Formulative Lens of William Shakespeare's Othello

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Formulative Lens of William Shakespeare's Othello

The Tragedy of Othello by William Shakespeare is a great work by a great author. Shakespeare was correct in titling it The Tragedy of Othello because Othello lost so much. In the literary sense, a tragedy is the downfall of a character through that character's own flaws. The way most people see a tragedy is a story where there is much suffering and loss, and a not so happy ending. No matter way one looks at it, literary or public sense, this was a correct title. The main character, Othello, brought his own downfall upon him through his flaws, caused the suffering of many people, and he himself loss very much. All of these factors pile up to equal a big tragedy.

The biggest things that one notices in the plot, are the great losses incurred by Othello. A key loss of Othello was that of his best companion, his wife, Desdemona. Desdemona was the closest person to him; no one can get closer to a guy than his wife. They were able to share their thoughts with each other and that is very powerful. The unfortunate part to it was that it only took a couple untruthful words from Iago to change Othello's opinion of her. "O, beware, my lord, of jealousy!/ It is the green eyed monster…" (III, iii). From words like this, and just a little more suggestions, Othello killed his wife. Its hard to believe that just a few well-placed words like this started a chain reaction that caused great harm to Othello.

Another is how Othello lost his friends, and is faith in them. By the end of the story, Othello has lost probably his best friend he had in Cassio. He lost Cassio because he did not trust him; Othello thought Cassio was his enemy. Othello believed in Iago so much that he forgot about others. And this trust in Iago was wrongly placed; he turned out to be his true enemy. Othello brought this upon himself by blindly following Iago when he had no other reason to do so but Iago's reputation as an honest fellow. "I know, Iago, Thy honesty and love…" (II, iii).

Another loss of Othello's was his good name, his reputation.

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