Spiffocracy

Chris Gallo

The Tragedy of Othello: the Moor of Venice

Greek tragedies rely on the character obtaining some form of anagnorisis, or recognition of their fate for the play to be tragic [Jacobus 33]. However Karl Jasper formulates “Christian salvation opposes tragic knowledge. The chance of being saved destroys the tragic sense of being trapped without chance of escape. Consequently no genuinely Christian tragedy can exist” [Kaiser 97]. So for Othello to be qualified as a tragedy, a new definition from the classic Greek must be proposed. Kaiser suggests that “The very challenging of traditional beliefs in Shakespeare's age made tragedy possible. The very element of doubt gives rise to the tragic emotions. Tragedy can only exist where there is both faith and skepticism” [Kaiser 104].

This moment of faith and skepticism in Othello comes at the end of the play, in act five, scene two, when Othello is preparing to kill Desdemona. He tells her “If you bethink yourself of any crime unreconciled as yet to heaven and grace, solicit for it straight” (5.ii.156). He believes she committed the crime for which he accuses her of, for the “honest” Iago told him such, but he needs her to admit to it. He demands that she repent for the saving of her soul to be sure, but also her admission will give closure to him, knowing that he did the right thing in killing his wife. His jealousy puts him over the edge when Desdemona weeps for the death of Cassio and so he then smothers her to death. The act committed, he has faith that he did the right thing, utterly immersed in the idea that Desdemona was false to him. The moment of tragedy, where Othello's belief in Desdemona's guilt is shattered, comes when Emily confronts Iago about what he has told Othello, and confesses that she herself gave Iago the handkerchief. It is at this moment that Othello moves from being a story, to a tragedy

Faith and skepticism is one of the main themes for Elizabethan tragedy, but there also exists a few more subtle themes, especially when only looking at the tragedies of Shakespeare himself. Kaiser says that “The main theme of Shakespearean tragedy is the emergence of evil through personality into action. And the final catastrophe is not due only to fatal accident, but may be partly accounted for by the fatal flaw in the characters” [Kaiser 209,210]. Othello's passionate jealousy ends up being his undoing in the play. His jealousy is so strong that when Iago “confirms” Cassio's affair with Othello's wife, thanks to an ill placed handkerchief, it sends Othello into a trance (4.i.45). It takes only that same handkerchief, Othello's jealousy, and a misplaced trust in his trusted Iago to make Othello tragically murder his wife. So it is quite plain that the fatal flaw in Othello is his jealousy, for if he was not blinded by his passion when confronting his wife, he might have listened to her reason and might have been able to see the pure truth of things before it was too late, or at the very least been help off on his plans for a few moments until Emilia could arrive on the scene and put his murderous doubts to rest with her explanation of events.

Much like the Greek tragedies before Othello a central theme that can be observed in tragedies that Shakespeare wrote is that the main protagonist are usually of noble birth, or in the case of Othello, of noble nature [Jacobus 30]. Othello's noble nature is referred to occasionally in the play by the other actors, once such incident in act 1, scene 3 when an officer refers to Othello as such (1.iii.95). Othello's noble nature could also easily be inferred from the very fact that the Duke and council trust Othello with the defense of their nation from the Turks and any other sea bound invaders. This noble character will then proceed to have his fate, or as the Greeks called it, the moira, revealed to the audience as the play unfolds [Jacobus 31]. Othello lets Iago's lies twist his emotions up to the point where he becomes as rash as fire (5.ii.134). After Othello has killed his new wife, he recognizes what he has done (Aristotle calls this the Anagnorisis) and at the same time he can see his fortunes reversed (which Aristotle calls the peripeteia), since he must be punished for the motive-less murder he has committed. The combination of the Anagnorisis and the peripeteia is seen in both Shakespearean tragedy and ancient Greek tragedy as most fulfilling for the audience by Aristotle [Jacobus 33]. Not only has Othello experienced a downfall, but so has his lovely wife, Desdemona, tragically for crimes she has not committed. Emilia dies for simply telling the truth. The only glimpse of justice in all of the events is that the mastermind, Iago, is wounded and captured, to hopefully pay for his schemes after the curtain closes.

Although Shakespeare wrote Othello to be tragic, there are many themes usually reserved for the genre of comedy throughout this play. Jealousy, especially causeless jealousy was often thought to be ridiculous in and of itself during the time Othello was written, a fool deserving of laughter. However in Othello this jealousy is seen as tragic, for at the climax of the play when Othello is demanding the handkerchief from Desdemona their inner states preoccupy the audience while the absurdity of the situation is pushed into the background [Honigmann 77 ]. We just need to look at Iago to see another theme from comedy appear in this play. Honigmann mentions “Iago is a direct descendant of the intriguing slave of classic comedy with this difference: the slave more often than not solves the problems of his master, whereas Iago creates them.” [Honigmann 75]. Iago's masterful narratives (3.iii.400) help illustrate to Othello his wifes imagined transgression. Othello's reaction to this news again carries comic potential amplified by the fact we can plainly see Iago pulling the strings behind the whole operation. It is interesting to see how Shakespeare has taken a play with so many comic devices and twisted it to create a very tragic piece with no obvious comic overtones.

The tragedies of Shakespeare, including Othello, have much in common with their Greek predecessors. In both a noble characters at the height of his fame experiences an intricate stream of events that will lead inevitably to his downfall. Although some religious differences slightly change why the pinnacle of the play is deemed tragic, then end result is the same. The hero broken or, as Shakespeare is more fond of, dead at the end of the play

Bibliography
E.A.J Honigmann “Othello”
1997 Published by The Arden Shakespeare, London
Jacobus, Lee “The Bedford Introduction to Drama”
2005 Boston & New York: Bedfor st. martin
Gerhard W Kaiser “The Substance of Greek and Shakespearean Tragedy” 1997
Shakespeare, William “Othello”
From Jacobus, Lee pages 419-461