Othello as a Mortality Play

Othello as a Mortality Play

Introduction

Othello can be seen as a mixture of various feelings including love, betrayal, pride and jealousy. This play of Shakespeare has been widely considered as a play that involves human psychology (Jamieson, 2013). The purpose of this play was to teach moral values to the illiterate population, and succeeded in engaging the audience, despite of having small cast and few themes. This essay discusses the character analysis of main cast of the play and concludes that whether those characters were good or evil.

Othello

The major character of the play, who was a Moor and served as general in the Venice defense forces. He was known for his courage and good decision power; he enjoyed high status due to his successful professional position (Absolute Shakespeare, 2005). However, he remained significantly different from those with whom he worked, due to his different color and orientation. Desdemona was the lady whom Othello loved and was married to, but a Iago succeeded in tricking Othello that his wife was unfaithful to him and was in relation with Cassio. Finally, out of jealousy he kills his faithful wife, and upon knowing the fact, he commits suicide.

The character analysis of Othello shows that he was not all evil, as he has a good moral character, successful professional and family life. However, his acts totally changed due to his blind belief on Iago. Thus, it can be said that despite of being a good decision maker for the military matters, he failed to find out the reality about his wife, and killed an innocent women just because Iago motivated him to do so.

Iogo

He was the ancient captain of the defense forces in which Othello served. He was in hope for promotion but due to Othello's favor, Cassio got the position. ...