Othello Flashcards
A.C. Bradley
“The most romantic figure among Shakespeare’s heroes” Bradley therefore places the blame for the play’s tragic denouement solely on Iago: “Othello is a sympathetic and nobel character who’s downfall is created by a being of pure evil”
T. S. Eliot
On Othello’s final monologue is a “Terrible exposure of human weakness” - Eliot states that Othello is a shameful masculine figure due to his inability to confront the true nature of his actions. Eliot criticises the way that Othello focuses on constructing a noble and heroic self-image rather than showing genuine remorse.
Ania Loomba
“Othello is a victim of racial beliefs precisely because he becomes an agent of misogynist ones” - Loomba’s post-colonial reading of Othello establishes Othello as a “product of a white patriarchy” that valorises him through his gender, and others him due to his race. She states that the central conflict in Othello is “between the racism of a white patriarchy and the threat posed to it by both a black man and a white woman”
Fred West
“Iago possesses all the psychological traits of a psychopath”. He is a profound and accurate portrait of psychopathy. Traits of a psychopath include lack of empathy and remorse, superficial charm.
Samuel Coleridge
Iago has a “motiveless malignity”. Suggests that his actions are driven by a desire to cause harm and Schadenfreude rather than by concrete motives.
Lisa Jardine
Desdemona becomes “too knowing, too independent” and her death represents the punishment she faces by the patriarchy for defying it’s rigid expectations
Freudian Perspective
“lago’s pain and distrust is caused by his repressed homosexual desire for Othello that is completely unrequited.”
In a 1938 production of Othello at London’s Old Vic, Laurence Olivier played lago as gay.
F R Leavis
“Iago simply exploits a weakness that already existed in Othello’s character”. Leavis opposes Bradley’s view by placing blame on Othello for his own hamartia and peripeteia.
