor, but for the human essence, and Othello’s scope is lost sight of if we can
understand him only by racial psychology. Othello is not a treatise on mixed
marriages, but a drama about Everyman, with the modifications necessary to
individualize him. Othello’s Moorishness, if it is anything more than a neutral
heritage from Cinthio, is less a psychological or moral factor than a symbol
of characteristic human problems currently denoted by such overly familiar
terms as “insecurity” and “rejection.” Moorishness, in this sense, is one of the
ills that flesh is heir to.
Te breakdown of Othello from Act 3 on is a collapse of certain props of
assurance—the assurance of being loved and the assurance of position—upon
which his personality rests and which, as we see long before then, he needs
after the manner of a habit. When he murders Desdemona he no longer has
the assurance of being loved, but, under the pressure of an alert instinct, he has
provided himself with a new “positional assurance.” Tis experience appears to
me to be representative rather than idiosyncratic.
* * *
Cause, Sacrifice, Murder
Te murder scene requires and fulfills all the careful characterization of
Othello that has gone before, for this exactly determines the tone and movement
of the scene. It is the high point of the themes of violence and justice. It is
another in a series of legal actions; like that in Act 1, it is concerned with a charge
of sexual misconduct. In Act 1 there were a defendant, a corroborating witness,
a judge, and a plaintiff given to recklessness but not incapable of reason and
patience. Here we have only the defendant and the plaintiff—a plaintiff given to
self-deception and passion.
* * *
After Desdemona awakes, the dialogue repeatedly draws upon court
procedure. She pleads, “guiltiness I know not” (39) and is warned by Othello:
Othello in the Twentieth Century 255
“Take heed of perjury” (51). But the irony is that Othello undermines his
own role:
Terefore confess thee freely of thy sin;
For to deny each article with oath
Cannot remove nor choke the strong conception
Tat I do groan withal. Tou art to die.
(53–56)
Te court has made up its mind in advance and sentenced her. Te judge loses
his composure, cites the circumstantial evidence that Iago gave him, and abuses
the prisoner: “By heaven, I saw my handkerchief in’s hand! / O perjur’d woman!”
(62–63). If Shakespeare had dramatized evil only by such travestying of justice,
he would have been very effective. But he has gone further.
Othello is not content with the role of judge. Note these lines:
Have you pray’d tonight, Desdemon?
If you bethink yourself of any crime
Unreconcil’d as yet to heaven and grace,
Solicit for it straight.
Des. Ten heaven
Have mercy on me!
Oth. Amen, with all my heart!
Tink on thy sins.
Terefore confess thee freely of thy sin.
Des. Ten Lord have mercy on me!
Oth. I say amen.
(25, 26–28, 33–34, 40, 53, 57)
Tough some of these lines might be spoken by a Christian judge, they belong
rather to the Christian priest, especially the priest in the role of confessor. Tis,
then, is Othello’s climactic means of placing himself on a pinnacle of assurance
and of blinding himself to the true nature of what he does there. Tough he has
already inclined to assume the role of priest, only now has he invested it with a
brief air of dignity, which Shakespeare uses skillfully to dramatize the horror of
Othello’s conduct: to the coolness, the prayerfulness, the almost gentle calmness
of the priest is added the frankness of the killer: “I would not kill thy unprepared
spirit. / No, heaven forfend! I would not kill thy soul” (31–32). Repeatedly
Othello talks of “killing” her—his voice quiet and controlled—at the same time
that he urges her to save her soul. Te shock is that of a murder by rite, of an
Othello 256
exotic depravity in which the selfless spiritual concern and the wholly selfish
violence are confounded. Te priest as killer is a remarkable dramatic conception:
an ultimate violence is expressed by doing violence to all our preconceptions. Tis
strategy is used doubly: the priestly role is worked out alongside the judicial role,
so that we also have the judge as killer. But then the judge, we recall, is also the
plaintiff and the prosecutor: and now he becomes also the executioner—as well
as the confessor bent on the spiritual salvation of the criminal. In this merging
of incompatible roles is the apex of Othello’s self-deception, and here at last we
can see that Othello was so easily deceived, so easily taken in by appearances and
the false physician and the honesty game, because he had such great talent, and
even a need, for self-deception. As we look further, we see that even his actions
as confessor are equivocal: for if Desdemona confesses what he is convinced she
must confess, she will give him the final assurance of his rectitude as judge and
executioner. Te revenger assumes the priest to hide the revenge; but even then
he is not content but must convert the priestly function into an instrument of
self-justification.
* * *
The End of the Case
Othello holds court until the end of the play: the judge (the judge-prosecutor-
priest-executioner) has to find his own crime (in the tragic pattern created by
Sophocles). Te court which had heard only one witness must in time, simply
by being a court—and this is one virtue of Othello’s ritualizing impulse to be
judicial—hear other witnesses. Te late criminal returns from death to charge,
“O, falsely, falsely murder’d!” (117), turning against Othello one of his favorite
words of accusation, and to plead again, “A guiltless death I die” (122). Othello’s
assurance is never dependable; the court is promptly thrown on the defensive,
reviles the victim (128ff.) to questioning Emilia, asserts, on the penalty of being
“damn’d,” that it “did proceed upon just grounds” (138), takes up the “honest
Iago” defense of the sole witness and of itself (148, 154), and then, authority
fading before the indignation of Emilia, fails into a slump while Emilia calls for
help, cross-examines Iago, and blasts his testimony (169ff.). Othello confesses
the death of Desdemona and then patiently, concessively (203, 210), almost
wearily resumes the defense of the court action (200ff., 210ff.). Tis part of Act
5 is arranged with especial skill, since the movement comes inevitably from the
characters and leads to maximum dramatic effect. Tere is an alternating rhythm
of passion in Othello and Emilia: the first violence of his defense is overborne by
her shock and incredulity, and when these have almost exhausted her, he is ready
to present an orderly and relatively unimpassioned summary of the evidence. And
it is just this complete judicial review of the case which leads at last to the hero’s
self-recognition in error (discovery of his “mistake” if not complete discovery of
Othello in the Twentieth Century 257
himself ) that distinguishes tragedy from the brute disaster that impinges only
on the beholders. For Othello’s defense of the court must name the handkerchief,
and this arouses Emilia to a new frenzy in which she tells the true story of the
handkerchief (219 ff.). Tis is the ironic climax of the court metaphor: in the end
the handkerchief does have evidential value—but the reverse of what Othello
had supposed. Te circumstantial evidence which he had admitted and relied on
and which once apparently revealed Desdemona to Othello, now partly reveals
Othello to himself.
Othello’s first impulse, after his new vision of truth, is to execute summary
justice on Iago, whom he attacks twice, the first time acting as a self-appointed
deputy for an apparently tardy or ineffectual divine justice: “Are there no
stones in heaven . . . ?” (234). Here is something again of Othello’s inclination
to spectacle, to the large mouth-filling stage effect; and the impulse to blame
the outer agency of evil and thus avert recognition of inner responsiveness to
it. But he does come to the judging of himself, according to his abilities; thus
the spirit of justice persists; human order is served by an implicit extension
of the very ritual of the court that earlier permitted Othello to gloss over
the role of revenge. Te instinct for ritualization, though it may be directed
toward self-deception, is related to the instinct for justice which includes self-
judgment. Te principle of the court is brought into play, and the individual
is subordinated to it, regaining community. Iago, on the other hand, in the
end simply closes up, hardens up in silence and resistance, hugs himself to
himself in a shut-off, private world that, though it may break under the cruder
instruments of retributive justice, is impermeable to spirit (cf. Othello’s “free
and open nature”—1.3.405).
It is possible to view the bowing before justice sentimentally, as we know from
the turn which drama aspiring to seriousness took in the eighteenth century. It
is, indeed, one of the more difficult feats to achieve a submission to justice—an
acknowledgement of one’s own errors—which is not also a prostration of dignity;
in this the dramatist wrestles with the paradox of the attainment of self in the
eclipse of self, and he becomes committed to cardinal problems of spirit. Te
greatness of Othello is not generally of that dimension. Shakespeare approaches
the personality rather in terms of a not wholly overt conflict between the sense
of justice and a vague appetite for eluding or circumventing its implications: he
gives us a series of self-judgments whose rigor is modified by men’s partiality to
other objectives.
* * *
Othello appears before the court of his own conscience, is sentenced to death by
himself, and executed by himself. He takes on the same multiplicity of roles that
had led to gross injustice in his dealing with Desdemona; his incompetence in
Othello 258
the earlier case he purges by his sentencing himself now; justice is served finally
by the death of the judge.
Perhaps we should say only that “overt justice” is served. For the foreground
action of the court (judicial self-judgment) is modified by a background action
of the feelings (personal self-judgment) that admits a charity which is excluded
from the sentencing itself. Te total self-judgment is colored by elements of
personality that we have discerned in other parts of the play. In other words,
we have again a provocatively ambiguous court scene, but one which tellingly
reverses the terms of the trial of Desdemona: there the private emotion was
primary but was qualified by the form of justice; here the act of justice is
primary but is qualified by the habits of private feeling. Two elements are tightly
interwoven, and we would lose sight of one or the other if we judged Othello to
be only the upright executor of justice or, conversely, only the self-regarding loser
sunk in self-pity and self-justification.
He speaks accusingly of his failure to kill Iago and keeps his own weapon
(5.2.243, 270–271). But here, too, is something of his love for executive despatch:
the man who disposed quickly and neatly of the cases of Cassio and Desdemona
has been inefficient in dealing with Iago, and on top of that he is hemmed in
by Gratiano. He is able to check the comfort of warrior’s memories—“O vain
boast!” (264) but falls into the sheer defensiveness of “Who can control his fate?”
(265), as if he were not actively concerned in the disaster. But, in another attempt
to face the moral issue, he turns to Desdemona’s body: “at compt,” he says, “Tis
look of thine will hurl my soul from heaven, / And fiends will snatch at it”
(273–275). Yet even here he in some way slights the present by leaping from past
to future: he less defines the quality of his act than anticipates its consequences. In
fact, he is a little disposed to revel in the hellish aftermath: “Whip me, . . . / . . . /
Blow me about in winds! roast me in sulphur! / Wash me in steep-down gulfs
of liquid fire!” (277–280). Here is the tendency to violence, even to spectacle; the
summoning of such penalties has a histrionic side. Indeed, Othello, the tough
man of war, the stoic in body, equates punishment with physical torment, which,
as he portrayed himself in Act 1, is just what he can best endure. “Facing the
consequences,” when these mean anguish of the flesh, may be a lesser task than
facing one’s spiritual state. When Lodovico asks Othello, in effect, to explain
himself, Othello replies: “An honourable murderer, if you will; / For naught did
I in hate, but all in honour” (294–295). Othello does say “murderer,” and it is
possible that combining “honourable” with “murderer” may be a bitter irony at
his own expense. But the second line, as well as Othello’s general incapacity for
the oblique, makes it very likely that he means, not “nothing but a murderer,
trying to look honorable,” but “though, alas, a murderer, still an honorable man.”
“Naught . . . in hate” again displays self-deception: Othello does not know how
close hate is to love, and he has forgot the intensity of his passion to destroy. In
Othello in the Twentieth Century 259
“all in honour” there is his old quest of assurance of position. Honor is a surrogate
for the justice that has gone utterly wrong: in lieu of the lost “cause” it implies a
code that ennobles the private lust for punitive action. Yet by “honor” he means
less the “active honor” that implies obligation of self to others than the “passive
honor” that asserts the obligation of others to oneself and one’s accompanying
privilege of imposing penalties on those who fail.
Amid spasmodic attacks on Iago, Othello approaches humility at only
one moment: when he asks Cassio’s pardon for plotting his death (300). His
terms of abuse for Iago are more frequent and more severe than the terms
of judgment for himself. On hearing the final details of the handkerchief
story, Othello cries “O fool! fool! fool!” (323). His epithet reminds him only
of the least of his errors. He somehow conveys the impression that his big
mistake was not so much murder and revenge as it was depriving himself of
Desdemona; he less repudiates the violence than deplores the silly mistakes
which wiped out a very nice girl. To understand the incompleteness of the
self-judgment we have only to recall the stern self-appraisal of Roderigo:
“O, villain that I am!” (5.1.29). Te impression of a not wholly disciplined
partiality persists even in his death speech, that ingenuous apologia in which
Othello bids the onlookers, “Speak of me as I am” (342), and then, with no
more self-awareness than before, labors to present an “I am” which will at the
last minute give all the assurance possible to a man about to be executed and
all the help possible to those willing to “extenuate” his history. Othello’s death
sentence does represent a self-judgment or at least an invocation of justice as a
public act; but while it is a penalty, it is also an act of desperation, a flight from
bereavement. Te guilt is never specified, but the extenuating circumstances
are. Te judge and prosecutor becomes, in the end, his own defense attorney,
accepting the ultimate legal penalty but throwing himself morally on the
mercy of the court of public opinion. He has “done the state some service,
and they know’t” (339); what the observers of these events must report is
“unlucky deeds” (341), as though no will had been involved; he was “wrought,
/ Perplex’d in the extreme” (345–346)—words which do not report that there
was no effort at the delay that might have untangled the maze of difficulties;
he “threw a pearl away”—a note of pitiable loss rather than of misconduct;
his eyes “Drop tears” (350) rapidly—the marks of a grief and tenderness that
appeal for sympathy and that might err but not overtly do evil. “Set you down
this” he goes on (351), as if he (who in Act 1 thought in terms of “cue” and
“prompter”) and they were collaborating on a work of dramatic art. As in
Act 1, Othello is conscious of his role and of his audience, particularly now
when he sharply focuses all eyes and ears on himself and his last words and
theatrically punctuates his death statement with the death blow. His final
stroke in the picture of himself is this:
Othello 260
And say besides that in Aleppo once,
Where a malignant and a turban’d Turk
Beat a Venetian and traduc’d the state,
I took by th’ throat the circumcised dog
And smote him—thus
(352–356)
In a last effort at security (self-esteem and popularity) he invites the Venetians
to remember him as a hero of both state and religion. Ironically, his analogy—in
which, as earlier (2.3.170), he plays for stock response of turkophobia—also has
the effect of making him a malignant dog. Tey may be a self-betrayal or, as I
suggested earlier, a symbolic effort at recovery by self-definition. But the effect of
the moral judgment of self is obscured by the showmanship. Othello’s last court
plays for at least a murmur of applause.
Othello is the least heroic of Shakespeare’s tragic heroes. Te need for
justification, for a constant reconstruction of himself in acceptable terms, falls
short of the achieved selfhood which can plunge with pride into great errors
and face up with humility to what has been done. All passion spent, Othello
obscures his vision by trying to keep his virtues in focus. Te Moor, the warrior,
the survivor of exotic adventures, the romantic historian of self, is oddly affiliated
with the middle-class hero, and in his kind of awareness we detect a prevision of
later domestic drama.
It is these aspects of Othello’s personality that are lost sight of when his ending
is pictured as a rather glorious affair. His very defensiveness and sentiment and
sense of loss and of good intention not quite explicably gone awry win an affection
which a stern facing of spiritual reality might not. In Othello, the hero is—a rare
thing—very close to Everyman in his latent capacity for violence and in all his
ordinary self-protective devices. Tis is the underlying, though unidentified,
reason why it is easy to “feel with” him. It is easy to feel with him, also, because
he ends things with a beguiling masterfulness; he commands attention, without
a disaffectingly conspicuous ostentation: his very use of reckless power matches
a secret impulse. With his uninhibitedness, he provides the observer with a
release for the unredeemed, though normally controlled, egotism that can aspire
secretly both to self-justification and to easy authority over the eyes and hearts
of others. Mature men resist the gratifications of these impulses when they
come separately; if they are offered together, the double beguilement requires a
sharper-eyed resistance. But Othello offers not only these satisfactions that may
slide in unperceived; he is, besides, carrying out at least a partial justice. If he is
not facing himself in the full truth of his deeds, he is unmistakably sentencing
himself to the ultimate penalty—as a pusillanimous person could not do. And
finally, to increase his claim upon our feelings, there come into our memories,
beyond that seductive union of spectacle and self-punishment before our eyes,
Othello in the Twentieth Century 261
impressions of other qualities of his—of the zealous soldier, the loyal servant of
the state, the candid and uncalculating man who, unlike Iago, desired the good.
Tis is the complex, and not easily resistible, recipe for the “noble Moor.” And a
portion of that nobility, of the largeness of the public figure, is there. So are the
failures, the self-centeredness, the blindness, the spiritual immaturity that we
have described. Tough it is easy to call Othello “simple,” the characterization is
far from simple, and it exacts of us the same double awareness as the trait of his
which we may call aspiration—an impulse which may lead to nobility or to flight
from actuality, or to something of both at once. In all his major actions there is
a comparable ambiguity.
In trying to win approval, from others and himself, Othello includes in his
summation a one-line definition of himself which has been remembered better
than any other part of his apologia—as “one that lov’d not wisely, but too well”
(344). Was his vice really an excess of a virtue? Or should he have said “not wisely,
nor enough”? One can guess that the constant quest of assurance might mean
less a free giving of self than a taking for self.
QQQ
1961—W. H. Auden.
“The Joker in the Pack,” from Encounter
W. H. Auden (1907–1973) was one of the most famous poets of the
century; his criticism was also influential. This essay was first published
in the journal Encounter and later appeared in Auden’s collection of
essays The Dyer’s Hand.
Reason is God’s gift; but so are the passions.
Reason is as guilty as passion.
—J. H. NEWMAN
I
Any consideration of the Tragedy of Othello must be primarily occupied, not with
its official hero but with its villain. I cannot think of any other play in which
only one character performs personal actions—all the deeds are Iago’s—and
all the others without exception only exhibit behavior. In marrying each other,
Othello and Desdemona have performed a deed, but this took place before the
play begins. Nor can I think of another play in which the villain is so completely
triumphant: everything Iago sets out to do, he accomplishes—(among his goals,
I include his self-destruction. Even Cassio, who survives, is maimed for life.
Othello 262
If Othello is a tragedy—and one certainly cannot call it a comedy—it is tragic
in a peculiar way. In most tragedies the fall of the hero from glory to misery and
death is the work, either of the gods, or of his own freely chosen acts, or, more
commonly, a mixture of both. But the fall of Othello is the work of another
human being; nothing he says or does originates with himself. In consequence
we feel pity for him but no respect; our aesthetic respect is reserved for Iago.
Iago is a wicked man. Te wicked man, the stage villain, as a subject of serious
dramatic interest does not, so far as I know, appear in the drama of Western
Europe before the Elizabethans. In the mystery plays, the wicked characters, like
Satan or Herod, are treated comically, but the theme of the triumphant villain
cannot be treated comically because the suffering he inflicts is real.
A distinction must be made between the villainous character—figures like
Don John in Much Ado, Richard III, Edmund in Lear, Iachimo in Cymbeline—
and the merely criminal character—figures like Duke Antonio in Te Tempest,
Angelo in Measure for Measure, Macbeth or Claudius in Hamlet. Te criminal
is a person who finds himself in a situation where he is tempted to break the
law and succumbs to the temptation: he ought, of course, to have resisted the
temptation, but everybody, both on stage and in the audience, must admit that,
had they been placed in the same situation, they, too, would have been tempted.
Te opportunities are exceptional—Prospero, immersed in his books, has left the
government of Milan to his brother, Angelo is in a position of absolute authority,
Claudius is the Queen’s lover, Macbeth is egged on by prophecies and heaven-
sent opportunities, but the desire for a dukedom or a crown or a chaste and
beautiful girl are desires which all can imagine themselves feeling.
Te villain, on the other hand, is shown from the beginning as being a
malcontent, a person with a general grudge against life and society. In most cases
this is comprehensible because the villain has, in fact, been wronged by Nature or
Society: Richard III is a hunchback, Don John and Edmund are bastards. What
distinguishes their actions from those of the criminal is that, even when they
have something tangible to gain, this is a secondary satisfaction; their primary
satisfaction is the infliction of suffering on others, or the exercise of power over
others against their will. Richard does not really desire Anne; what he enjoys is
successfully wooing a lady whose husband and father-in-law he has killed. Since
he has persuaded Gloucester that Edgar is a would-be parricide, Edmund does
not need to betray his father to Cornwall and Regan in order to inherit. Don
John has nothing personally to gain from ruining the happiness of Claudio and
Hero except the pleasure of seeing them unhappy. Iachimo is a doubtful case of
villainy. When he and Posthumus make their wager, the latter warns him:
If she remain unseduced, you not making it appear otherwise, for your
ill opinion and th’assault you have made on her chastity you shall answer
me with your sword.
Othello in the Twentieth Century 263
To the degree that his motive in deceiving Posthumus is simply physical fear of
losing his life in a duel, he is a coward, not a villain; he is only a villain to the
degree that his motive is the pleasure of making and seeing the innocent suffer.
Coleridge’s description of Iago’s actions as “motiveless malignancy” applies in
some degree to all the Shakespearian villains. Te adjective motiveless means,
firstly, that the tangible gains, if any, are clearly not the principal motive and,
secondly, that the motive is not the desire for personal revenge upon another for
a personal injury. Iago himself proffers two reasons for wishing to injure Othello
and Cassio. He tells Roderigo that, in appointing Cassio to be his lieutenant,
Othello has treated him unjustly, in which conversation he talks like the
conventional Elizabethan malcontent. In his soliloquies with himself, he refers to
his suspicion that both Othello and Cassio have made him a cuckold, and here he
talks like the conventional jealous husband who desires revenge. But there are, I
believe, insuperable objections to taking these reasons, as some critics have done,
at their face value. If one of Iago’s goals is to supplant Cassio in the lieutenancy,
one can only say that his plot fails for, when Cassio is cashiered, Othello does
not appoint Iago in his place. It is true that, in Act III, Scene 3, when they swear
blood-brotherhood in revenge, Othello concludes with the words
. . . now thou are my lieutenant
to which Iago replies:
I am your own for ever
but the use of the word lieutenant in this context refers, surely, not to a public
military rank, but to a private and illegal delegation of authority—the job
delegated to Iago is the secret murder of Cassio, and Iago’s reply, which is a
mocking echo of an earlier line of Othello’s, refers to a relation which can never
become public. Te ambiguity of the word is confirmed by its use in the first line
of the scene which immediately follows. Desdemona says
Do you know, sirrah, where the Lieutenant Cassio lies?
(One should beware of attaching too much significance to Elizabethan
typography, but it is worth noting that Othello’s lieutenant is in lower case
and Desdemona’s in upper). As for Iago’s jealousy, one cannot believe that a
seriously jealous man could behave towards his wife as Iago behaves towards
Emilia, for the wife of a jealous husband is the first person to suffer. Not only
is the relation of Iago and Emilia, as we see it on stage, without emotional
tension, but also Emilia openly refers to a rumor of her infidelity as something
already disposed of.
Othello 264
Some such squire it was
Tat turned your wit, the seamy side without
And made you to suspect me with the Moor.
At one point Iago states that, in order to revenge himself on Othello, he will
not rest till he is even with him, wife for wife, but, in the play, no attempt at
Desdemona’s seduction is made. Iago does not make an assault on her virtue
himself, he does not encourage Cassio to make one, and he even prevents
Roderigo from getting anywhere near her.
Finally, one who seriously desires personal revenge desires to reveal himself.
Te revenger’s greatest satisfaction is to be able to tell his victim to his face—
“You thought you were all-powerful and untouchable and could injure me with
impunity. Now you see that you were wrong. Perhaps you have forgotten what
you did; let me have the pleasure of reminding you.”
When at the end of the play, Othello asks Iago in bewilderment why he
has thus ensnared his soul and body, if his real motive were revenge for having
been cuckolded or unjustly denied promotion, he could have said so, instead of
refusing to explain.
In Act II, Scene 1, occur seven lines which, taken in isolation, seem to make
Iago a seriously jealous man.
Now I do love her too.
Not out of absolute lust (though peradventure
I stand accountant for as great a sin)
But partly led to diet my revenge
For that I do suspect the lusty Moor
Hath leaped into my seat; the thought whereof
Doth like a poisonous mineral gnaw my vitals.
But if spoken by an actor with serious passion, these lines are completely at
variance with the rest of the play, including Iago’s other lines on the same
subject.
And it is thought abroad, that twixt my sheets
He’s done my office: I know not if ’t be true
Yet I, for mere suspicion in that kind.
Will do, as if for surety.
It is not inconceivable, given the speed at which he wrote, that, at some point
in the composition of Othello, Shakespeare considered making Iago seriously
jealous and, like his prototype in Cinthio, a would-be seducer of Desdemona,
and that, when he arrived at his final conception of Iago, he overlooked the
Othello in the Twentieth Century 265
incompatibility of the poisonous mineral and the wife-for-wife passages with
the rest.
In trying to understand Iago’s character one should begin, I believe,
by asking why Shakespeare should have gone to the trouble of inventing
Roderigo, a character who has no prototype in Cinthio. From a stage director’s
point of view, Roderigo is a headache. In the first act we learn that Brabantio
had forbidden him the house, from which we must conclude that Desdemona
had met him and disliked him as much as her father. In the second act, in
order that the audience shall know that he has come to Cyprus, Roderigo has
to arrive on the same ship as Desdemona, yet she shows no embarrassment
in his presence. Indeed, she and everybody else, except Iago, seem unaware
of his existence, for Iago is the only person who ever speaks a word to him.
Presumably, he has some official position in the army, but we are never told
what it is. His entrances and exits are those of a puppet: whenever Iago has
company, he obligingly disappears, and whenever Iago is alone and wishes to
speak to him, he comes in again immediately.
Moreover, so far as Iago’s plot is concerned, there is nothing Roderigo
does which Iago could not do better without him. He could easily have found
another means, like an anonymous letter, of informing Brabantio of Desdemona’s
elopement and, for picking a quarrel with a drunken Cassio, he has, on his own
admission, other means handy.
Tree lads of Cyprus, noble swelling spirits
Tat hold their honours in a wary distance,
Te very elements of this warlike isle
Have I to-night flustered with flowing cups.
Since Othello has expressly ordered him to kill Cassio, Iago could have
murdered him without fear of legal investigation. Instead, he not only chooses
as an accomplice a man whom he is cheating and whose suspicions he has
constantly to allay, but also a man who is plainly inefficient as a murderer and
also holds incriminating evidence against him.
A man who is seriously bent on revenge does not take unnecessary risks
nor confide in anyone whom he cannot trust or do without. Emilia is not, as in
Cinthio, Iago’s willing accomplice, so that, in asking her to steal the handkerchief,
Iago is running a risk, but it is a risk he has to take. By involving Roderigo in his
plot, he makes discovery and his own ruin almost certain. It is a law of drama
that, by the final curtain, all secrets, guilty or innocent, shall have been revealed
so that all, on both sides of the footlights, know who did or did not do what,
but usually the guilty are exposed either because, like Edmund, they repent and
confess or because of events which they could not reasonably have foreseen.
Don John could not have foreseen that Dogberry and Verges would overhear
Othello 266
Borachio’s conversation, nor Iachimo that Pisanio would disobey Posthumus’
order to kill Imogen, nor King Claudius the intervention of a ghost.
Had he wished, Shakespeare could easily have contrived a similar kind of
exposure for Iago. Instead, by giving Roderigo the role he does, he makes Iago as
a plotter someone devoid of ordinary worldly common sense.
One of Shakespeare’s intentions was, I believe, to indicate that Iago desires
self-destruction as much as he desires the destruction of others but, before
elaborating on this, let us consider Iago’s treatment of Roderigo, against
whom he has no grievance—it is he who is injuring Roderigo—as a clue to his
treatment of Othello and Cassio.
When we first see Iago and Roderigo together, the situation is like that in
a Ben Johnson comedy—a clever rascal is gulling a rich fool who deserves to
be gulled because his desire is no more moral than that of the more intelligent
avowed rogue who cheats him out of his money. Were the play a comedy, Roderigo
would finally realize that he had been cheated but would not dare appeal to the
law because, if the whole truth were made public, he would cut a ridiculous or
shameful figure. But, as the play proceeds, it becomes clear that Iago is not simply
after Roderigo’s money, a rational motive, but that his main game is Roderigo’s
moral corruption, which is irrational because Roderigo has given him no cause
to desire his moral ruin. When the play opens, Roderigo is shown as a spoiled
weakling, but no worse. It may be foolish of him to hope to win Desdemona’s
affection by gifts and to employ a go-between, but his conduct is not in itself
immoral. Nor is he, like Cloten in Cymbeline, a brute who regards women as mere
objects of lust. He is genuinely shocked as well as disappointed when he learns
of Desdemona’s marriage, but continues to admire her as a woman full of most
blessed condition. Left to himself, he would have had a good bawl, and given her
up. But Iago will not let him alone. By insisting that Desdemona is seducible and
that his real rival is not Othello but Cassio, he brings Roderigo to entertain the
idea, originally foreign to him, of becoming a seducer and of helping Iago to ruin
Cassio. Iago had had the pleasure of making a timid conventional man become
aggressive and criminal. Cassio beats up Roderigo. Again, at this point, had he
been left to himself, he would have gone no further, but Iago will not let him
alone until he consents to murder Cassio, a deed which is contrary to his nature,
for he is not only timid but also incapable of passionate hatred.
I have no great devotion to the deed:
And yet he has given me satisfying reasons.
’Tis but a man gone.
Why should Iago want to do this to Roderigo? To me, the clue to this and
to all Iago’s conduct is to be found in Emilia’s comment when she picks up the
handkerchief.
Othello in the Twentieth Century 267
My wayward husband hath a hundred times
Wooed me to steal it . . .
what he’ll do with it
Heaven knows, not I,
I nothing but to please his fantasy.
As his wife, Emilia must know Iago better than anybody else does. She
does not know, any more than the others, that he is malevolent, but she does
know that her husband is addicted to practical jokes. What Shakespeare gives
us in Iago is a portrait of a practical joker of a peculiarly appalling kind, and
perhaps the best way of approaching the play is by a general consideration of
the Practical Joker.
II
Social relations, as distinct from the brotherhood of a community, are only
possible if there is a common social agreement as to which actions or words are
to be regarded as serious means to a rational end and which are to be regarded
as play, as ends in themselves. In our culture, for example, a policeman must be
able to distinguish between a murderous street fight and a boxing match, or a
listener between a radio play in which war is declared and a radio news-broadcast
announcing a declaration of war.
Social life also presupposes that we may believe what we are told unless
we have reason to suppose, either that our informant has a serious motive for
deceiving us, or that he is mad and incapable himself of distinguishing between
truth and falsehood. If a stranger tries to sell me shares in a gold mine, I shall
be a fool if I do not check up on his statements before parting with my money,
and if another tells me that he has talked with little men who came out of a
flying saucer, I shall assume that he is crazy. But if I ask a stranger the way to the
station, I shall assume that his answer is truthful to the best of his knowledge,
because I cannot imagine what motive he could have for misdirecting me.
Practical jokes are a demonstration that the distinction between seriousness
and play is not a law of nature but a social convention which can be broken, and
that a man does not always require a serious motive for deceiving another.
Two men, dressed as city employees, block off a busy street and start digging it
up. Te traffic cop, motorists and pedestrians assume that this familiar scene has
a practical explanation—a water main or an electric cable is being repaired—and
make no attempt to use the street. In fact, however, the two diggers are private
citizens in disguise who have no business there.
All practical jokes are anti-social acts, but this does not necessarily mean
that all practical jokes are immoral. A moral practical joke exposes some flaw in
society which is a hindrance to a real community or brotherhood. Tat it should
be possible for two private individuals to dig up a street without being stopped
Othello 268
is a just criticism of the impersonal life of a large city where most people are
strangers to each other, not brothers; in a village where all the inhabitants know
each other personally, the deception would be impossible.
A real community, as distinct from social life, is only possible between
persons whose idea of themselves and others is real, not fantastic. Tere is,
therefore, another class of practical jokes which is aimed at particular individuals
with the reformatory intent of de-intoxicating them from their illusions. Tis
kind of joke is one of the stock devices of comedy. Te deceptions practiced on
Falstaff by Mistress Page, Mistress Ford and Dame Quickly, or by Octavian on
Baron Ochs are possible because these two gentlemen have a fantastic idea of
themselves as lady-charmers; the result of the jokes played upon them is that
they are brought to a state of self-knowledge and this brings mutual forgiveness
and true brotherhood. Similarly, the mock deaths of Hero and of Hermione are
ways of bringing home to Claudio and to Leontes how badly they have behaved
and of testing the genuineness of their repentance.
All practical jokes, friendly, harmless or malevolent, involve deception, but not
all deceptions are practical jokes. Te two men digging up the street, for example,
might have been two burglars who wished to recover some swag which they
knew to be buried there. But, in that case, having found what they were looking
for, they would have departed quietly and never been heard of again, whereas,
if they are practical jokers, they must reveal afterwards what they have done or
the joke will be lost. Te practical joker must not only deceive but also, when he
has succeeded, unmask and reveal the truth to his victims. Te satisfaction of the
practical joker is the look of astonishment on the faces of others when they learn
that all the time they were convinced that they were thinking and acting on their
own initiative, they were actually the puppets of another’s will. Tus, though his
jokes may be harmless in themselves and extremely funny, there is something
slightly sinister about every practical joker, for they betray him as someone who
likes to play God behind the scenes. Unlike the ordinary ambitious man who
strives for a dominant position in public and enjoys giving orders and seeing
others obey them, the practical joker desires to make others obey him without
being aware of his existence until the moment of his theophany when he says:
“Behold the God whose puppets you have been and behold, he does not look like
a god but is a human being just like yourselves.” Te success of a practical joker
depends upon his accurate estimate of the weaknesses of others, their ignorances,
their social reflexes, their unquestioned presuppositions, their obsessive desires,
and even the most harmless practical joke is an expression of the joker’s contempt
for those he deceives.
But, in most cases, behind the joker’s contempt for others lies something else,
a feeling of self-insufficiency, of a self lacking in authentic feelings and desires
of its own. Te normal human being may have a fantastic notion of himself,
but he believes in it: he thinks he knows who he is and what he wants so that
Othello in the Twentieth Century 269
he demands recognition by others of the value he puts upon himself and must
inform others of what he desires if they are to satisfy them.
But the self of the practical joker is unrelated to his joke. He manipulates
others but, when he finally reveals his identity, his victims learn nothing about
his nature, only something about their own; they know how it was possible for
them to be deceived but only why he chose to deceive them. Te only answer
that any practical joker can give to the question: “Why did you do this?” is Iago’s:
“Demand me nothing. What you know, you know.”
In fooling others, it cannot be said that the practical joker satisfies any
concrete desire of his nature: he has only demonstrated the weaknesses of others
and all he can now do, once he has revealed his existence, is to bow and retire
from the stage. He is only related to others, that is, so long as they are unaware
of his existence: once they are made aware of it, he cannot fool them again, and
the relation is broken off.
Te practical joker despises his victims, but at the same time he envies them
because their desires, however childish and mistaken, are real to them, whereas
he has no desire which he can call his own. His goal, to make game of others,
makes his existence absolutely dependent upon theirs; when he is alone, he is a
nullity. Iago’s self-description, I am not what I am, is correct and the negation of
the Divine I am that I am. If the word motive is given its normal meaning of a
positive purpose of the self like sex, money, glory, etc., then the practical joker
is without motive. Yet the professional practical joker is certainly driven, like a
gambler, to his activity, but the drive is negative, a fear of lacking a concrete self,
of being nobody. In any practical joker to whom playing such jokes is a passion,
there is always an element of malice, a projection of his self-hatred onto others,
and in the ultimate case of the absolute practical joker, this is projected onto
all created things. Iago’s statement, “I am not what I am,” is given its proper
explanation in the Credo which Boito wrote for him in his libretto for Verdi’s
opera.
Credo in un Dio crudel che m’ha creato
Simile a se, e che nell’ira io nomo.
Dall viltà d’un germe e d’un atomo
Vile son nato,
Son scellerto
Perchè son uomo:
E sento il fango originario in me
E credo l’uom gioco d’iniqua sorte
Dal germe della culla
Al verme dell’avel.
Vien dopo tanto irrision la Morte
E poi? La Morte e il Nulla.
Othello 270
Equally applicable to Iago is Valéry’s “Ebauche d’un serpent.” Te serpent speaks
to God the Creator thus
O Vanité! Cause Première
Celui qui règne dans les Cieux
D’une voix qui fut la lumière
Ouvrit l’univers spacieux.
Comme las de son pur spectacle
Dieu lui-même a rompu l’obstacle
De sa parfaite éternité;
Il se fit Celui qui dissipe
En conséquences son Principe,
En étoiles son Unité.
And of himself thus
Je suis Celui qui modifie
the ideal motto, surely, for Iago’s coat of arms.
Since the ultimate goal of Iago is nothingness, he must not only destroy
others, but himself as well. Once Othello and Desdemona are dead his
“occupation’s gone.”
To convey this to an audience demands of the actor who plays the role
the most violent contrast in the way he acts when Iago is with others and the
way he acts when he is left alone. With others, he must display every virtuoso
trick of dramatic technique for which great actors are praised, perfect control
of movement, gesture, expression, diction, melody and timing, and the ability
to play every kind of role, for there are as many “honest” Iagos as there are
characters with whom he speaks, a Roderigo Iago, a Cassio Iago, an Othello Iago,
a Desdemona Iago, etc. When he is alone, on the other hand, the actor must
display every technical fault for which bad actors are criticized. He must deprive
himself of all stage presence, and he must deliver the lines of his soliloquies in
such a way that he makes nonsense of them. His voice must lack expression, his
delivery must be atrocious, he must pause where the verse calls for no pauses,
accentuate unimportant words, etc.
III
If Iago is so alienated from nature and society that he has no relation to time
and place—he could turn up anywhere at any time—his victims are citizens of
Shakespeare’s Venice. To be of dramatic interest, a character must to some degree
be at odds with the society of which he is a member, but his estrangement is
normally an estrangement from a specific social situation.
Othello in the Twentieth Century 271
Shakespeare’s Venice is a mercantile society, the purpose of which is not
military glory but the acquisition of wealth. However, human nature being what
it is, like any other society, it has enemies, trade rivals, pirates, etc., against whom
it must defend itself, if necessary by force. Since a mercantile society regards
warfare as a disagreeable, but unfortunately sometimes unavoidable, activity and
not, like a feudal aristocracy, as a form of play, it replaces the old feudal levy by
a paid professional army, nonpolitical employees of the State, to whom fighting
is their specialized job.
In a professional army, a soldier’s military rank is not determined by his social
status as a civilian, but by his military efficiency. Unlike the feudal knight who
has a civilian home from which he is absent from time to time but to which,
between campaigns, he regularly returns, the home of the professional soldier is
an army camp and he must go wherever the State sends him. Othello’s account
of his life as a soldier, passed in exotic landscapes and climates, would have struck
Hotspur as unnatural, unchivalrous and no fun.
A professional army has its own experiences and its own code of values which
are different from those of civilians. In Othello, we are shown two societies, that
of the city of Venice proper and that of the Venetian army. Te only character
who, because he is equally estranged from both, can simulate being equally
at home in both, is Iago. With army folk he can play the blunt soldier, but in
his first scene with Desdemona upon their arrival in Cyprus, he speaks like a
character out of Love’s Labour’s Lost. Cassio’s comment
Madam, you may relish him more in the soldier than the scholar
is provoked by envy. Iago has excelled him in the euphuistic flirtatious style
of conversation which he considers his forte. Roderigo does not feel at home,
either with civilians or with soldiers. He lacks the charm which makes a man a
success with the ladies, and the physical courage and heartiness which make a
man popular in an army mess. Te sympathetic aspect of his character, until Iago
destroys it, is a certain humility; he knows that he is a person of no consequence.
But for Iago, he would have remained a sort of Bertie Wooster, and one suspects
that the notion that Desdemona’s heart might be softened by expensive presents
was not his own but suggested to him by Iago.
In deceiving Roderigo, Iago has to overcome his consciousness of his
inadequacy, to persuade him that he could be what he knows he is not,
charming, brave, successful. Consequently, to Roderigo and, I think, to
Roderigo only, Iago tells direct lies. Te lie may be on a point of fact, as when
he tells Roderigo that Othello and Desdemona are not returning to Venice
but going to Mauritania, or a lie about the future, for it is obvious that even if
Desdemona is seducible, Roderigo will never be the man. I am inclined to think
that the story Iago tells Roderigo about his disappointment over the lieutenancy
Othello 272
is a deliberate fabrication. One notices, for example, that he contradicts himself.
At first he claims that Othello had appointed Cassio in spite of the request of
three great ones of the city who had recommended Iago, but then a few lines
later, he says
Preferment goes by letter and affection,
Not by the old gradation where each second
Stood heir to the first.
In deceiving Cassio and Othello, on the other hand, Iago has to deal with
characters who consciously think well of themselves but are unconsciously
insecure. With them, therefore, his tactics are different; what he says to them is
always possibly true.
Cassio is a ladies’ man, that is to say, a man who feels most at home in feminine
company where his looks and good manners make him popular, but is ill at ease
in the company of his own sex because he is unsure of his masculinity. In civilian
life he would be perfectly happy, but circumstances have made him a soldier
and he has been forced by his profession into a society which is predominantly
male. Had he been born a generation earlier, he would never have found himself
in the army at all, but changes in the technique of warfare demand of soldiers,
not only the physical courage and aggressiveness which the warrior has always
needed, but also intellectual gifts. Te Venetian army now needs mathematicians,
experts in the science of gunnery. But in all ages, the typical military mentality is
conservative and resents the intellectual expert.
A fellow
Tat never set a squadron in the field
Nor the division of a battle knows
More than a spinster . . . mere prattle without practise
Is all his soldiership
is a criticism which has been heard in every army mess in every war. Like so
many people who cannot bear to feel unpopular and therefore repress their
knowledge that they are, Cassio becomes quarrelsome when drunk, for alcohol
releases his suppressed resentment at not being admired by his comrades in
arms and his wish to prove that he is what he is not, as “manly” as they are. It is
significant that, when he sobers up, his regret is not that he has behaved badly
by his own standards but that he has lost his reputation. Te advice which Iago
then gives him, to get Desdemona to plead for him with Othello, is good advice
in itself, for Desdemona obviously likes him, but it is also exactly the advice a
character-type like Cassio will be most willing to listen to, for feminine society
is where he feels most at home.
Othello in the Twentieth Century 273
Emilia informs Cassio that, on her own initiative, Desdemona has already
spoken on his behalf and that Othello has said he will take the safest occasion
by the front to restore him to his post. Hearing this, many men would have been
content to leave matters as they were, but Cassio persists: the pleasure of a heart-
to-heart talk with a lady about his fascinating self is too tempting.
While he is talking to Desdemona, Othello is seen approaching and she
says;
Stay and hear me speak.
Again, many men would have done so, but Cassio’s uneasiness with his own
sex, particularly when he is in disgrace, is too strong and he sneaks away, thus
providing Iago with his first opportunity to make an insinuation.
Cassio is a ladies’ man, not a seducer. With women of his own class, what he
enjoys is socialized eroticism; he would be frightened of serious personal passion.
For physical sex he goes to prostitutes and when, unexpectedly, Bianca falls in
love with him, like many of his kind, he behaves like a cad and brags of his
conquest to others. Tough he does not know who the owner of the handkerchief
actually is, he certainly knows that Bianca will think that it belongs to another
woman, and to ask her to copy it is gratuitous cruelty. His smiles, gestures and
remarks about Bianca to Iago are insufferable in themselves; to Othello, who
knows that he is talking about a woman, though he is mistaken as to her identity,
they are an insult which only Cassio’s death can avenge.
In Cinthio nothing is said about the Moor’s color or religion, but Shakespeare
has made Othello a black Negro who has been baptized.
No doubt there are differences between color prejudice in the twentieth
century and color prejudice in the seventeenth and probably few of Shakespeare’s
audience had ever seen a Negro, but the slave trade was already flourishing and
the Elizabethans were certainly no innocents to whom a Negro was simply a
comic exotic. Lines like
. . . an old black ram
is tupping your white ewe . . .
Te gross clasps of a lascivious Moor . . .
What delight shall she have to look on the devil
are evidence that the paranoid fantasies of the white man in which the Negro
appears as someone who is at one and the same time less capable of self-control
and more sexually potent than himself, fantasies with which, alas, we are only too
familiar, already were rampant in Shakespeare’s time.
Te Venice of both Te Merchant of Venice and Othello is a cosmopolitan
society in which there are two kinds of social bond between its members, the
Othello 274
bond of economic interest and the bond of personal friendship, which may
coincide, run parallel with each other or conflict, and both plays are concerned
with an extreme case of conflict.
Venice needs financiers to provide capital and it needs the best general it can
hire to defend it; it so happens that the most skillful financier it can find is a Jew
and the best general a Negro, neither of whom the majority are willing to accept
as a brother.
Tough both are regarded as outsiders by the Venetian community, Othello’s
relation to it differs from Shylock’s. In the first play, Shylock rejects the
Gentile community as firmly as the Gentile community rejects him; he is just
as angry when he hears that Jessica has married Lorenzo as Brabantio is about
Desdemona’s elopement with Othello. In the second place, while the profession
of usurer, however socially useful, is regarded as ignoble, the military profession,
even though the goal of a mercantile society is not military glory, is still highly
admired and, in addition, for the sedentary civilians who govern the city, it has
a romantic exotic glamour which it cannot have in a feudal society in which
fighting is a familiar shared experience.
Tus no Venetian would dream of spitting on Othello and, so long as there is
no question of his marrying into the family, Brabantio is delighted to entertain
the famous general and listen to his stories of military life. In the army, Othello
is accustomed to being obeyed and treated with the respect due to his rank and,
on his rare visits to the city, he is treated by the white aristocracy as someone
important and interesting. Outwardly, nobody treats him as an outsider as they
treat Shylock. Consequently, it is easy for him to persuade himself that he is
accepted as a brother and when Desdemona accepts him as a husband, he seems
to have proof of this.
It is painful to hear him say
But that I love the gentle Desdemona
I would not my unhoused free condition
Put into circumscription or confine
For the sea’s worth
for the condition of the outsider is always unhoused and free. He does not or will
not recognize that Brabantio’s view of the match
If such actions may have passage free,
Bond-slaves and pagans shall our statesmen be
is shared by all his fellow senators, and the arrival of news about the Turkish fleet
prevents their saying so because their need of Othello’s military skill is too urgent
for them to risk offending him.
Othello in the Twentieth Century 275
If one compares Othello with the other plays in which Shakespeare treats
the subject of male jealousy, Te Winter’s Tale and Cymbeline, one notices that
Othello’s jealousy is of a peculiar kind.
Leontes is a classical case of paranoid sexual jealousy due to repressed
homosexual feelings. He has absolutely no evidence that Hermione and Polixenes
have committed adultery and his entire court are convinced of their innocence, but
he is utterly possessed by his fantasy. As he says to Hermione: “Your actions are my
dreams.” But, mad as he is, “the twice-nine changes of the Watery Starre” which
Polixenes has spent at the Bohemian court, make the act of adultery physically
possible so that, once the notion has entered his head, neither Hermione nor
Polixenes nor the court can prove that it is false. Hence the appeal to the Oracle.
Posthumus is perfectly sane and is convinced against his will that Imogen has
been unfaithful because Iachimo offers him apparently irrefutable evidence that
adultery has taken place.
But both the mad Leontes and the sane Posthumus react in the same way;
“My wife has been unfaithful; therefore she must be killed and forgotten.” Tat
is to say, it is only as husbands that their lives are affected. As king of Bohemia,
as a warrior, they function as if nothing has happened.
In Othello, thanks to Iago’s manipulations, Cassio and Desdemona behave
in a way which would make it not altogether unreasonable for Othello to
suspect that they were in love with each other, but the time factor rules out the
possibility of adultery having been actually committed. Some critics have taken
the double time in the play to be merely a dramaturgical device for speeding the
action which the audience in the theatre will never notice. I believe, however,
that Shakespeare meant the audience to notice it as, in Te Merchant of Venice, he
meant them to notice the discrepancy between Belmont time and Venice time.
If Othello had simply been jealous of the feelings for Cassio he imagined
Desdemona to have, he would have been sane enough, guilty at worst of a lack
of trust in his wife. But Othello is not merely jealous of feelings which might
exist; he demands proof of an act which could not have taken place, and the
effect on him of believing in this physical impossibility goes far beyond wishing
to kill her: it is not only his wife who has betrayed him but the whole universe;
life has become meaningless, his occupation is gone.
Tis reaction might be expected if Othello and Desdemona were a pair like
Romeo and Juliet or Antony and Cleopatra whose love was an all-absorbing
Tristan–Isolde kind of passion, but Shakespeare takes care to inform us that it
was not.
When Othello asks leave to take Desdemona with him to Cyprus, he stresses
the spiritual element in his love.
I therefore beg it not
To please the palate of my appetite
Othello 276
Nor to comply with heat, the young affects
In me defunct, and proper satisfaction,
But to be free and bounteous to her mind.
Tough the imagery in which he expresses his jealousy is sexual—what other
kind of images could he use?—Othello’s marriage is important to him less as a
sexual relationship than as a symbol of being loved and accepted as a person, a
brother in the Venetian community. Te monster in his own mind too hideous
to be shown is the fear he has so far repressed that he is only valued for his social
usefulness to the City. But for his occupation, he would be treated as a black
barbarian.
Te overcredulous, overgood-natured character which, as Iago tells us, Othello
had always displayed is a telltale symptom. He had had to be overcredulous in
order to compensate for his repressed suspicions. Both in his happiness at the
beginning of the play and in his cosmic despair later, Othello reminds one more
of Timon of Athens than of Leontes.
Since what really matters to Othello is that Desdemona should love him as
the person he really is, Iago has only to get him to suspect that she does not, to
release the repressed fears and resentments of a lifetime, and the question of what
she has done or not done is irrelevant.
Iago treats Othello as an analyst treats a patient except that, of course,
his intention is to kill not to cure. Everything he says is designed to bring to
Othello’s consciousness what he has already guessed is there. Accordingly, he has
no need to tell lies. Even his speech, “I lay with Cassio lately,” can be a truthful
account of something which actually happened: from what we know of Cassio,
he might very well have such a dream as Iago reports. Even when he has worked
Othello up to a degree of passion where he would risk nothing by telling a direct
lie, his answer is equivocal and its interpretation is left to Othello.
Othello: What hath he said?
Iago: Faith that he did—I know not what he did.
Othello: But what?
Iago: Lie—
Othello: With her?
Iago: With her, on her, what you will.
Nobody can offer Leontes absolute proof that his jealousy is baseless: similarly,
as Iago is careful to point out, Othello can have no proof that Desdemona really
is the person she seems to be.
Iago makes his first decisive impression when, speaking as a Venetian with
firsthand knowledge of civilian life, he draws attention to Desdemona’s hood-
winking of her father.
Othello in the Twentieth Century 277
Iago: I would not have your free and noble nature
Out of self-bounty be abused, look to’t:
I know our country disposition well:
In Venice they do let God see the pranks
Tey dare not show their husbands: their best conscience
Is not to leave’t undone but keep’t unknown.
Othello: Dost thou say so?
Iago: She did deceive her father, marrying you:
And when she seemed to shake and fear your looks,
She loved them most.
Othello: And so she did.
Iago: Why, go to then!
She that so young could give out such a seeming
To seal her father’s eyes up, close as oak.
He thought ’twas witchcraft.
And a few lines later, he refers directly to the color difference.
Not to affect many proposed matches,
Of her own clime, complexion, and degree,
Whereto we see in all things nature tends,
Foh! one may smell in such a will most rank,
Foul disproportions, thoughts unnatural.
But pardon me: I do not in position
Distinctly speak of her, though I may fear
Her will, recoiling to her better judgment
May fall to match you with her country-forms,
And happily repent.
Once Othello allows himself to suspect that Desdemona may not be the person
she seems, she cannot allay the suspicion by speaking the truth but she can
appear to confirm it by telling a lie. Hence the catastrophic effect when she
denies having lost the handkerchief.
If Othello cannot trust her, then he can trust nobody and nothing, and
precisely what she has done is not important. In the scene where he pretends that
the Castle is a brothel of which Emilia is the Madam, he accuses Desdemona,
not of adultery with Cassio, but of nameless orgies.
Desdemona: Alas, what ignorant sin have I committed?
Othello: Was this fair paper, this most goodly book
Made to write whore upon. What committed?
Committed? O thou public commoner,
Othello 278
I should make very forges of my cheeks
Tat would to cinders burn up modesty
Did I but speak thy deeds.
And, as Mr. Eliot has pointed out in his farewell speech, his thoughts are not
on Desdemona at all but upon his relation to Venice, and he ends by identifying
himself with another outsider, the Moslem Turk who beat a Venetian and
traduced the state.
Everybody must pity Desdemona, but I cannot bring myself to like her. Her
determination to marry Othello—it was she who virtually did the proposing—
seems the romantic crush of a wily schoolgirl rather than a mature affection; it
is Othello’s adventures, so unlike the civilian life she knows, which captivate her
rather than Othello as a person. He may not have practiced witchcraft, but, in
fact, she is spellbound. And despite all Brabantio’s prejudices, her deception of
her own father rather makes an unpleasant impression: Shakespeare does not
allow us to forget that the shock of the marriage kills him.
Ten, she seems more aware than is agreeable of the honor she has done
Othello by becoming his wife. Where Iago tells Cassio that “our General’s wife
is now the General” and, soon afterwards, soliloquizes
His soul is so enfettered to her love
Tat she may make, unmake, do what she list
Even as her appetite shall play the god
With his weak function
he is, no doubt, exaggerating, but there is much truth in what he says. Before
Cassio speaks to her, she has already discussed him with her husband and learned
that he is to be reinstated as soon as is opportune. A sensible wife would have
told Cassio this and left matters alone. In continuing to badger Othello, she
betrays a desire to prove to herself and to Cassio that she can make her husband
do as she pleases. She is frightened because she is suddenly confronted with a
man whose sensibility and superstitions are alien to her.
Tough her relation with Cassio is perfectly innocent, one cannot but share
Iago’s doubts as to the durability of the marriage. It is worth noting that, in the
willow-song scene with Emilia, she speaks with admiration of Lodovico and
then turns to the topic of adultery. Of course, she discusses this in general terms
and is shocked by Emilia’s attitude, but she does discuss the subject and she does
listen to what Emilia has to say about husbands and wives. It is as if she had
suddenly realized that she had made a mésalliance and that the sort of man she
ought to have married was someone of her own class and color like Lodovico.
Given a few more years of Othello and of Emilia’s influence and she might well,
one feels, have taken a lover.
Othello in the Twentieth Century 279
IV
And so one comes back to where one started, to Iago, the sole agent in the
play. A play, as Shakespeare said, is a mirror held up to nature. Tis particular
mirror bears the date 1604, but, when we look into it, the face that confronts
us is our own in the middle of the twentieth century. We hear Iago say the
same words and see him do the same things as an Elizabethan audience heard
and saw, but what they mean to us cannot be exactly the same. To his first
audience and even, maybe, to his creator, Iago appeared to be just another
Machiavellian villain who might exist in real life but with whom one would
never dream of identifying oneself. To us, I think, he is a much more alarming
figure; we cannot hiss at him when he appears as we can hiss at the villain
in a Western movie because none of us can honestly say that he does not
understand how such a wicked person can exist. For is not Iago, the practical
joker, a parabolic figure for the autonomous pursuit of scientific knowledge
through experiment which we all, whether we are scientists or not, take for
granted as natural and right?
As Nietzsche said, experimental science is the last flower of asceticism. Te
investigator must discard all his feelings, hopes and fears as a human person and
reduce himself to a disembodied observer of events upon which he passes no
value judgment. Iago is an ascetic. “Love” he says, “is merely a lust of the blood,
and a permission of the will.”
Te knowledge sought by science is only one kind of knowledge. Another
kind is that implied by the Biblical phrase, “Ten Adam knew Eve, his wife,” and
it is this kind I still mean when I say, “I know John Smith very well.” I cannot
know in this sense without being known in return. If I know John Smith well,
he must also know me well.
But, in the scientific sense of knowledge, I can only know that which does not
and cannot know me. Feeling unwell, I go to my doctor who examines me, says
“You have Asian flu,” and gives me an injection. Te Asian virus is as unaware of
my doctor’s existence as his victims are of a practical joker.
Further, to-know in the scientific sense means, ultimately, to-have-power-
over. To the degree that human beings are authentic persons, unique and self-
creating, they cannot be scientifically known. But human beings are not pure
persons like angels; they are also biological organisms, almost identical in their
functioning, and, to a greater or lesser degree, they are neurotic, that is to say,
less free than they imagine because of fears and desires of which they have no
personal knowledge but could and ought to have. Hence, it is always possible to
reduce human beings to the status of things which are completely scientifically
knowable and completely controllable.
Tis can be done by direct action on their bodies with drugs, lobotomies,
deprivation of sleep, etc. Te difficulty about this method is that your victims
will know that you are trying to enslave them and, since nobody wishes to be
Othello 280
a slave, they will object, so that it can only be practiced upon minorities like
prisoners and lunatics who are physically incapable of resisting.
Te other method is to play on the fears and desires of which you are aware
and they are not until they enslave themselves. In this case, concealment of your
real intention is not only possible but essential for, if people know they are being
played upon, they will not believe what you say or do what you suggest. An
advertisement based on snob appeal, for example, can only succeed with people
who are unaware that they are snobs and that their snobbish feelings are being
appealed to and to whom, therefore, your advertisement seems as honest as Iago
seems to Othello.
Iago’s treatment of Othello conforms to Bacon’s definition of scientific enquiry
as putting Nature to the Question. If a member of the audience were to interrupt
the play and ask him: “What are you doing?” could not Iago answer with a boyish
giggle, “Nothing. I’m only trying to find out what Othello is really like”? And we
must admit that his experiment is highly successful. By the end of the play he does
know the scientific truth about the object to which he has reduced Othello. Tat
is what makes his parting shot, “What you know, you know,” so terrifying for, by
then, Othello has become a thing, incapable of knowing anything.
And why shouldn’t Iago do this? After all, he has certainly acquired
knowledge. What makes it impossible for us to condemn him self-righteously
is that, in our culture, we have all accepted the notion that the right to know is
absolute and unlimited. Te gossip column is one side of the medal; the cobalt
bomb the other. We are quite prepared to admit that, while food and sex are
good in themselves, an uncontrolled pursuit of either is not, but it is difficult
for us to believe that intellectual curiosity is a desire like any other, and to
realize that correct knowledge and truth are not identical. To apply a categorical
imperative to knowing, so that, instead of asking, “What can I know?” we ask,
“What, at this moment, am I meant to know?”—to entertain the possibility that
the only knowledge which can be true for us is the knowledge we can live up
to—that seems to all of us crazy and almost immoral. But, in that case, who are
we to say to Iago—“No, you mustn’t.”
QQQ
1983—A. D. Nuttall. “Othello,” from
A New Mimesis: Shakespeare and the Representation of Reality
A. D. Nuttall, who died in 2007, was a professor at Oxford and one
of the most admired Shakespearean scholars of recent years. His last
book was Shakespeare the Thinker.
Othello in the Twentieth Century 281
Shakespeare’s play about Venice, Othello, has been the occasion of a classic
dispute in Transparent criticism. Tere is disagreement about the hero: is he, in
fact, heroic? Othello’s speech at the end of the play causes most of the trouble:
Soft you; a word or two before you go.
I have done the state some service, and they know’t—
No more of that. I pray you, in your letters,
When you shall these unlucky deeds relate,
Speak of me as I am; nothing extenuate,
Nor set down aught in malice. Ten must you speak
Of one that loved not wisely, but too well;
Of one not easily jealous, but, being wrought,
Perplexed in the extreme; of one whose hand,
Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away
Richer than all his tribe; of one whose subdu’d eyes,
Albeit unused to the melting mood,
Drops tears as fast as the Arabian trees
Teir med’cinable gum. Set you down this;
And say besides that in Aleppo once,
Where a malignant and a turban’d Turk
Beat a Venetian and traduc’d the state,
I took by th’throat the circumcised dog.
And smote him—thus.
(He stabs himself )
(V. ii. 341–59)
T. S. Eliot in ‘Shakespeare and the Stoicism of Seneca’ observed that in this speech
Othello seems to be ‘cheering himself up’: ‘He is endeavouring to escape reality,
he has ceased to think about Desdemona, and is thinking about himself.’ F. R.
Leavis in his ‘Diabolic intellect and the noble hero’ picked up a word applied by
Eliot to the Stoic hero, ‘self-dramatization’, and said that this speech by Othello,
though it begins in quiet authority, ends precisely in self-dramatization: no tragic
hero this, but one who has learned nothing from his misfortune and would rather
rant than think. On the other side stands Dame Helen Gardner. In her article,
‘Te noble Moor’, she reaffirmed the essential nobility of Othello, his generosity,
the greatness of his heart, his absoluteness and disinterestedness; and many felt
that the cynics had been silenced.
My general argument has been that Shakespeare’s mimesis is unusually
comprehensive. He moves forward on a total front. He imitates individuals but
he also imitates contexts. My response to this disagreement of Transparent critics
is to stand further back for a while. Tere are more things in this play than the
figure of Othello, and it may be that in understanding some of them we shall
Othello 282
understand him. To begin with we may be utterly formalist and ask what kind
of play Othello is.
Shakespeare’s plays have come down to us in the triple division into comedies,
histories and tragedies laid down by the editors of the First Folio. Tere is in
this division a large measure of editorial accident, for the three categories are
not co-ordinate. Richard II is, clearly, a history, but, equally clearly, it is also a
tragedy. Indeed it is formally a better tragedy than Othello in that it deals with
the fall of a prince. Othello, on the other hand, is about an almost bourgeois
Italian household, a misunderstanding and a murder at a level which involves
no repercussions among nations. Its social milieu is that normally inhabited by
comedy. Tis social difference is enough to stamp Richard II as central tragedy
and Othello as peripheral tragedy.
Othello, to be sure, is not the only Shakespearean tragedy to deal with upper-
middle-class goings-on. Romeo and Juliet refers to a similar section of society, but
then it has long been commonplace to observe that Romeo and Juliet opens like
a comedy. Te long dynastic rivalry of Montagues and Capulets brings us nearer
to the proper political stature of central tragedy than anything that can happen
behind Othello’s closed front door.
But there is the phrase ‘domestic tragedy’. Is this appropriate to Othello?
Te phrase ‘domestic tragedy’ is commonly used to connote a distinct genre: all
those Elizabethan and Jacobean plays which dealt with real-life murders and
scandals, such as Jonson’s and Dekker’s Te Lamentable Tragedy of the Page of
Plymouth, Yarrington’s Two Lamentable Tragedies, A Yorkshire Tragedy (about a
man who murdered his two children) and Arden of Faversham (about the murder
in 1551 of Tomas Arden by his wife), Wilkin’s Te Miseries of Enforced Marriage,
Heywood’s A Woman Killed with Kindness. It is fairly obvious that these plays
catered for appetites which are served today by the more sensational Sunday
newspapers. Te title pages of these domestic tragedies repeatedly strike a note of
prurient censoriousness which is immediately recognizable. Othello is not in any
straightforward manner a member of this class, although we may note in passing
that both Te Miseries of Enforced Marriage and A Woman Killed with Kindness
deal, like Othello, with the then uncommon theme of marriage. Moreover,
Michel Grivelet has pointed to the popularity among writers of domestic tragedy
of the novellas of Bandello, Boccaccio and Cinthio. Te principal source of
Othello is a novella by Cinthio. Again, the stories of domestic tragedies tend to
crop up later in ballads. Tis is true of Arden of Faversham and it is also true, as
it happens, of Othello.
Te authors of these plays seem not to have used the term ‘domestic tragedy’
themselves. Te word ‘domestic’ was used of ‘what goes on in a house’ (in
accordance with its etymological derivation from domus, ‘house’) and also of
national as opposed to foreign affairs. Tomas Heywood does occasionally play
on this ambiguity, but in the only place where he uses ‘domestic’ to designate
Othello in the Twentieth Century 283
genre (‘domestic histories’) he is referring to chronicles of England. Te earliest
example in the Oxford English Dictionary of domestic as opposed to regal (where
the Dictionary offers the slightly misleading gloss ‘devoted to home life’) is from
Davenant’s Playhouse to be Let:
Kings who move
Within a lowly sphere of private love,
Are too domestic for a throne.
Nevertheless, it is plain that the idea of a contrast between the tragedy of courts
and the tragedy of private, household events was current in Shakespeare’s time.
Te unknown author of A Warning for Fair Women (1599) refers to his play as ‘a
true and home-born tragedy’. Yves Bescou has remarked that in A Woman Killed
with Kindness the house is itself a principal character. But in the common run of
Elizabethan domestic tragedy there is admittedly little sense of tension between
the idea of tragedy and the idea of domesticity.
Here Shakespeare is unlike the rest. For if we say that Othello is his domestic
tragedy we must note that in this case the term connotes a paradox, domestic
and yet a tragedy, tragic and yet domestic. If this is acknowledged the phrase has
a certain utility as a description of the play. Tomas Rymer’s celebrated attack on
Othello, published in 1693, turns primarily on the fact that the play is bathetically
domestic. Speaking of its moral, he says,
First, Tis may be a caution to all Maidens of Quality how, without their
Parents consent, they run away with Blackamoors . . . . Secondly, Tis
may be a warning to all good Wives, that they look well to their Linnen.
Othello’s tragedy indeed is strangely—and formally—introverted; it consists
in the fact that he left the arena proper to tragedy, the battlefield, and entered a
subtragic world for which he was not fitted. Othello is the story of a hero who
went into a house.
Long ago A. C. Bradley observed that, if the heroes of Hamlet and Othello
change places, each play ends very quickly. Hamlet would see through Iago in
the first five minutes and be parodying him in the next. Othello, receiving clear
instructions like ‘Kill that usurper’ from a ghost, would simply have gone to work.
Tus, as the classic problem of Hamlet is the hero’s delay, so the classic problem
of Othello is the hero’s gullibility. Te stronger our sense of Othello’s incongruity
in the domestic world, the less puzzling this becomes. Certainly, Othello is about
a man who, having come from a strange and remote place, found his feet in the
world of Venetian professional soldiership—and then exchanged that spacious
world for a little, dim world of unimaginable horror. ‘War is no strife / To the
dark house and the detested wife’ comes not from Othello but from a comedy,
but it will serve here. Its note of peculiarly masculine pain and hatred can still
Othello 284
score the nerves. It is therefore not surprising that Shakespeare avails himself of
the metaphor of the caged hawk. Desdemona says, ‘I’ll watch him tame’, at III.
iii. 23. Te real process of taming a hawk by keeping it awake and so breaking its
spirit is described at length in T.H. White’s Te Goshawk (1953). Othello turns
the image round when he says of Desdemona,
If I do prove her haggard,
Tough that her jesses were my dear heart-strings,
I’d whistle her off and let her down the wind
To prey at fortune.
(III.iii.264–7)
He speaks formally of Desdemona, but it is hard not to feel that in the last words
it is his own dream of liberty which speaks.
Othello is also about insiders and outsiders. Te exotic Moor finds when he
leaves the public, martial sphere that he is not accepted, is not understood and
cannot understand. Te Venetian colour bar is sexual, not professional. Iago
plays on this with his ‘old black ram . . . tupping your white ewe’ (I. i. 89–90) and
the same note is struck by Roderigo with his ‘gross clasps of a lascivious Moor’
(I. i. 127). Othello’s gullibility is not really so very strange. Coal-black among
the glittering Venetians, he is visibly the outsider, and in his bewilderment he
naturally looks for the man who is visibly the insider, the man who knows the
ropes, the sort of man who is always around in the bar, the ‘good chap’ or (as they
said then) the ‘honest’ man. And he finds him.
Tere are two schools of thought on the sort of actor who should play
Iago. School A chooses a dark, waspish fellow. School B chooses a bluff, straw-
haired, pink-faced sort of man, solid-looking with no nonsense about him.
In production School B triumphs, for the role, cast in this way, becomes both
credible and terrifying. Although Iago is everywhere spoken of as a ‘good chap’,
he has no friends, no loves, no positive desires. He, and not Othello, proves to be
the true outsider of the play, for he is foreign to humanity itself. Othello comes
from a remote clime, but Iago, in his simpler darkness, comes from the far side
of chaos—hence the pathos of Shakespeare’s best departure from his source. In
Cinthio’s novella the Ensign (that is, the Iago-figure) with a cunning affection
of reluctance, suggests that Desdemona is false and then seeing his chance, adds,
‘Your blackness already displeases her.’ In Shakespeare’s play we have instead a
note of bar-room masculine intimacy, in assumed complicity of sentiment. Iago
says, in effect ‘Well, she went with a black man, so what is one to think?’ (III. iii.
232–7). Othello’s need to be accepted and guided makes him an easy victim of
this style. Te hero is set for his sexual humiliation.
From the beginning of the play Othello is associated with outdoor weather,
with openness: ‘Te Moor is of a free and open nature’ (I. iii. 393); ‘But that I
Othello in the Twentieth Century 285
loved the gentle Desdemona, / I would not my unhoused free condition / Put into
circumscription and confine / For the sea’s worth’ (I. ii. 25–8). Note the important
word ‘unhoused’ and the powerful emphasis on the last four monosyllables. In
II. i, set on the quayside in Cyprus, the language bursts into profusion of images
of wind and weather, before it brings Othello down from the high seas into the
encircling arms of his wife. Te effect is best represented by sporadic quotation:
‘What from the cape can you discern at sea? / Nothing at all, it is a high-wrought
flood. / I cannot twixt the heaven and the main/Descry a sail. / Methinks the
wind hath spoke aloud at land; / A fuller blast ne’er shook our battlements. / . . .
Te chidden billow seems to pelt the clouds; / Te wind-shaked surge, with high
and monstrous mane, / Seems to cast water on the burning Bear, / And quench
the guards of th’ever fixed Pole. . . . Te town is empty; on the brow o’th’sea /
Stand ranks of people, and they cry “A sail!” . . . . Great Jove Othello guard, /
And swell his sail with thine own powerful breath, / Tat he may bless this bay
with his tall ship, / Make love’s quick pants in Desdemona’s arms. . . . O my soul’s
joy! / If after every tempest came such calms’ (II. i. 1–6, 12–15, 53–4, 77–80,
182–3). Te diminuendo is marvellously managed: the bay becomes the arms of
Desdemona, the tall ship Othello himself. When, in III. iii, Othello thinks his
married happiness is irretrievably lost, he makes a formal speech of valediction.
Tis speech turns insensibly from a farewell to married contentment into the
real farewell, the real loss, which is the loss of that military action and freedom
in which alone Othello’s true personality could move:
I had been happy if the general camp,
Pioneers and all, had tasted her sweet body,
So I had nothing known. O, now for ever
Farewell the tranquil mind! farewell content!
Farewell the plumed troops, and the big wars
Tat makes ambition virtue! O, farewell!
Farewell the neighing steed and the shrill trump,
Te spirit-stirring drum, th’ear-piercing fife,
Te royal banner, and all quality,
Pride, pomp and circumstance, of glorious war!
And O ye mortal engines whose rude throats
T’immortal Jove’s dread clamours counterfeit,
Farewell! Othello’s occupation’s gone.
(III. iii. 349–61)
Te word ‘big’ in line 353 is exactly right. He is surrounded by things which are
too small to fight with, things like handkerchiefs. When, later in the same scene,
he envisages a dark release from the dreadful circumscription of the house, once
more a great flood surges in the language of the play:
Othello 286
Like to the Pontic sea,
Whose icy current and compulsive force
Ne’er feels retiring ebb, but keeps due on
To the Propontic and the Hellespont;
Even so my bloody thoughts, . . . .
(III. iii. 457–61)
Othello’s gradual disintegration is mirrored in his style of speech, at first swiftly
authoritative, then broken and at last full of a barbaric extremism. Te thing is
done slowly through the play, but there are certain speeches in which the entire
triple development is gone through in little. When near the beginning of the
play the truculent gang comes crowding in with weapons and torches, Othello
easily controls them:
Keep up your bright swords, for the dew will rust them.
(I. ii. 59)
When he is brought before the Duke and the Senators in I. iii he is at first
similar. Asked to account for his conduct he gives the reverend ‘signiors’ a very
gentlemanly account (smooth, unflustered, almost majestic) of the way he won
Brabantio’s daughter (I. iii. 128–70). Tere is no sign of any break in this style
until we reach line 260. Here Othello’s language suddenly becomes problematic,
so much so that most editors assume that the text is corrupt. Te speech appears
in Alexander’s edition of the Works in the following form (Desdemona has just
asked to be allowed to go with him to the wars):
Othello: Let her have your voice.
Vouch with me, heaven, I therefore beg it not
To please the palate of my appetite;
Nor to comply with heat—the young affects
In me defunct—and proper satisfaction;
But to be free and bounteous to her mind
And heaven defend your good souls that you think
I will your serious and great business scant
For she is with me.
(I. iii. 260–8)
Te crux occurs in the baffling third and fourth lines, which remain puzzling even
after they have been amended and repunctuated, as here, by a modern editor. In
the case of this play, it is not easy to determine whether the first Quarto of 1622
or the Folio of 1623 has the higher authority. In the crux before us, however, this
thorny problem fortunately does not arise, for the two are virtually identical. Te
Othello in the Twentieth Century 287
first Quarto gives: ‘Nor to comply with heat, the young affects in my defunct, and
proper satisfaction’. Te difficulties are evident. Is ‘affects’ a noun, in apposition
to ‘heat’, or a verb (the relative pronoun ‘which’ having been elided) which would
turn ‘young’ into a noun, the object of ‘affects’? Should we change ‘my’ to ‘me’
(as Alexander did) so that we can read ‘the young affects in me defunct’ as an
absolute construction, equivalent to ‘the youthful passions being dead in me’?
Does ‘proper’ mean ‘legitimate’ or ‘my own’? Quite obviously, the sentence is a
mess. But a Transparent reading may suggest that nevertheless we can accept it
as it stands; that is, if we look through the fractured form to the possible person
we may understand the forms as we never could if we looked at form alone.
A certain meaning comes through, and indeed it is strange. Othello seems
to be saying, ‘Do not think that I am asking for this out of lust, for I am past
all that, rather I am interested in Desdemona’s mind.’ Tis does not have to be
a full profession of impotence (though the powerful word defunct might be held
to imply that), but only of diminished desires, but this in a newly married hero
is sufficiently arresting. Attempts to make defunct bear some such meaning as
‘discharged’ or ‘freed’ by analogy with the Latin defunctus periculis (‘freed from
perils’) will not do. Tis sense is not found elsewhere in English and, even in Latin,
only emerges when there is an accompanying ablative (periculis). If Othello had
said, ‘defunct from x’, this gloss might have been defensible, but he did not. No
audience hearing these words would understand ‘discharged’. Othello, beginning
to explain that his request does not arise from lust, for the first time loses control
of his sentence and so, we may infer, of his thoughts. Why?
Desdemona has just intervened in the men’s world of senatorial debate with
a sexual candour almost as startling as Othello’s sexual retreat:
My heart’s subdu’d
Even to the very quality of my lord:
I saw Othello’s visage in his mind;
And to his honours and his valiant parts
Did I my soul and fortunes consecrate.
So that, dear lords, if I he left behind,
A moth of peace, and he go to the war,
Te rites for why I love him are bereft me,
And I a heavy interim shall support
By his dear absence. Let me go with him.
(I. iii. 250–9)
Tere is no serious doubt that ‘rites’ in line 257 is a reference to the consummation
of the marriage. Tis is what throws Othello off balance. She began by speaking
of his mind—that part was excellent, carried no danger in terms of the stereotype
of the lascivious Moor—but then she asked to be allowed to consummate the
Othello 288
marriage. Othello’s status in Venetian society is strong as long as it is kept separate
from questions of sexuality. His speech is a stumbling, eager attempt to quash the
implication of lasciviousness and to recover balance by catching at Desdemona’s
initial emphasis on mental affinity. Te two speeches, Desdemona’s and Othello’s,
are chiastically arranged: ABBA, mind, desire, desire, mind, but Othello’s
answering version is strangled and broken. To emend is to make it smooth. But
the very roughness can be seen as correct, if one intuits a person in the part.
Te editorial questions may still need answers (I think ‘affects’ is probably a
noun and that ‘proper’ means here ‘my own’) but an actor can deliver the speech
as given in the first Quarto, if he is allowed to stammer or hesitate. It remains
true that the speech, thus unamended, would count as the most extreme piece
of naturalistic confusion in the canon (though Leontes’ speech, ‘Affection! thy
intention stabs the centre’ in Te Winter’s Tale, I. ii. 138–46, comes very close). Te
collapse of Othello’s language is microcosmic of the collapse of his personality
in the entire tragedy.
Othello was perplexed in the extreme before Iago went to work on him.
Marriage itself disoriented him. Naturally, his valediction of marital happiness
became a valediction of the military life. It was there that he last knew himself.
We are now in a position to return to his final speech before he stabs himself
(V. ii. 341–59). Othello quietly stops the captors who would lead him away; he
speaks briefly of his service to the state and then asks that, when the story of his
actions and his fate is told, it should be fairly told; if it is fair, it will tell not of
a pathologically jealous man but rather of a confused man, one who threw away
a treasure and weeps for it; moreover the story should also include the slaying
of the Turk long ago in Aleppo. As he tells of the slaying of the Turk, he kills
himself on the clinching word ‘thus’.
In this speech the pathos of the outsider reaches a climax. It is true that
Othello has not attained full understanding, but there is a kind of dignity, for that
very reason, in ‘perplexed in the extreme’ (V. ii. 349). In the course of the speech
his mind flinches away from the mangled, unintelligible scene around him, back
to his heroic past, when he had an honoured part to play. It is no accident that
Othello’s memory, in its search for a feat proper to be remembered, should light
on the slaying of the turbanned Turk. To assert his Venetian status to the full
he needs as enemy a spectacularly foreign figure. Yet, as we watch him, we see,
not a Venetian but—precisely—a spectacularly foreign figure. Tat this is art of
the highest order rather than accident is brought home by the conclusion of the
speech. For at the moment when Othello comes, in his remote narrative, to the
slaying of the foreigner, before our eyes he stabs himself, in a horrific parallelism.
It is as if as his last act of devoted service, his last propitiatory offering to the
state, he kills the outsider, Othello.
Let us now turn to the questions we posed at the outset. Is the rhetoric of
his speech self-dramatizing, histrionic, or is it noble? I answer, it is noble, but
Othello in the Twentieth Century 289
its nobility is tragically deracinated. I said before that Othello’s tragedy lay in
the fact that he left the arena proper to tragedy. Te logical ‘shimmer’ of this
suggestion affects our perceptions of his final speech. Nobility thus isolated
and astray is infected with absurdity, but the very absurdity is tragic. Othello’s
rhetoric is the rhetoric of a shame-culture. . . . Othello’s shame-culture is more
primitive, more thoroughly pre-Stoic than Coriolanus’s, and his difference from
the society around him is also greater.
Othello is actually simpler than those around him. A shame-culture identifies
glory and virtue. Te manner in which this survived in Shakespeare’s time (and,
to some extent in ours) was in the notions of honour and reputation. Tus Cassio
harps desperately on his ‘reputation’ as ‘the immortal part’ of himself (II. iii. 253–
7). But it is in Othello that we find the notion of reputation, not as something
extrinsic but as the centre of his moral identity, operating with enough force
(as Iago knows) to kill him. At I. iii. 274 Othello says, in the first Quarto,
‘Let . . . all indign and base adversities / Make head against my reputation.’ Tere
he is insisting still on a confidence which is seriously threatened. But then, in a
marvellous scene, Iago gets to work within Othello’s mind, thinking his thoughts
aloud for him and he knows well on which nerve he should press:
But he that filches from me my good name
Robs me of that which not enriches him
And makes me poor indeed.
(III. iii. 163–5)
In the world of professional military action Othello was a human being. When
he passed through the door of the house he became a kind of nothing. Te word
‘occupation’ is in our day and was in Shakespeare’s a relatively colourless word (it
had a few extra meanings then, but that is by the way). Shakespeare is therefore
doing something very deliberate when he places it at the climax of Othello’s
speech of valediction at 111. iii. 349–61: ‘Othello’s occupation’s gone.’ He is
making sure that we notice that the idea of profession or métier has an ethical
status in Othello’s mind which it does not naturally have in ours.
Venice in Othello is the same city we [see] in Te Merchant of Venice. Othello
is thus no feudal baron or chieftain, but a professional mercenary, paid by the
state. Tus a certain continuity of economic reference links the two plays. But
in Othello Shakespeare plays down the references to money. Instead he develops
at greater length something which is also present in Te Merchant of Venice.
At III. iii. 31 Antonio said, ‘the trade and profit of the city / Consisteth of all
nations.’ Venice is the landless city where different kinds and races meet in a
strangely abstract effort of aggrandizement. Te sea is the medium of their wars
as money is the medium of their wealth. Tis, in Te Merchant of Venice, yielded
the endlessly fruitful contrast between a Jewish and a Christian consciousness. In
Othello 290
Othello it permits the study of a primitive consciousness yoked to the service of
a complex, civic society. Venice is for Shakespeare an anthropological laboratory.
Itself nowhere, suspended between sea and sky, it receives and utilizes all kinds
of people.
Othello in his last speech is reverting to the earlier phase. Utterly beaten by his
domestic environment, he goes back into his heroic past and delivers his formal
vaunt (characteristic of the shame-culture hero from the boasts of the Homeric
warrior to the beot-word of the Anglo-Saxons, and thence to the ‘I killed me a
b’ar when I was three’ of the American folk hero) though, at the beginning of
his speech at least, Othello is restrained by his civilized environment. Te speech,
properly delivered, should not sound more and more shrilly histrionic as it goes
on. On the contrary, it should gather strength and confidence. Te actor must
draw himself up to his full physical height. Of course there is immense pathos.
For—though we dispute their judgement—we are now in a position to account
for the reaction of Eliot and Leavis. Othello’s behaviour, if judged by the mores of
the city, would be merely theatrical. It may really have a therapeutic function, if
not of ‘cheering him up,’ of galvanizing muscles trained to kill. But ultimately all
talk of self-dramatization is a product of the discrepancy between Othello’s own
nature and the place in which he finds himself. Shame-culture is more concerned
than later cultures with outward behaviour; indeed, it locates identity in outward
features. Tus for a shame-culture what in us would be artificial posturing may
be a means of recovering one’s true self. For all the pathos of incomprehension
Othello is at last more authentically himself than at any time since the beginning
of the play. Tis recovery of self, however achieved, corresponds to the ‘moment
of insight’ customary in tragedies and successfully prevents Othello from turning
into a ‘sick’ paraphrase or serious parody of tragic form. Te core of Othello’s
nobility is real. He has reached a clearing in the forest, a small but sufficient open
space in the labyrinth. He has come to a place where, once more, he has a job to
do—a job like the jobs he did before—and he knows how to do it well. It is to
kill himself. His words recall his feats against the foreign dog and his conclusion
is another feat, both like and horribly unlike those.
Tus Othello joins the basically economic insight into cultural variation which
we find in Te Merchant of Venice to the contrast of heroic and civic cultures which
is so finely treated in the Roman plays. Although Othello postdates Coriolanus
and is more primitive than he, there is nevertheless implicit in what I have been
saying a shadowy version of the ‘evolving human nature’ we [see] in the Roman
plays. Te civic state naturally succeeds the heroic. Othello does not merely
belong to another culture but to an earlier one. In the first of the three great
dramatists of ancient Greece, Aeschylus, there is virtually no distinction between
motive and public situation (this is a continuation of a shame-culture refusal to
separate inner and outer). Te dilemma of Orestes is essentially public: one god
says ‘Do this,’ another god says, ‘Do that.’ Tere is no question of attributing
Othello in the Twentieth Century 291
hesitation or procrastination to Orestes as a feature of his character (indeed,
he can hardly be said to have character). Tis holds to some extent for Othello,
or for Othello’s conception of Othello. Remember here Bradley’s remark, cited
earlier, about Hamlet and Othello changing places. One thing Othello does not
suffer from is hesitation or infirmity of purpose. Between the thing which is to
be done and the doing of it no mental shadow falls.
At a later stage of cultural evolution people become aware that their actions
are not only provoked by the outside world but are also inwardly motivated.
Te notion of self, as we saw, begins to contract. Te shame-culture hero is his
strength, his gleaming arms, even, at times, his cloud of assisting goddesses.
Later we begin to assume that the self is separate from such external factors; we
say ‘Oh, yes, she did well in the four-hour examination, but that’s just because
she happens to have a strong constitution—it’s not merit.’ I suppose this is the
present phase for most of us. Can one imagine a further phase? By continuing the
trend, we would get an even more narrowly contracted ego, perhaps one which
might even view its own motives as separate from itself. Certainly a person like
that would seem civilized—rather horribly so—and would be a proper product
of a world grown very old.
One cannot ascribe to Othello as developed a conspectus of evolving human
nature as we find in Julius Caesar and Coriolanus but it may be, nevertheless, that
in Othello, some four or five years later than Julius Caesar, Shakespeare began to
push harder at the idea I have just let fall. If Othello is the underevolved man,
who is overevolved? Te answer is Iago. For if the workings of Othello’s mind
recall the oldest literature we have, Iago’s evoke a literature as yet unwritten, the
literature of existentialism, according to which any assumption of motive by the
ego is an act of unconditional, artificial choice. Mark Antony is strange but Iago
is far stranger. Mark Antony exploits the emotion he really feels; Iago chooses
which emotions he will experience. He is not just motivated, like other people.
Instead he decides to be motivated. He concedes that he has no idea whether
Othello has had sexual relations with his wife. He simply opts, in a vacuum, for
that as a possible motive.
I think I know how this astonishing idea occurred to Shakespeare. In the
seventh story of the third decade of the Hecatommithi of Giraldi Cinthio, the
following passage occurs (I quote from the careful translation by Raymond Shaw,
given in an appendix to M. R. Ridley’s New Arden edition of Othello):
Te wicked ensign, caring nothing for the loyalty due to his wife or the
friendship, loyalty and duty he owed the Moor, fell passionately in love
with Disdemona and turned all his thoughts to seeing whether he might
enjoy her. . . . Everything that the ensign did to kindle in her a love for
him was useless. So he imagined that the reason was that Disdemona
had become enamoured of the captain and so decided to put him out of
Othello 292
the way. Furthermore he changed the love that he bore the lady into the
bitterest hatred.
Te important phrase is ‘So he imagined’ and the crucial word is ‘so’. Te Italian,
which Shakespeare may have read, reproduces this feature. I assume that in fact
it is merely verbal slackness on Cinthio’s part. But, taken literally, it implies that
the ensign deliberately imagined that something was the case, and this impression
is reinforced by the active voice of ‘changed’ a few lines below where we might
have expected ‘his love changed’. Most readers would hardly notice these two
tiny anomalies. But Shakespeare, I suspect, did notice them, and paused in his
reading. For here is the germ of the existentialist Iago.
QQQ
1992—Harold Bloom. “Introduction,” from Iago
Harold Bloom is a professor at Yale University. He has edited dozens
of anthologies of literature and literary criticism and is the author of
more than 30 books, including The Western Canon and Shakespeare: The
Invention of the Human.
To see Iago as affiliated with his fellow-Machiavel, Edmund, is traditional;
to see his troubling affinities with some aspects of Hamlet, the counter-
Machiavel, is not altogether untraditional. Hamlet and Iago alike are theatrical
geniuses, though the Prince of Denmark’s genius is universal, whereas Iago,
who prides himself upon his military talents, displays throughout a dramatic
grasp of the power of fantasy that rivals Shakespeare’s own. I cannot therefore
agree with the late C. L. Barber and Richard P. Wheeler when, in their very
useful book, Te Whole Journey, they say of Iago: “What he seeks is to become
the Moor by making the Moor enact his fantasies, fantasies that will destroy
them both. When that is accomplished, he can stop.” Iago is too aware of
the incommensurateness between his godlike general and himself to seek to
become Othello, and dreadfully enough the fantasies that Iago makes the Moor
enact are authentically Othello’s own uneasy imaginings. Shakespeare’s grand
negations, at their strongest, are figures in a kind of negative poetics, even a
kind of dramatic negative theology. Iago, like Hamlet, is a great improviser. He
does not set out to become the Moor, or to destroy the Moor; it may be that he
does not even begin with the desire to destroy Desdemona. I think we need to
start farther back with Iago, in order to see more fully how original a character
he was, and is. Iago is not a skeptic, but a believer. His religion is war, and his
god is Othello, and so his fury when Cassio is preferred to him is the fury of
Othello in the Twentieth Century 293
the priest or worshipper who has been found unworthy, or at least less worthy
than another who lacks the intensity of his own devotion. Iago becomes instead
a priest of Resentment, fit ancestor for many current pale clerks whose faith
has been thwarted.
Iago, as Harold Goddard wisely said, is the incarnation of the spirit of
modern war, indeed a prophecy of total war, the religion of war. His truest
forerunner in Shakespeare is not Richard III but Ulysses, the theoretician of
war, indeed its positive theologian, as opposed to its negative theologians in Iago
and Edmund, and its fantastic imagination in Macbeth. Just as the relationship
between Lear’s Fool and Lear, or between Falstaff and Hal, cannot be understood
without our recognizing the extraordinary ambivalence of the Fool towards
Lear, and of Hal towards Falstaff, so we need to comprehend Iago primarily
in terms of his apocalyptic ambivalence in regard to Othello. Even as the play
opens, we confront in Iago’s ambivalence something very close to its descendant
in Melville’s Ahab. Ahab’s Othello is Moby Dick, conceived as a great Gnostic
Demiurge, a cosmic principle that inspires hatred and revenge. Iago’s Moby
Dick is the superb Othello, greatest of captains, worshipped by Iago as the
God of War, but the worship has become hatred and a spur to revenge. Moby
Dick has crippled Ahab, perhaps castrated him, but the permanent mystery of
Shakespeare’s tragedy is that Othello has done nothing to Iago, except failed to
give him preference over Cassio. Yet in a perspective granted by the negative
theology of war-as-religion, Iago’s malignancy is anything but motiveless. For
Iago, God or Othello is everything, because war is everything, and if Othello
prefers Cassio, then Iago is nothing, as Cain felt he was nothing when Abel was
preferred by Yahweh, or as Satan in Paradise Lost believes himself to be nothing
when he belatedly hears Christ preferred by Milton’s God. Iago is neither Cain
nor the Devil, but something far worse: a priest of Moloch or Mars who is also
a master psychologist, a great playwright and a theologian of the primal Abyss.
Iago’s cognitive power is his most astonishing attribute; his intellect is as quick
and fecund as Hamlet’s, though vastly less comprehensive.
Iago’s incessant war is against being itself, which he has identified with
Othello. Tat identification, granted Iago’s perspective, is no hyperbole; cultural
change and loss accounts for our tendency to undervalue Othello. Iago’s Othello
is far closer to the Iliad ’s Achilles than he is to Shakespeare’s Achilles in Troilus
and Cressida, though I mean a closeness in ontological force, rather than in
personality. Te given in Shakespeare’s Te Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice, is
Othello’s splendor of being, his unquestioned magnitude, his absolute authority
and perfection in the camp and field of war. We do not much exalt the purity
of arms, but Shakespeare sometimes does, or at least allows some of his plays
to entertain the possibility of such exaltation. Iago believes in nothing but his
captain Othello, loves nothing but the captain in Othello, and destroys Othello,
but not as captain, not as the pure warrior. Even his destruction of Othello the
Othello 294
man remains a negative celebration of Othello the captain, a negative affirmation
of the reality of the God of War.
A worship that is hatred is best expressed by Iago’s marvelous boast: “I am
not what I am,” which echoes and undoes St. Paul’s “By the grace of God I am
what I am.” By Othello’s refusal of grace or preference, Iago is driven to the
negation: “I am not what I am.” Tat statement is not a mere insistence that he
is not Othello’s “honest Iago,” the ensign or standard-bearer pledged to die rather
than to yield Othello’s colors to the enemy. I hear a kind of religious despair in it
as well: “I am not what I am,” I am nothing, if the only ontological being that I
acknowledge has failed to acknowledge me. Reality has abandoned Iago, and his
revenge is a rebellion that in the first place is against himself. He will not, cannot
walk away from Othello to another captain: he now hates God, but continues to
believe in him. Tat ambivalent regard for Othello demands expression through
a passion for destruction that is also a creative passion. Primal ambivalence
fires the whole substance of Iago’s being, and fathers his genius: the would-be
second-in-command emerges as a Machiavel, as a poet who writes with people
rather than with words, and most fascinatingly as the first High Aesthete, a
dramatic critic adoring his own achievement as a dramatist. Richard III’s gusto,
his savage delight in his own villainy, is replaced by Iago’s subtly perverse sadistic
pleasure in his power of manipulation. Richard manipulates both his equals and
his underlings. Iago manipulates as he chooses, but he knows that his negative
greatness achieves apotheosis only by manipulating the fall of his mortal god,
Othello. Iago’s motive is Sublime: he debases, humiliates, and finally destroys
the only authority he recognizes; his enterprise finally intends nothing less than
the death of God. Te God of War, having failed to recognize his true son in
Iago, must be horribly punished. Falstaff, the God of Wit, is punished for having
recognized his true son in Hal, who may once have accepted the recognition,
but now recoils from it in a profound ambivalence. Hal cannot allow himself to
know that he both loves and hates Falstaff, but consciously regards the fat knight
as a kind of superior fool or jester. Te ambivalence, transferred from Henry IV
to Falstaff, destroys Falstaff and strengthens Hal. Iago, when we first encounter
him, has been rejected for Cassio, and is conscious only of his great hatred for
Othello. As he works upon Othello, Iago is delighted and surprised by his ease
and aesthetic wonder of accomplishment. Te delight could not have its intensity
and largeness of dimension if Iago did not retain a reverence and passion for the
magnitude of what he was ruining. A great captain, for Iago and for Shakespeare,
is a masterpiece of nature, an Adamic splendor falling from godlike to something
less than human status.
I think we must dismiss any speculation that Iago has a repressed sexual
desire for Othello, which is about as useless as the notion that there was a
sexual relationship between Falstaff and Hal. An extreme negative theologian or
Gnostic does not lust after God, and what Freud learned from Shakespeare was
Othello in the Twentieth Century 295
the terrible ambivalence of our longing for reconcilement with the father while
wishing also to murder the father. Freudian readings of Shakespeare, as I have
remarked elsewhere, give us neither Shakespeare nor Freud, but a Shakespearean
reading of Freud is capable of giving us both. Iago is subtler than Freud, as
negative theology is frequently subtler than moral psychology. Reconcilement
with Othello is not possible, Iago realizes, because it is Othello who must
atone for the rejection of Iago. Te degradation of God, a Gnostic concept, is
Iago’s project: the involuntary atonement of Othello through his debasement.
Te murder of Othello is not, cannot be Iago’s project. A negative theologian
does not seek to slay the father, nor to replace the father. It is enough that the
father descend into the Abyss, there to suffer uncreation, to return to the void
formlessness of night.
For me, the Shakespearean question to ask concerning Iago is: how does he
change in the course of the drama? Unlike Macbeth, Iago does not progressively
have control of his own imagination. What makes Te Tragedy of Othello, the Moor
of Venice so harrowing a work is the total triumph of Iago, until he is brought
down so unexpectedly by his wife’s outrage at the victimage of Desdemona.
Iago’s changes, until Emilia’s courage ends him, are marches of triumphalism, in
which he perpetually astonishes himself by his own manipulative genius. Yet that
is only part of the story, the emergence of Iago as appreciative dramatic critic of
his own power in composition. Tere is another side to this triumphalism, and
that is the extent to which Iago, as great improviser, traps himself also in his own
web. More successful at manipulating Othello than he could have imagined,
he is forced into a situation where he must prove Othello’s love a whore, or
himself be slain by Othello. His extraordinary status as pure negation gives at
once unlimited intellect, an overwhelming sense of nothingness, and a primal
ambivalence towards Othello’s massive, ontological presence that drives him
beyond even his worked-out plottings. In this he differs from Edmund, who
keeps to plan until the bodies of Goneril and Regan are brought in. Iago changes
with each fresh confrontation, whether with Othello or with Desdemona, until
he enters the final changelessness of his silence, prompted by outrage at Emilia’s
courageous devotion to the murdered and slandered Desdemona.
Iago tells us that he is nothing if not critical, and that he has never found
a man that knew how to love himself. We can apply both these self-judgments
to one of the most extraordinary moments in the play, when Emilia has given
Iago the handkerchief and then been sent away by him (Act III, scene iii, lines
318–29). Alone on stage, Iago exults at his own mastery, and then is moved to a
marvelous and horrible aesthetic apprehension of the ruined Othello, the fallen
god of honorable war, and now Iago’s masterpiece:
I will in Cassio’s lodging lose this napkin
And let him find it. Trifles light as air
Othello 296
Are to the jealous confirmations strong
As proofs of Holy Writ. Tis may do something.
Te Moor already changes with my poison:
Dangerous conceits are in their natures poisons,
Which at the first are scarce found to distaste,
But, with a little, act upon the blood,
Burn like the mines of sulfur. I did say so.
Enter Othello.
Look where he comes! Not poppy nor mandragora,
Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world,
Shall ever medicine thee to that sweet sleep
Which thou owedst yesterday.
We shudder and yet, for this great moment, we are Iago, or perhaps Iago is
already John Keats and Walter Pater, particularly as he rolls out those sensuous
negatives: “Not poppy nor mandragora, / Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world
. . .” For he is nothing if not critical, and he chants an appreciation of his own
poisonous art, relishing each syllable of “poppy” and “mandragora” and “drowsy
syrups” and “sweet sleep.” Aesthetic awareness in our modern sense, the poetic
self-consciousness of Keats and Pater and the sublime Oscar Wilde, is invented
by Iago in this grand negative moment. Te excited apprehension of: “Tis may
do something” leads to the conscious pride of “I did say so,” as Iago hymns the
power of his own “dangerous conceits.” It is only a step from this to that still
more dangerous prevalence of the murderous imagination that will triumph even
more sublimely in the strongest of all Shakespearean negations, Macbeth.
QQQ
297
OTHELLO
IN THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY
q
At the start of the twenty-first century, it seems that the issues in Othello
that primarily concern, trouble, and excite critics are those related to race and
gender. Some of the foremost current critics, however, examine these issues in
the light of an older tradition, one that emphasizes character and aesthetics.
An example is Frank Kermode’s essay from his book Shakespeare’s Language,
excerpted here.
Othello is often used to reflect contemporary realities and even to comment on
social issues. A 2006 production staged in Decatur, Alabama, which included
images of the World Trade Center towers, emphasized the military aspect of
the play, putting most of the cast in uniforms and making Cyprus suggestive of
Bagdad. In 2005, the BBC broadcast a two-hour Othello, adapted by Andrew
Davis, in which John Othello, a detective in Scotland Yard, is confronted by
the problems of racial discord, anxiety about terrorism, and gender inequality
currently disturbing English tranquility. In 2001, Tim Blake Nelson’s film, O,
transformed Othello into a teen movie about a black high-school basketball star,
his envious best friend, and his white girlfriend.
2000—Frank Kermode.
“Othello,” from Shakespeare’s Language
Frank Kermode is one of Britain’s most respected literary critics. He has
written many highly acclaimed books, including Shakespeare’s Language,
The Age of Shakespeare, and Pieces of My Mind, a collection of his essays.
If we are to believe the latest Arden editor, Othello is closer in date to Hamlet than
we used to think, for he says it was composed in “late 1601.” At any rate, there is
a cluster of plays near this date, a year or two after Hamlet and probably close to
Twelfth Night and Troilus and Cressida.
1
Others prefer a date nearer 1604; that
would twin the play with Measure for Measure, the plot for which derives from
Othello 298
the collection of stories by Giraldo Cinthio. Te issues are very complicated, and
there is little certainty in any of the results.
Te existence of two texts (the Quarto of 1622 and the Folio of 1623)
creates problems different from those encountered in Hamlet or King Lear but
no less difficult. Tey remain unlikely to be solved in such a way as to command
anything approaching editorial consensus, and I do not in any case aspire to assist
the editors in their enquiries, but with Othello as with Hamlet it is necessary on
occasion to say where a particular reading originates and why one has chosen it.
Textual scholars, loving their trade, will not agree, but critics hoping to comment
on the language of the plays must think it unfortunate that the texts of three of
the greatest of them should present these virtually intractable textual problems.
Fortunately the plays remain for the most part intelligible, and susceptible to
comment on their greatly varying styles.
What is extraordinary is the extent of the differences between plays written,
one after another, in the first years of the new century. Te style of Othello we may
think of as having been formed while Shakespeare was reading for the task—
mostly of Cinthio’s novella, which he handles with notable skill and freedom, but
also current books about the Mediterranean world.
Since the principal characters of the story were soldiers, the setting couldn’t
be other than military in character. Shakespeare had plenty of experience doing
the military—the life of various kinds of soldier is amply recorded in the History
plays and All ’s Well, and is not absent from Hamlet—but he had not hitherto
attempted that almost invariant type, the foul-mouthed N.C.O. I myself have
memories, happily remote, of Iago-like warrant officers, sycophantic self-seekers,
the main difference being that Iago has a surprisingly educated vocabulary. At
its core, however, is filth.
Te first word of the play is Roderigo’s “Tush,” and Iago’s reply begins with
an oath: “’Sblood.” His first word to Brabantio is “’Zounds” (85), repeated at line
107. None of these expletives is to be found in the Folio text. Honigmann counts
fifty cases where the profanities of Q are deleted or modified in F probably
because the latter, dependent on a manuscript written by the scribe Ralph Crane,
was produced after 1606, when the Act to Restrain the Abuses of the Players
forbade the use of oaths or the name of God.
2
“Tush” and “pish” may sound
like Rosalind’s “pretty oaths that are not dangerous” (As You Like It, IV.i.189),
but their elimination along with others more shocking makes a considerable
difference to the tone of the play, and especially to the characterisation of Iago.
Te profanities occur not only in soldierly contexts, where they could be taken
simply as appropriate to the language of the camp, but more significantly in the
context of sexual disgust to which Iago’s thoughts repeatedly refer themselves.
Te opening scene, as always with Shakespeare carefully excogitated, never
simple narrative exposition, is here worth particularly close attention. It does
provide some necessary exposition but also describes an evil soldierly prank:
Othello in the Twenty-first Century 299
you may think Roderigo must be half drunk to be seduced into the noisy
demonstration outside Brabantio’s house—as dangerous to him as it is useful to
Iago. Tere have been critics, led by Dr. Johnson, who have wished away the first
act of the play, and indeed Boito eliminated it when writing the Otello libretto
for Verdi. But this move, however correct Johnson might think it and however
economical in terms of lyric theatre, would not be sufficient compensation for
its cost.
Tis opening scene outside Brabantio’s house, with the subsequent interruption
of the wedding night of Othello and Desdemona, seems to me a version of
charivari. Charivari was an old custom: if you disapproved of a match as being
incongruous in some way, for instance if you deplored a disparity in age (or in
colour) between bride and bridegroom, you could call your neighbours and make
a disturbance outside their dwelling. Te practice was at one time reflected in
the clamorous reaction to eclipses, also instances of order disrupted, as Othello
remembers in V.ii.99–101, “Methinks it should be now a huge eclipse / Of sun
and moon, and that th’ affrighted globe / Did yawn at alteration.”
Iago will use the noise of the charivari, this “rough music,” to his own ends.
In the passage before they start making a row, while he and Roderigo are still
whispering in the street, we judge the violence of his emotion by his vocabulary:
if I don’t hate Othello “Abhor me . . . Despise me” (1.i.6, 8), with a hint that,
since he knows his own foulness, these are indeed the proper responses to him.
Unlike Roderigo, he need not make himself known to Brabantio, and can use
what sexual insults he pleases: “Even now, now, very now, an old black ram /
Is tupping your white ewe” (88–89) is Iago’s way of informing the senator that
his daughter has eloped, and this voyeuristic and disgusted attitude to sex is
constant in him. Tey are at it at this very moment! Imagine it! And the man
is black, a devil: the senator’s daughter is being “cover’d with a Barbary horse”
(111), is “making the beast with two backs” (116). Brabantio recognises the
speaker as a “profane wretch” (114), “a villain” (117), but Iago has disappeared
before the senator has made ready to hurry with Roderigo to the Sagittary, there
to continue the process of charivari and disturb the wedding night of Othello
and Desdemona.
Iago’s onslaught on Brabantio’s susceptibilities is kept up by his pupil
Roderigo (“the gross clasps of a lascivious Moor” [126]); but he is required to
be somewhat civil, as Iago is not. One striking aspect of the scene is that there
are echoes of Hamlet’s habitual hendiadys. As George T. Wright demonstrated,
Othello comes second only to Hamlet in the frequency of its use of hendiadys,
though it offers less than half as many instances;
3
Shakespeare’s enthusiasm
for the device was waning, as one can see as Othello proceeds. But the habit of
expansive doubling continues at the outset of this new one: “as loving his own
pride and purposes,” “trimm’d in forms and visages of duty,” “Te native act and
figure of my heart,” “by night and negligence,” “your pleasure and most wise
Othello 300
consent,” “play and trifle with your reverence,” “an extravagant and wheeling
stranger / Of here and every where,” “flag and sign of love,” “the property of
youth and maidhood”—all these occur in the first 170 lines. Othello’s opening
speech in the next scene carries it on: “my life and being,” “my unhoused free
condition / Put into circumscription and confine” (I.ii.21, 26–27). Brabantio
continues the habit in his protest to the Duke:
my particular grief
Is of so flood-gate and o’erbearing nature
Tat it engluts and swallows other sorrows . . .
(I.iii.55–57)
And:
I therefore apprehend and do attach thee.
For an abuser of the world, a practicer
Of arts inhibited and out of warrant.
(I.ii.77–79)
Tere is another trace of the device in the senators’ war council (“Neglecting an
attempt of ease and gain / To wake and wage a danger profitless” [I.iii.29–30]).
Later instances are Brabantio’s “a judgment main’d and most imperfect” (99),
“thin habits and poor likelihoods” (108), “indirect and forced courses” (111).
Te Duke calls the proposed expedition “stubborn and boist’rous” (228) and
Othello refers, in Hamletian vein, to “the flinty and steel couch of war” (230),
asking for Desdemona “such accommodation and besort / As levels with her
breeding” (238–39); and, in a very strained expression, referring to his sight
as “My speculative and offic’d instruments” (270). Desdemona, addressing the
Senate, catches the habit in her speech proclaiming her part in the wooing:
“Tat I did love the Moor to live with him, / My downright violence, and storm
of fortunes, / May trumpet to the world” (I.iii.248–50). Here her own sense
that the unconventionality of her choice amounts to a kind of social violence
is emphasised by hendiadys (“My downright violence, and storm”). Later we
have “quality and respect,” “honesty and trust” (I.iii.282, 284), “worldy matter
and direction” (299), and so on. Te habit has spread to almost every character,
but examples become harder to find as the play discovers and develops its own
dialect, becomes less fond of semantic collision and contraction.
Hamlet can be coarsely bawdy, and seems to mean to offend Ophelia by
being so, but although in future plays Shakespeare was to be capable of rendering
deep sexual disgust (for example in Troilus and Cressida, Timon of Athens, and Te
Winter’s Tale, and in one or two sonnets) Iago is probably his most disgusted
and disgusting character, claiming precedence over Tersites and Apemantus by
Othello in the Twenty-first Century 301
virtue of his centrality to an action of which he is indeed the sole agent. Mention
of Desdemona having sex is all that is needed to make him talk dirty: Othello
“hath boarded a land carract” (I.ii.50) means that he has gone aboard her, almost
as an act of piracy or rape, as if any other explanation of the relationship were
out of the question. Te scene ends with a prose discussion between Iago and
Roderigo, and here Iago offers the young man he means to push deeper into
corruption an account of his beliefs and habits. Although it may suggest a similar
self-hatred, this confession in no way resembles the Credo written by Boito for
Verdi, which makes of Iago a gloomy nineteenth-century atheist. Yet it does
offer a kind of philosophy.
Roderigo is in love with Desdemona, and Iago cannot think of love as
anything but lust: the beloved object is a guinea hen, a loose or worthless woman;
the lover is behaving like a baboon. Roderigo claims that it is not in his “virtue”
or nature to stop being “fond,” whereupon Iago delivers an extraordinary speech
comparing the body to a garden, considered as a piece of coarse nature that the
gardener, or human will, can amend. Te fluency and power of this speech are
remarkable—the persuasiveness of the analogy and the conceptual clarity of the
conclusion drawn:
If the beam of our lives had not one scale of reason to poise another of
sensuality, the blood and baseness of our natures would conduct us to
most prepost’rous conclusions. But we have reason to cool our raging
motions, our carnal stings, our unbitted lusts . . .
(I.iii.326ff.)
Iago’s opening exclamation (“Virtue? a fig! ’tis in ourselves that we are thus or
thus” [319]) ensures that the speech begins with the equivalent of an obscene
gesture, but the argument that the will should have “power and corrigible
authority” is perfectly conventional. Tis is good doctrine, the reason controlling
the senses, the lower powers of the soul. Roderigo’s admission that he cannot
wield such control, his will being presumably unequal to the task, is met with
another piece of advice: love “is merely a lust of the blood and a permission of
the will” (334–35), which means that love is possible only because the will has
abdicated its power over the senses. Iago’s deception of Roderigo depends on
the young man’s willingness to believe that Desdemona is sexually corruptible,
that he can buy her with presents, taking comfort meanwhile from the thought
that the violent beginning of Desdemona’s love for Othello will surely be
followed by a movement of revulsion, as Iago’s philosophy of lust would lead
him to expect. And for good measure Othello will surely, in his turn, grow sick
of Desdemona. “Te food that to him now is as luscious as locusts, shall be
to him shortly as acerb as the coloquintida” (347–49). Te locust was a very
sweet fruit, the food of John the Baptist in the wilderness; coloquintida was
Othello 302
bitter and used as a purge. Iago can look about quite widely for his similes. Te
union of the lovers is a match between “an erring barbarian and a super-subtle
Venetian” (355–56), a black man and a well-born Venetian lady; they had, at
least among the vulgar, reputations, the black man for superior sexual powers,
the Venetian lady for love affairs.
Te aptness of this talk, and its lexical resourcefulness, display a mind, almost
the mind of a poet, made formidable and alien by the context of corruption, a
mind capable of seeming honest when honesty is called for but soured with its
own baseness. Iago’s baseness is more fundamental than a mere desire for revenge
against Cassio and Othello; it is darker than Edmund’s in King Lear. Te whole
point of the dialogue between Desdemona and Iago on the wharf at Cyprus
(II.i) is to demonstrate that Iago, though apparently willing to pass the time of
day with women, cannot quite manage to keep suppressed his loathing of them;
he hates them for being sexed. Tat Cassio delights in touching them, smiling,
taking their hands, and so forth makes him a man whom Iago hates less for his
lieutenancy than for his sexual freedom, his ease with women:
4
“a most profane
and liberal counsellor,” he calls him (163–64); and although there is here a tinge
of puritanical contempt for the libertine, Iago’s next exchange with Roderigo,
which follows hard upon the rapture greeting Othello’s safe arrival, again dwells
on the image of Desdemona engaged in “the act of sport” (227). He knows
that she is to be credited with a “delicate tenderness” (232), but he uses that
knowledge only to persuade Roderigo that she will come to “disrelish and abhor”
the Moor—“very nature will instruct her” to do so (233–34). Her flirting with
Cassio is lechery, and after it copulation must inevitably follow: “hard at hand
comes the master and main exercise, th’ incorporate conclusion. Pish!” (261–63
[F]). (Othello, infected by Iago’s corruption, echoes this “Pish!” in IV.i.42.)
In the course of the play this kind of talk is contrasted with the innocently
excessive courtesies of Cassio, the secret rebelliousness of Emilia, and of
course the honesty of Othello himself, before his fall. Cassio’s language is so
near the extreme of doting admiration that Iago can profess to believe that
his “civil and humane seeming” is only a cover for his “salt and most hidden
loose affection” (II.i.239–41). Of course his immediate intention is to gull
Roderigo; the art of the play is to make his claim seem not quite implausible.
Cassio’s extravagances, however disinterested, may sometimes go over the top,
as when he expresses his hopes that Othello will arrive safely in Cyprus, and
“Make love’s quick pants in Desdemona’s arms” (II.i.80); here he uses a trope
from erotic poetry, to be found also in Tomas Carew’s poem “A Rapture”:
“Yet my tall pine shall in the Cyprian strait / Ride safe at anchor, and unlade
her freight.” Cassio has a touch of the libertine, and his relationship with
Bianca is important to the plot, but he is incapable of the language of Iago;
he combines a politely seductive way of talking
5
with a matter-of-fact attitude
to sexual satisfaction, a not unusual combination.
Othello in the Twenty-first Century 303
A dialogue in Act II is carefully inserted to make plain this capital
difference between Iago and Cassio. Iago says Othello has left early to be with
Desdemona: “He hath not yet made wanton the night with her; and she is
sport for Jove.”
Cas. She’s a most exquisite lady.
Iago. And I’ll warrant her, full of game.
Cas. Indeed she’s a most fresh and delicate creature.
Iago. What an eye she has! Methinks it sounds a parley to provocation.
Cas. An inviting eye; and yet methinks right modest.
Iago. And when she speaks, is it not an alarum to love?
Cas. She is indeed perfection.
Iago. Well—happiness to their sheets!
(iii.18ff.)
Tis keenly written passage (some of which F tries to render as verse) contrives
a social encounter that can only make Cassio uneasy; his position is such that
despite his being the superior officer he cannot reprove Iago, only withhold
assent to his slyly voyeuristic propositions and provide more courtly alternatives.
When Iago invites him to drink to the health of “black Othello” (32), he tries
to decline the invitation, such toasts being a courtesy he disapproves of because,
as he explains, he has a weak head for drink. Tis is candid, but Iago seems to
have known about this weakness already. Cassio makes a mistake when, having
himself been addressed as “lieutenant” (13), he replies with “good Iago” (33), a
patronising form of address like “honest,” a word which from now on becomes
central to the play. Iago resents it, for it is a word normally used of inferiors, but
he makes use of it, since a reputation for good-humoured servile reliability suits
his ends.
6
Cassio indeed loses this match, since it is as if he were explaining or
defending his more delicate sexual attitudes by deriving them from his higher
rank and class, a certain coarseness in these matters being exactly what one would
expect of a social inferior.
Iago naturally has no use for the language of courtship; all love-making for
him is merely the submission of the will to the base passions of the body. He
assumes that Othello is a “lusty Moor” (II.i.295), perhaps because he is black,
and the ideas of blackness and sexual potency were already twinned, or perhaps
because he just assumes that all men are lusty. Othello himself has explained
to the Duke that he wants Desdemona to come to Cyprus with him, “Nor to
comply with heat (the young affects / In me defunct) and proper satisfaction; /
But to be free and bounteous to her mind” (I.iii.264–66). (Here “affects” means
“passions,” “defunct” means not “dead” but “spent, a matter of the past,” and
“proper” means “personal” or even, in this context, “selfish.”
7
) Othello is to him a
gross and grossly privileged body, so deficient in the cunning of intellect that he
Othello 304
is easily duped. Iago doesn’t seem to be particularly lustful himself; he may take
that to be a source of strength, while still envying others who are.
All this we infer only from the language of the individual characters. As it
happens, Iago’s is least interesting when he is thinking in verse; his soliloquy
at the end of II.i is unconvincing, almost an admission of confusion in the
author as well as the character, a muddle of implausible motives where none
was needed other than the established foulness of the man’s imagination.
8

Even when Othello asks him to explain the reason for the brawl (II.iii.176ff.)
he speaks of the peaceful merriment that preceded it as being “in terms like
bride and groom / Devesting them for bed.” His obsession gets uninhibited
play when he later tells Othello what he experienced when sharing a bed with
Cassio (III.iii.413–26)
9
and again expresses his obsessive interest in what
people do in bed (“kiss me hard . . . laid his leg / Over my thigh”). When
Boito rewrote this for Verdi (“Era la notte, Cassio dormia”), he had to leave this
kind of thing out, as too strong for a polite late-nineteenth-century audience;
Verdi supplied the feeling with eery music, giving the speech the air of an
erotic dream.
10
Te pivotal scene of the play is III.iii, which from the outset, with Iago’s
“I like not that” as Cassio withdraws, to the end, when Othello has accepted
the charge against Desdemona and planned her death and Cassio’s, is fewer
than five hundred lines long, probably less than half an hour of stage time.
It is extraordinarily bold. Desdemona aids the process, twice commending
Iago’s honesty, a conviction of which in the other characters is now essential
to his design; at her exit Othello speaks of his love for her and the chaos that
will follow if his love should ever cease. It is at exactly this point (93) that
Iago goes to work, sowing doubts about Cassio. Te dialogue is spare, at first
sounding almost like casual chat between a superior, who calls his interlocutor
“thou,” and a subordinate, who must use “you” but who, without ceasing to be
deferential, can count on his boss’s trust and on a long acquaintance:
Iago. My noble lord—
Oth. What dost thou say, Iago?
Iago. Did Michael Cassio, when you woo’d my lady,
Know of your love?
Oth. He did, from first to last. Why dost thou ask?
Iago. But for a satisfaction of my thought,
No further harm.
Oth. Why of thy thought, Iago?
Iago. I did not think he had been acquainted with her.
Oth. O yes, and went between us very oft.
Iago. Indeed!
Oth. Indeed? ay, indeed. Discern’st thou aught in that?
Othello in the Twenty-first Century 305
Is he not honest?
Iago. Honest, my lord?
Oth. Honest? ay, honest.
Iago. My lord, for aught I know.
Oth. What dost thou think?
Iago. Tink, my lord?
Oth. Tink, my lord? By heaven, thou echo’st me,
As if there were some monster in thy thought
Too hideous to be shown . . .
. . .
If thou dost love me,
Show me thy thought.
(93–116)
In the first exchange the pentameters are broken up, giving the passage a
peculiar uneasiness, which is reinforced by the triple “honest” and the triple
“think,” especially where two usages collide. “What didst not like?” asks Othello,
seventy-five lines after Iago planted the expression. Te question whether
Cassio is or merely “seems” honest (unlike Iago, whom Othello accepts as honest
all through) is now adroitly raised. “I dare be sworn I think that he is honest.” “I
think so too . . . Why then I think Cassio’s an honest man”:
Nay, yet there’s more in this.
I prithee speak to me as to thy thinkings,
As thou dost ruminate, and give thy worst of thoughts
Te worst of words.
(130–33)
At which point Iago expresses moral indignation, again with sound doctrine,
explaining that even a slave can keep his thoughts to himself, and that one
may have “uncleanly apprehensions” (139) without revealing them. But Othello
insists that if Iago thinks him wronged he should make known his “thoughts”
(143–44); “By heaven, I’ll know thy thoughts” (162).
Here we are only at the beginning of a storm; no high colours, no blasts of
rhetoric; the words “honest” and “think,” “thinking,” “thoughts” have to do all the
work. After a while Iago, who has spoken of his own “jealousy” (147), meaning
something like “envy” or “undue curiosity,” but without sexual implication, uses
the word again, now with full sexual reference and direct application to Othello’s
case: “O, beware, my lord, of jealousy! / It is the green-ey’d monster which doth
mock / Te meat it feeds on” (165–67). Te seventy or so lines of verse that
have elapsed before there is any direct accusation of Cassio and Desdemona
have brought Othello to “misery” (171). He soon asserts that he could never
Othello 306
suffer cuckoldry, adding that Desdemona’s infidelity, if it existed, could not be
attributed to any weakness in himself: “For she had eyes, and chose me” (189).
And now the insistence is on eyes: “I’ll see before I doubt” (190) . . . “Look to your
wife, observe her well with Cassio, / Wear your eyes thus, not jealious nor secure”
(197–98) (not suspicious but not overconfident); “In Venice they do let God see
the pranks / Tey dare not show their husbands” (202–3) . . . “She that so young
could give out such a seeming / To seel her father’s eyes up” (209–10) . . . “If more
thou dost perceive, let me know more; / Set on thy wife to observe” (239–40). Tis
string of words will culminate in Othello’s demand for “the ocular proof . . . Make
me to see ’t” (360–64). A passage of high tension, generated by all the words that
have been in play: “honest,” “think,” “see”:
Oth. I do not think but Desdemona’s honest.
Iago. Long live she so! and long live you to think so!
(225–26)
Iago then touches on the disparity or disproportion between Othello and
his Venetian wife, already become, through his assiduity, a credible cause of
concern:
Iago. To be direct and honest is not safe.
Oth. Nay, stay. Tou shouldst be honest.
Iago. I should be wise—for honesty’s a fool . . .
(378–82)
I think my wife be honest, and think she is not;
I think that thou art just, and think thou art not.
I’ll have some proof.
(384–86)
“I see, sir, you are eaten up with passion . . . You would be satisfied? . . . but how?
How satisfied, my lord? / Would you, the supervisor, grossly gape on? / Behold
her topp’d?” (391–96) (here he uses to Othello himself the word Roderigo had
used to Brabantio in the opening scene: “the gross clasps of a lascivious Moor”
[126] and “Your daughter . . . hath made a gross revolt” [133–34], as well as “top,”
a variant of the word “tupping” in line 89).
It were a tedious difficulty, I think,
To bring them to that prospect, damn them then,
If ever mortal eyes do see them bolster
More than their own. What then? How then?
What shall I say? Where’s satisfaction?
Othello in the Twenty-first Century 307
It is impossible you should see this,
Were they as prime as goats, as hot as monkeys . . .
(397–403)
Te only “satisfaction” available is Iago’s account of his night with Cassio.
It becomes clear, in this masterly dialogue, that Iago’s interest in sex is to
watch others doing it, or at least to think about them doing it. It was important
therefore to develop these ideas of seeing, these increasingly coarse descriptions
and conjectures. Te tone has grown calculatedly immodest—“damn them
then”—and this is achieved before the story about Cassio in bed, and before
the handkerchief provides what looks like satisfactory ocular evidence. For the
tactician Iago has correctly guessed Othello’s reaction even to the possibility of
his wife’s unfaithfulness, and at first with all the hesitations proper to an honest
man (and an inferior) communicating such a suspicion, he infects Othello with
his own disgust. Following the uses of “honest,” “think,” and “see,” with their
derivatives, one begins to understand how compact and fierce this writing is.
Even after the account of Cassio’s dream, when Othello is ready to tear his
wife to pieces, the honest man can admit “yet we see nothing done; / She may
he honest yet” (432–33)—which is the moment to introduce the handkerchief,
something which can be seen, something with which Iago can claim to have seen
Cassio wiping his beard. And the scene ends with the pair swearing a joint oath
of loyalty and vengeance.
Considering the scantiness, or absence, of incriminating evidence, and
the completeness of Othello’s collapse, it would be easy to read this scene as
an allegory of demonic possession, a reading Othello himself for a moment
considers but dismisses in the last scene of the play: “I look down towards his
feet; but that’s a fable. / If that thou be’st a devil, I cannot kill thee” (V.ii.286–
87). Te success of Iago is “diabolic” only in the sense that his temptation has
discovered in Othello a horror of his tempter’s apparent knowingness about sex.
Once more the effect is got by reiteration: “honest,” “think,” etc. Te magical
force of this rhetoric is what makes the scene possible.
Soon the handkerchief, the false substitute for “ocular proof,” becomes itself
the means of equally terrible reiteration. Othello credits it with an occult power
that has now become appropriate to the occasion. Te Egyptian or gipsy who
gave it to his mother “could almost read / Te thoughts of people” (III.iv.57–58).
It had the power of controlling his father’s love for his mother; if she lost it he
would loathe her. He is talking about his own love for Desdemona: “there’s magic
in the web of it” (69).
Te ensuing dialogue with Desdemona—she lying about the handkerchief
and crazily resuming her plea for Cassio, while he says almost nothing but
“handkerchief ”—is as brilliantly conceived as the Othello–Iago dialogue, and it
is hard to imagine a dramatic poetry more minimally perfect:
Othello 308
Oth. Is’t lost? Is’t gone? Speak, is’t out o’ th’ way?
Des. Heaven bless us!
Oth. Say you?
Des. It is not lost; but what and if it were?
Oth. How?
Des. I say, it is not lost.
Oth. Fetch’t, let me see’t.
Des. Why, so I can, sir, but I will not now.
Tis is a trick to put me from my suit.
Pray you let Cassio be receiv’d again.
Oth. Fetch me the handkerchief, my mind misgives.
Des. Come, come;
You’ll never meet a more sufficient man.
Oth. Te handkerchief!
Des. I pray talk me of Cassio.
Oth. Te handkerchief!
Des. A man that all his time
Has founded his good fortunes on your love,
Shar’d dangers with you—
Oth. Te handkerchief!
Des. I’ faith, you are to blame.
Oth. ’Zounds!
11

(III.iv.79–98)
It has often been remarked, by G. B. Shaw with derogatory intent, that
Othello is the most operatic of Shakespeare’s tragedies; think, for example, of
the duet at the end of III.iii (where Verdi has the advantage of Shakespeare
that he can make Iago and Otello swear their oath together instead of having
to do it one at a time). Tis intense Shakespearian scene, too, is in its way
equally musical. Tis kind of writing, by quasi-musical, quasi-magical means,
achieves a rawness of passion, a conflict between innocently suicidal enquiry and
a rage almost beyond words. Rage beyond words was not something the early
Shakespeare would have even thought of aiming at. Here, as in Hamlet, a long
experience of theatre has taught him a new way of writing poetry.
Te strangest line in Desdemona’s part comes in IV.iii. Othello has just
grossly insulted and struck her in the presence of Lodovico, the Venetian envoy.
Now he orders her to bed. Talking with Emilia, she remembers the maid Barbary
and her song, but before she sings it she says, with apparent inconsequence,
“Tis Lodovico is a proper man” (35). None of this passage (30–52) is included
in Q. Tere must have been some good reason to exclude the Willow Song
(perhaps the temporary unavailability of a boy actor who could sing), and the line
about Lodovico was lost along with the song. Some modern editors, including
Othello in the Twenty-first Century 309
Honigmann, give the line to Emilia, but only because it seems “out of character”
for Desdemona.
12
Despite his treatment of her, she has continued submissive
and loving to Othello, even when he acted out his horrible pretence that she
was a whore and Emilia her bawd. After Othello’s aria “Had it pleas’d heaven
/ To try me with affliction . . .” (IV.ii.47ff.) she hardly complains: “I hope my
noble lord esteems me honest,” and “Alas, what ignorant sin have I committed?”
(65, 70). Even at her boldest, as when she insists on going to Cyprus, she has
deserved Lodovico’s compliment, “Truly, an obedient lady” (IV.i.248). Yet now,
at a moment of intense marital distress, her thoughts wander momentarily
to another man. Very shortly she listens with amazement to Emilia’s avowal
that she would be unfaithful to her husband if the reward was great enough.
Desdemona says she would not behave so “For the whole world” (IV.iii.79). Te
fine speech (not in Q) in which Emilia stands up for women’s right to sensual
life against the restrictions imposed by tyrannical men is not the sort of thing
Desdemona would ever have spoken (IV.iii.84–103). Yet she is rather taken by
Lodovico, and at a very odd moment.
It is true that she can say unexpected things; she is represented as suffering
a kind of loss of attention: after the horrible brothel scene when cast as “that
cunning whore of Venice / Tat married with Othello” (IV.ii.89–90), she declares
herself “half asleep” (97) and hardly understands what Emilia says next. Tese
moments may contribute to any secret disposition in an audience to agree that it
was less than seemly of this young woman, ignoring the “curled darlings of her
nation,” to marry a man so alien and so much older, an “extravagant and wheeling
stranger” (I.i.136), a general whose social standing, though high, depends entirely
upon his military rank in an embattled state. (As Auden remarks, Brabantio was
happy enough to have Othello to supper and hear his tales, but that was another
matter from having him as a son-in-law.
13
) And she is made to lie
14
—about the
handkerchief, and about the identity of her murderer. Many of these traits may
be attributed to a strain of feminism in the play, a hint of the ways in which
women might sometimes escape the regime imposed by their husbands—a little
quiet talk with another woman, a venial fib or two. Yet the fact remains that
there is a faint ambiguity in her character as we try to see it as a whole, and this
is notoriously true also of Othello’s.
Tere have been some celebrated criticisms of Othello’s generally orotund
way of speaking, which may be regarded as a sort of innocent pompousness or,
if you dislike it, a self-regard that is not so innocent. It is easy enough to explain
the choice for Othello of this particular mode of speech. He is meant to be a
man whose sole reason for existence is command—after all, he is responsible for
the security of an empire, Cyprus being a province that must be defended. Te
self-esteem of such a man can be rendered in the naturally hyperbolical terms
of military glory. It has been observed that Londoners of the time were familiar
with the idea of magnificent North African potentates. “Te black, or tawny,
Othello 310
soldier-hero was a figure in festivals long before he reached the Elizabethan stage
. . . Tese Moorish shows were resplendent, soldierly and sensual . . . the role of
the Moor in public spectacle was to enrich the public conception of power and
sexual potency in the early stages of Tudor empire.”
15
Te example of Marlowe’s Tamburlaine was fairly recent, but Othello does
not have his out-and-out bombast, and there is a touch of modesty and courtesy
in his speech. His first line, “’Tis better as it is” (I.ii.6), is intended to promote
calm in the face of Iago’s pretended anger on his behalf; he has nothing to fear
from Brabantio, he says, because of his services to the state. Here he claims
royal birth, like a sultan in a Lord Mayor’s Show; he will not boast of it except
by mentioning it, but the final effect is not quite modest. When he speaks of
his “demerits,” the word (as in Coriolanus, I.i.275) means “merits.” It is an odd
word since it can also mean its opposite; but I think the point of it is to have
Othello use a strange word rather than a familiar one—something he does on a
good many other occasions. Its oddness makes it stand out against the bustling
language of the messages concerning the military crisis, and his character
is already pretty firmly established as calm, grandiloquent, unaware of his
vulnerability, by the famous line “Keep up your bright swords, for the dew will
rust them” (I.ii.59). Tis invulnerability is founded in a soldier’s courage, and it
does not, as he supposes, extend to the dangers of civilian life.
Arriving in the Senate House, where all the talk is practical, he utters
an oration on the topic of his marriage (“Most potent, grave, and reverend
signiors” [I.iii.76ff.]) and on his wooing of Desdemona, “Wherein I spoke of
most disastrous chances: / Of moving accidents by flood and field, / Of hair-
breadth scapes i’ th’ imminent deadly breach, / Of being taken by the insolent
foe / And sold to slavery” (134–38)—a speech of forty-one lines celebrated for
their grandeur, which is enhanced by the tinkling couplets and plain prose of
the following speeches by the Duke and Brabantio. Te speech is completely
successful; the Duke is proud that his warrior deputy talks exactly as he would
be expected to fight, superbly. And the grandeur depends partly on Othello’s use
of unusual words like “demerit” and “agnize” and “indign.” Te one word he finds
no synonyms for is “honest,” twice applied to Iago in this scene (284, 294) and
repeatedly in later scenes. And it is the honest Iago who will, in the course of the
play, reduce Othello’s language as well as his honour.
Before the temptation scene it is impossible to imagine Othello using the
vocabulary of Iago; indeed, he rarely uses language appropriate to prose. It is
essential to the character that until he collapses he speaks grandly. Later come
the anguished repetitions of “handkerchief,” the questioning of the sense in
which Iago uses the word “lie,” the pathetic stress on “honesty,” the unaccustomed
langue verte picked up from Iago, and the vile berating of Desdemona, whom he
calls a whore, which suits his action in striking her.
Othello in the Twenty-first Century 311
Othello’s final speech has been much commented upon. In a famous essay
T. S. Eliot noted that in his self-pitying grandeur, his boasting about his weapon
and his past achievements, he stresses his claim to be serving the state but makes
no mention whatever of Desdemona. “Humility is the most difficult of all virtues
to achieve; nothing dies harder than the desire to think well of oneself . . . I do not
believe that any writer has exposed this bovarysme, the human will to see things
as they are not, more clearly than Shakespeare.”
16
Tis view has been much
attacked, but it has not lost all its force. Eliot does not support his observation by
comment on the language of the speech, which has some resemblance to that of
Othello’s speech to the Senate at the outset. It repeats the point made in I.ii.18
about the respect he has won by “My services which I have done the signiory,”
but important differences arise from the fact that he cannot now allow himself to
speak of “My parts, my title, and my perfect soul” (I.ii.31). Instead, he compares
himself to Judas (“the base Indian”) who “threw a pearl away / Richer than all his
tribe” (V.ii.347–48).
17
He claims not to be jealous except when “wrought.” He
cannot confess to weeping without explaining that it isn’t his usual practice. And
he ends with a recollection of one more notable service to the state.
We need not suppose that Shakespeare was contemptuous; only that, as his
language suggests, Othello was human, the victim of long habit, and wanting, as
he ended his life, to enter a plea for merciful interpretation. Tat he did not get
it in the play, and has not always had it subsequently, merely shows how variable
interpretation must be when it has to work on language as complex as that of
Othello.
NOTES
1. Othello, ed. E. A. J. Honigmann (Arden edition, 1997). The date is discussed
in Appendix I, pp. 344–50, the text in Appendix 2, pp. 351–67, which summarises
the arguments in Honigmann’s book on the subject, The Texts of “Othello” (1996).
2. On the cleaning up of F. see Honigmann. p. 352.
3. “Hendiadys and Hamlet,” PMLA 96, pp. 168ff.
4. W. H. Auden thought otherwise, arguing that Cassio is easy only with
“women of his own class.” “The Joker in the Pack,” in The Dyer’s Hand (1963),
p. 262.
5. Auden speaks of Cassio’s “socialized eroticism,” p. 262.
6. See Empson’s essay “Honest in Othello,” in The Structure of Complex Words,
pp. 218–49. The preceding chapters, “Honest Man” and “Honest Numbers”
(pp. 185–217), are also relevant.
7. See the discussion of “defunct” in Hulme, Explorations in Shakespeare’s Lan-
guage, pp. 153–54. I think the best of her suggestions is that it means “past danger.”
The sense of “proper” seems to be misunderstood by Honigmann (“in conformity
with rule”).
8. Auden, who describes Iago as a practical joker, goes so far as to say that
he ought to act brilliantly when being all the varieties of himself as presented to
Othello, Cassio, Desdemona, etc., but badly in the soliloquies: “He must deliver
Othello 312
the lines of his soliloquies in such a way that he makes nonsense of them” (“The
Joker in the Pack,” p. 258).
9. On the importance in the play of the word “bed,” which occurs more than
twenty times, see R. R. Heilman, Magic in the Web (1956).
10. Otello is not only the finest of Shakespearian operas but in certain respects
offers an intelligent commentary on its source. It has been remarked that Boito
underlined certain passages in the play, for example Iago’s description of love as
“merely a lust of the blood and a permission of the will,” but Verdi did not set
them; I take these to indicate that Boito saw the importance of the lines but, feel-
ing he could not use them, indicated that the music must somehow convey their
sense. See James A. Hepokoski, Otello (1987), for a study of Boito’s dealings with
Shakespeare.
11. F weakens this exit by substituting “Away” for “’Zounds.”
12. This is the reason why some editors transfer Miranda’s excoriation of
Caliban (The Tempest, I.ii.351–62) to Prospero. But the motive is not a good one,
for it assumes that editors already know all they need to about the limits of the
character.
13. “The Joker in the Pack,” p. 263. Auden remarks that in a mercantile and
warlike society like Venice there was need of foreign soldiers and also of usurers,
the latter being Jews and socially unacceptable despite their utility. “No Venetian
would dream of spitting on Othello as on Shylock, but a line was drawn neverthe-
less, and it excluded marriage to a high-born Venetian woman.”
14. “Lie” is another reiterated word; “lie/lies” occurs twenty-five times in the
play. It provides the theme of Desdemona’s talk with the Clown (III.iv), a scene
which prepares us for Iago’s casual and obscene punning in the horrible IV.i:
“Lie—With her? / With her? On her; what you will . . . / Lie with her? lie on her?
We say lie on her, when they belie her” (34–37)—at which point Othello has his
fit. This device of hammering away at certain words is, as we have seen, a habit of
the mature Shakespeare.
15. Philip Brockbank, “The Theatre of Othello,” in On Shakespeare (1989),
p. 200. Brockbank’s information comes from The Calendar of Dramatic Records in
the Books of the Livery Companies of London, 1485–1640, eds. D. J. Gordon and Jean
Robertson (1954).
16. “Shakespeare and the Stoicism of Seneca,” in Selected Essays (1932),
pp. 131–32.
17. “Judean” is the reading of F; Q (and F2) read “Indian.” The arguments for
and against are summarised by Honigmann in the Arden edition, p. 342.
QQQ
313
BIBLIOGRAPHY
q
Adamson, Jane. “Othello” as Tragedy: Some Problems of Judgment and Feeling
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980).
Booth, Stephen. “King Lear,” “Othello”: Indefinition and Tragedy (New Haven:
Yale University Press, 1983).
Campell, Lily B. Shakespeare’s Tragic Heroes: Slaves of Passion (Gloucester, Mass.:
Peter Smith, 1973).
Davies, Anthony. Filming Shakespeare’s Plays: The Adaptations of Laurence Olivier,
Orson Welles, Peter Brook and Akira Kurosawa (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1990).
Draper, John William. The Othello of Shakespeare’s Audience (New York: Octagon
Books, 1966).
Elliott, George Roy. Flaming Minister: A Study of “Othello” as a Tragedy of Love
and Hate (Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1953).
Fiedler, Leslie A. The Stranger in Shakespeare (London: Croom Helm, 1973).
Greenblatt, Stephen. Renaissance Self-Fashionings: From More to Shakespeare
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1980).
Kolin, Philip, ed. Othello: New Critical Essays (New York: Routledge, 2001).
Leavis, F. R. “Diabolic Intellect and the Noble Hero: or The Sentimentalist’s
Othello,” from The Common Pursuit (London: Chatto & Windus, 1952).
MacDonald, Ann-Marie. Goodnight Desdemona (Good Morning Juliet) (Toronto:
Coach House Press, 1990).
Neely, Carol Thomas. “Women and Men in Othello,” from The Woman’s Part:
Feminist Criticism of Shakespeare, edited by Carolyn Ruth Swift Lenz, et al.
(Urbana, Ill.: University of Illinois Press, 1980).
Rosenberg, Marvin. The Masks of Othello (Berkeley: University of California
Press, 1961).
Snyder, Susan. Othello: Critical Essays (New York: Garland, 1988).
Vaughan, Virginia Mason. Othello: A Contextual History (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1994).
Bibliography 314
Vaughan, Virginia Mason, and Kent Cartwright, eds. Othello: New Perspectives
(Rutherford, N.J.: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1990).
Vogel, Paula. Desdemona: A Play about a Handkerchief (New York: Dramatists
Play Service, 1994).
315
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
q
Twentieth Century
A. C. Bradley, “Othello,” from Shakespearean Tragedy (London: Macmillan,
1904).
T. S. Eliot, “The Hero Cheering Himself Up” (1927), from “Shakespeare and
the Stoicism of Seneca,” reprinted in Selected Essays 1917–1932 (London:
Faber and Faber, 1932).
G. Wilson Knight, “The Othello Music,” from The Wheel of Fire (London:
Methuen, 1930), pp. 97–119.
William Empson, “The Best Policy,” from Life and Letters To-Day 14, no. 4
(summer 1936), pp. 39–45.
Harold C. Goddard, “Othello,” from The Meaning of Shakespeare, vol. 2 (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1951), pp. 69–106. © 1951 by the University
of Chicago.
Kenneth Burke, “‘Othello’: An Essay to Illustrate a Method,” from The Hudson
Review 4, no. 2 (summer 1951), pp. 165–200. Reprinted by permission of
The Hudson Review.
Robert B. Heilman, “Othello: The Unheroic Tragic Hero,” from Magic in the
Web: Action and Language in Othello (Lexington: University of Kentucky
Press, 1956), pp. 137–168. © University of Kentucky Press.
W. H. Auden, “The Joker in the Pack,” from Encounter (August 1961). Reprinted
in The Dyer’s Hand and Other Essays (New York: Random House, 1962),
pp. 246–272.
A. D. Nuttall, “Othello,” from A New Mimesis: Shakespeare and the Representation
of Reality (London: Methuen, 1983), pp. 120–143. © 1983 A. D. Nutall.
Harold Bloom, “Introduction,” from Iago (New York, 1992), pp. 1–5.
Twenty-first Century
Frank Kermode, “Othello,” from Shakespeare’s Language (New York: Farrar,
Straus and Giroux, 2000), pp. 165–182. © 2000 by Frank Kermode.
Reprinted by permission of Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
317
Action, Rymer on improbabilities of,
51–52, 56–57
Adams, John Quincy, 99, 117–126
Aemilia. See Emilia
Agent-act ratio, 234–243
Aldridge, Ira, 97
Alienation
Auden on, 270–278
Nuttall on, 284, 288
Analogies, between Iago and Turk,
197–200
Arden, Mary, 1
Aristotle, 84
Artistry, Iago and, 152
Artists, 98–99
Auden, W. H., 137, 261–280
Barbarity, 84
Beauty, Knight on, 157–175
Betrayal, murder and, 36
Betterton, Tomas, 83, 85
Bianca, character of, 41
Birth of William Shakespeare, 1
Bloom, Harold, 137, 292–296
Boito, Arrigo, 99
Brabantio
Adams on, 118–121
arrest of Othello and, 6–7
character of, 41
Coleridge on, 114–115
control of by Iago, 24–25
Goddard on, 188, 191
Kermode on, 299–300
Rymer on, 52–53
Bradley, A. C.
on evil nature of Iago, 137, 139–
141, 153–156
on friends’ and acquaintances’
impressions of Iago, 142–144
on inner character of Iago, 144–147
on motivation of Iago, 147–153
Branagh, Kenneth, 138
Burbage, James, 2
Burbage, Richard, 45
Burke, Kenneth, 138, 224–251
on action and individual nature,
234–243
on cathartic functions of Iago,
224–228
on handkerchief, 247, 248–251
on ideal paradigm, 228–234
on peripety, 243–249
Cassio
Adams on, 124
Auden on, 272–273
character of, 41
Coleridge on, 116–117
disgrace of, 11–12, 31
dishonesty of Iago and, 142–143
Empson on, 180, 185
as gentleman, 9
reasons for Iago’s hatred of, 148–
149, 154
INDEX
q
Index 318
Rymer on, 57
Schlegel on, 101
as warrior, 196
Catharsis, 224–228, 249–250
Characterization
Adams on, 121–122, 124–125
Bradley on, 137, 139–147
Burke on, 138
Empson on, 138
Goddard on, 191
Griffith on, 95
Hazlitt on, 98
Johnson on, 93–94
Rymer on, 49–51, 57–58, 69–70
Shaw on, 134–136
Teobald on, 90
Charivari, 299
Charles II (King of France), 46
Cinthio, Giraldi, 45, 127
Clown, 42, 182–183
Coldness, Bradley on, 144, 145–146,
148
Cold War, 195
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, 83, 97–98,
113–117, 140, 149
Colin, Alexandre-Marie, 99
Comedy, Iago and, 9
Complexity of Iago, 153–154
Composite Personality, Goddard on,
195–196
Condell, Henry, 3
Confession, Heilman on, 254–256
Consistency, Rymer on lack of, 64–65
Contempt, Auden on, 268–269
Contrasts
Goddard on, 190–191, 211–215
Hazlitt on, 103–104
Knight on, 158–160, 164–165,
176–177
Nuttall on, 283
Conventionality, lack of, 84
Courtiers, Cassio as, 9
Creed of Iago, Bradley on, 145
Crime and Punishment (Dostoevsky),
213
Criminals, Auden on, 262–263
Cultural evolution, 290–291
Cynicism, Knight on, 171–173
Danger, Iago and, 150–151
Davis, Andrew, 297
Death of William Shakespeare, 3
Deception
Auden on, 268
Desdemona and, 9–10
Iago and, 29–30, 140–141
Delacroix, 99
Desdemona
Adams on, 99, 118–121, 123–124
Auden on, 278
Burke on, 226
changing of ending and, 84
character of, 9–10, 41
Emilia on faithfulness of, 17
Gildon on, 78–79
Goddard on, 186–187, 188–191,
200–204, 211–215
Goddard on death of, 216–222
Griffith on, 95
Hazlitt on, 107–108, 111
Johnson on, 93
Knight on, 167–168, 171, 174–175
love of, 7, 8
murder of, 19
obedience and, 8
relationship of with Cassio, 13
Roderigo’s love for, 5, 23
Rymer on, 47, 57, 70
Rymer on improbabilities of, 50–51
Schlegel on, 101
Swinburne on, 128
Vogel on, 138
Detachment, Knight on, 159–160
Devils, Knight on, 175–176
Dido, Gildon on, 79–80
Divinity, Knight on, 175–176
Index 319
Dogs, Empson on, 185
Domesticity, Knight on, 167–169
Domestic tragedy, Nuttall on, 282–283
Dreams, Goddard on, 187
Ducis, Jean-Francois, 84
Eavesdropping, Goddard on, 187
Editors, importance of, 83–84
Eliot, T. S., 137, 156–157
Emilia
character of, 41
on faithfulness of Desdemona, 17
handkerchief and, 14, 21
Hazlitt on, 106–107
Iago’s feelings toward, 146
lack of understanding of Iago by,
143
on lies of Iago, 38
Rymer on improbabilities of, 50
Schlegel on, 101
Emotions, Swinburne on, 98,
133–134
Empson, William, 138, 179–186
Endings, changing of, 84
Envy, Iago and, 146
Estrangement, Burke on, 138
Etheridge, George, 71
Evil
Bradley on, 139–141, 153–156
Empson on, 186
False interpretations, Bradley on,
139–140
Farce, Rymer on, 57–58, 75
First Folio, 3, 282
Fishburne, Laurence, 138
Freedom, 28, 188
Gay rights. See Homosexuality
Gentlemen, 9, 84
Gentleness, Knight on, 167–168
Gildon, Charles, 46, 75–81
Globe Teater, 2
Goddard, H. C., 137
on aspects of war in play,
196–200
on death of Desdemona, 216–222
on Desdemona, 200–204
on Desdemona and Iago, 211–215
Hamlet vs. Othello and, 186–189
on Iago, 191–194
on Iago as spirit of modern war,
195–196
on misunderstandings, 210–211
on Othello, 204–210
on parent-child situation, 188–189
on race, 189–191
on war and peace, 222–223
Goodness, Iago’s hatred of in men,
146
Greenblatt, Stephen, 138
Greene, Robert, 1
Griffith, Elizabeth, 84, 94–95
Guilt, Othello and, 25
Gullibility, Nuttall on, 283–284
Hamlet, comparison of Iago to, 137,
292–296
Hamlet, comparison to, 186–188,
297–301
Handkerchief
Burke on, 247, 248–251
Emilia and, 14, 21
Goddard on, 201–204
Hughes on, 88
Iago and, 16
Kermode on, 307–308
Knight on, 168
Rymer on, 66, 67, 72–73, 74
Swinburne on, 127, 128–129
Hathaway, Anne, 1
Hatred
Bloom on, 294
Goddard on, 195–196
Iago and, 147–149
Hazlitt, William, 98, 102–112, 140
Index 320
Hecatommithi (Cinthio), 45, 127,
291–292
Hecht, Anthony, 137
Heilman, Robert B., 137, 252–261
Hemings, John, 3
Heroism, 260–261, 280–292
History of the Turks (Knolles), 45
Homosexuality
Bloom on, 294–295
Leontes and, 275–276
twentieth-century responses and,
138
Honesty
Bradley on, 142
Empson on, 138, 179–186
Goddard on, 190–191
Hopkins, Anthony, 138
Hostility, Iago and, 146
Hughes, John, 86–89
Hughes, Margaret, 46
Hugo, Victor, 98, 126–127
Humanity, 145–146, 154
Humility, Heilman on, 259
Iachimo, 140
Iago
actors portraying, 284
analogy of to Turk, 197–200
Auden on, 137, 261–280
Bloom on, 137
Bloom on comparison of to Hamlet,
292–296
Bradley on, 137
Bradley on evil and, 139–141,
153–156
Bradley on friends’ and
acquaintances’ impressions of,
142–144
Bradley on inner character of,
144–147
Bradley on motivation of, 147–153
character of, 41
Coleridge on, 97–98, 115–116
control of Brabantio by, 24–25
corruption of language by, 8
deceit of, 5, 6, 29–30
deceit of Othello by, 15–16
delight of in pain and suffering,
24
disgrace of Cassio and, 11–12
Emilia on lies of, 38
Gildon on, 81
Goddard on, 137, 187–188, 190–
194, 211–215
hatred of Othello by, 23
Hazlitt on, 104, 109–112
Heilman on, 137, 252–261
Hughes on, 87–88
Hugo on, 98, 126–127
Johnson on, 93
as Katharma, 224–228
Kermode on, 300–308
Knight on, 171–176, 178
lies of, 20
plot of, 31
reality and, 8, 28
reasons of for hatred of Cassio,
148–149
Rymer on, 50, 62, 64
Schlegel on, 100–101
self-understanding of, 23–24
as spirit of modern war, 195–196
Swinburne on, 127–130
transformation of Othello and,
31–33
Ideal paradigm, Burke on, 228–234
Identity, 261–280. See also Self-
understanding
Ignorance, Coleridge on, 117
Improbabilities
Gildon on, 75–81
Goddard on, 210–211
Rymer on, 49–51
Impropriety, Voltaire on, 90–92
Infidelity, murder and, 36
Inner self, Goddard on, 191
Index 321
Intelligence
evil and, 153–156
Goddard on, 193–194, 195–196
James I (King of England), 45
Jealousy
Auden on, 264–265, 275–276
Gildon on, 81
Griffith on, 94
Hughes on, 87–88
Kermode on, 305–306
Rymer on, 48, 68
Schlegel on, 100
Shaw on, 134–135
Swinburne on, 130
Teobald on, 90
Johnson, Samuel, 84, 93–94, 97
Jokes, 205–209, 267–270
Jones, James Earl, 138
Jonson, Ben, 3
Justification
Bradley on, 147–153
Burke on, 234–243
Hazlitt on, 109–110
Rymer on improbabilities of, 51,
54–55
Shaw on, 134–135
Katharma, Iago as, 224–228
Kean, Edmund, 97, 99
Kermode, Frank, 297–311
Kimble, Charles, 99
King’s Men, 2
Knight, G. W., 137, 157–178
Knolles, Richard, 45
Knowledge, Auden on, 279–280
Lamb, Charles, 83, 98, 102
Language
Adams on, 122
Coleridge on, 114–115
Desdemona and, 14
Empson on, 138, 179–186
Iago and, 24–25
Kermode on, 302–304, 308–311
Knight on, 137, 157–175
Nuttall on, 286–288
of Othello, 38, 40
Othello and, 26
power of, 8
Rymer on, 48–49, 53–54, 59–60, 65
Leavis, F. R., 137
Leontes, 275–276
Lies
Desdemona and, 20, 203–204
of Iago, 20
Linnen, Rymer on, 46, 48
Lodovico, 34, 42
Loneliness, Burke on, 251
Lord Chamberlain’s Men, 1–2. See also
King’s Men
Love
Desdemona, Othello and, 7
Desdemona and, 8
Gildon on, 79
Kermode on, 301–302
Othello and, 6
Machiavelli, 140
MacDonald, Ann-Marie, 138
Magic, Burke on, 249
Malignity, motiveless, 140, 149
Malone, Edmund, 84
Marriage, of Shakespeare, 1
Melodrama, Shaw on, 98
Mephistopheles (Goethe), comparison
of Iago to, 139, 174, 175
Military. See Wars
Misunderstandings, Goddard on,
210–211
Montano, 42, 57
Moors, 47, 75–76
Morality
Adams on, 118
Coleridge on, 97
Eliot on, 157
Index 322
Goddard on, 137
Griffith on, 84, 94–95
Lamb on, 98
Moral pyromaniac, Iago as, 137,
193–194
Motivation
Bradley on, 147–153
Burke on, 234–243
Hazlitt on, 109–110
Rymer on improbabilities of, 51,
54–55
Shaw on, 134–135
Motiveless malignity, 140, 149
Mousetraps, Goddard on, 187
Murder
of Desdemona, 19
Heilman on, 254–256
infidelity and, 36
of Roderigo, 18
Swinburne on, 133
Music, 99
Nationality, Iago and, 140
Nature, marriage as against, 10–11,
27–28
Nelson, Tim Blake, 297
New Historicism, 138
Nobility
Knight on, 164, 167, 177–178
Nuttall on, 280–292
of Othello, 137
Rymer on, 49
Nuttall, A. D., 138, 280–292
Obedience, Desdemona and, 8
Olivier, Laurence, 97, 138
Opera, 99
Othello
actors portraying, 83, 85, 97, 99, 138
character of, 41
deceit of by Iago, 15–16
Eliot on, 137, 156–157
final speech of, 38–40
Gildon on, 76
Goddard on, 189–191, 204–210
hatred of by Iago, 23
Hazlitt on, 104, 106–107
Hecht on, 137
Heilman on, 257–261
Hughes on, 88
Hugo on, 98, 126–127
Johnson on, 93
Knight on, 176–177
language of, 38, 40
love of, 7
murder of Desdemona by, 19
nobility of, 137
Nuttall on, 284–290
Rymer on improbabilities of, 49–50
self-understanding of, 35
strength of, 25–26, 27
Teobald on, 90
transformation of, 31–33
Pagans, Adams on, 121
Paintings, 99
Paradigms, Burke on, 228–234
Paradise Lost (Milton), 139
Parent-child situation, Goddard on,
188–189
Passion
Adams on, 118–121, 124
Coleridge on, 114
Hazlitt on, 104–105, 109, 112
Heilman on, 256–257
Hughes on, 87
Iago and, 148
Knight on, 163
Shaw on, 135
Swinburne on, 130
Pepys, Samuel, 46–47
Peripety, Burke on, 243–249
Petrarchan ideal, 3
Pharmakos, 225
Index 323
Pleading, Rymer on, 53–54
Plotting
Burke on, 243–249
of Iago, 31
Johnson on, 94
Rymer on, 72–73, 74–75
Rymer on improbabilities of, 63–64
Poetics (Aristotle), 84
Poetry, 2, 3
Pope, Alexander, 75, 83, 89, 91
Portraiture, 241
Possession, Burke on, 138, 247–248
Power, 109, 150–151
Practical Joke (Dostoevsky), 205–209
Practical jokes, Auden on, 267–270
Pride, Iago and, 146
Profanity, 46, 298
Profit, Empson on, 183
Promiscuity, Vogel on, 138
Psychology, Goddard on, 191–194
Puritanism, 2, 46
Purity, Schlegel on, 101
Pyromaniac, moral, 137, 193–194
Race
Adams on, 99, 118–126
Auden on, 273
Coleridge on, 114
Gildon on, 76–77
Goddard on, 189–191
Lamb on, 102
nineteenth-century critics and,
97–98
Roderigo and, 5–6
Schlegel on, 97, 100–101
Taylor on, 97
twentieth-century responses and,
138
twenty-first-century interpretations
and, 297
Realism, Swinburne on, 131–133
Reality, Iago and, 8
Religion, Gildon on, 76
Remorse, Hazlitt on, 106
Restoration period, 46, 180–182
Revenge
Auden on, 264–266
Goddard on, 187, 194
Hazlitt on, 104–105
Teobald on, 90
Robeson, Paul, 138
Roderigo
Auden on, 265–266
character of, 41
love for of Desdemona, 5, 23
murder of, 18
Rymer on, 71
Rymer on improbabilities of, 50–51
Swinburne on, 131
Rymer, Tomas, 46, 47–75
Sacrifice, 101, 254–256
Sanity, evil and, 153
Satan (Milton), comparison of Iago to,
139
Schlegel, August Wilhelm, 97, 99–101
Schröder, Friedrich Ludwig, 84
Scientific enquiry, 279–280
Self-control, of Iago, 144
Self-destruction, Auden on, 266
Selfishness, Hazlitt on, 103
Self-understanding
Coleridge on, 113–114
Iago and, 8, 28, 146, 295–296
love and, 7
opening conversation between Iago
and Roderigo and, 23–24
of Othello, 35
Separation, Knight on, 164–165
Sexuality
Nuttall on, 287–288
Shakespeare on, 3
Vogel on, 138
Shakespeare, John, 1
Index 324
Shaw, George Bernard, 98, 134–136
Short View of Tragedy (Rymer), 46, 47
Skin color
Adams on, 99, 118–126
Auden on, 273
Coleridge on, 114
Gildon on, 76–77
Goddard on, 189–191
Lamb on, 102
nineteenth-century critics and,
97–98
Roderigo and, 5–6
Schlegel on, 97, 100–101
Taylor on, 97
twentieth-century responses and,
138
twenty-first-century interpretations
and, 297
Smock Alley Teater, 84
Soliloquies, Bradley on, 147
Speech
Adams on, 122
Coleridge on, 114–115
Desdemona and, 14
Empson on, 138, 179–186
Iago and, 24–25
Kermode on, 302–304, 308–311
Knight on, 137
Nuttall on, 286–288
of Othello, 26, 38, 40
power of, 8
Rymer on, 48–49, 53–54, 59–60, 65
Steele, Richard, 83, 85
Storms, symbolism of, 169–170
Strength, Desdemona and, 200
Structure, Bradley on, 137
Suicide, Nuttall on nobility of, 280–
292
Superiority, Iago and, 150–151
Swift, Jonathan, 75
Swinburne, Algernon Charles, 98,
127–134, 140
Symbolism
Burke on, 224–251
Goddard on, 217–219
Knight on, 157–161, 168–171
Temptation, Kermode on,
310–311
Teobald, Lewis, 89–90
Toughts, Rymer on, 54–55
Tragedy
Auden on, 262
Goddard on, 186–188
Hazlitt on, 103
Hughes on, 86–89
Knight on, 137
Nuttall on, 282–283
Schlegel on, 100–101
Swinburne on, 133–134
Voltaire on, 92
Transcendentalism, 221–222
Transformation, of Othello, 31–33
Traps, Goddard on, 187
Trojan Horse, 195
Trust, Auden on, 277–278
Truth, Bradley on, 140–141
Turks
fighting against, 6, 7
importance of to plot, 196–200
invasion of Cypress by, 45
Tyrwhitt, Tomas, 113
Venice, 75–76, 270–274
Venice, Duke of, 42, 53
Verdi, Giuseppe, 99
Vigny, Alfred de, 98
Villains
Auden on, 262–263
Bradley on, 139–140
Goddard on, 193
Violence, Heilman on, 254–256
Vogel, Paula, 138
Voltaire, 84, 90–92
Index 325
Warriors, 196
Wars
Goddard on aspects of in play,
196–200, 222–223
Iago as spirit of, 195–196,
293–294
Knight on, 167
Weakness
Auden on, 269
Desdemona and, 200
Eliot on, 156
Knight on, 162
Welles, Orson, 138
Witchcraft, 7, 122–123
Women
earliest on stage, 46
Goddard on, 188–189
twentieth-century responses and,
138
World Trade Center, 297