Examples Of Insecurity In Othello

In a passage from William Shakespeare’s Othello, Iago dramatizes a subsequent conflict between Othello and Desdemona when he warns the former of a green-eyed monster, the manifestation of jealousy. As the play progresses, Othello becomes more like this beast that Iago told him about. Instead of being the honorable and respectable character he was, Othello now displays a more questionable personality, one that causes him to doubt his wife of infidelity. Even though Iago does play a role, it is mostly due to Othello’s insecurity that transforms him into a monstrous person.

Even before Iago exerts his influence over Othello, we can observe the inklings of Othello’s insecurity and the doubt he has regarding his relationship with Desdemona. During his audience with the Duke, Othello describes the circumstances by which he became acquainted with Desdemona. He says on the occasions that he told Brabantio of his life stories, he would also tell Desdemona the same stories. Then, Othello self-consciously proposes that the sole reason why Desdemona loves him is because she pitied his misfortunes: “She loved me for the dangers I had passed, / And I loved her that she did pity them” (I.iii.193-194). Othello feels way because as

an African American, he knows that he would never be fully accepted in Venice, a white dominated society. When Desdemona expresses her love for him, Othello never considered the possibility that Desdemona loves him because he is a person worthy of affection. Instead, he believes that it was his stories that won her over. However, we know that Desdemona genuinely loves him, because when the Duke suggests that Desdemona should be sent to her father’s house, she immediately confronted him, saying how she did love Othello to live with him, and how she is very much attracted to the qualities what made Othello who he is:
That I did love the Moor to live with him
My downright violence and storm of fortunes
May trumpet to the world. My heart’s subdued
Even to the very quality of my lord (I.iii.283-286).
Despite her proclamation, Othello does not see their love as meaningful as Desdemona sees it. These details are crucial to our understanding that Othello does have his faults that makes him susceptible to jealousy.
Ultimately, when Iago managed to exploit Othello’s doubt about their love and his self-worth, Othello slowly became the green-eyed monster.

When Iago advises Othello to be wary of Desdemona, Othello declares to Iago that he is sure that Desdemona is chaste. Yet, he cannot help but think Desdemona is not who she seems to be. When he says, “And yet, how nature erring from itself,” he is proposing that Desdemona had departed her wifely duties for some other man (III.iii.267). Later, when Iago says, “Her will, recoiling to her better judgement, / May fall to match you with her country forms / and happily repent,” he is alluding that it is Desdemona’s nature to go after someone of her own race (III.iii.276-278). While entertaining this thought, Othello

says:
Haply, for I am black
And have not those soft parts of conversation
That chamberers have, or for I am declined
Into the vale of years (III.iii.304-307).
Here, Othello is suggesting that Desdemona must have had cheated on him because he is an old, African American man who can’t talk to her in the way other young White men can.
Lastly, while he was dying, Othello told his companions to, “speak of [him] as [he is]…Of one not easily jealous, but being wrought, / perplexed in the extreme” (V.ii.402-406). (Othello is displaying preservation? Insecure of the image he made?)
In conclusion, we should interpret Othello as a tragedy in which the protagonist’s insecurity causes him to become susceptible to jealousy.