Racism And Jealousy In Shakespeare's Othello

While I do agree that the play shows some emphasis on the power of love and what it can do to weak minded men like Othello, I completely disagree with Carol Neely and actually think that Othello’s central theme revolves around race and jealousy. Racism is clearly seen in the play and it plays an important role in Othello’s behavior and actions. Jealousy is also seen all over the play and is fueled by circumstantial evidence in the play instead of real facts, but nevertheless, this is what drives Othello to kill his wife and Iago to manipulate everyone around him to do his evil deeds. Is true that Othello loves his wife and that he considers her to be his most valuable possession in the beginning of the play but that feeling quickly changes to hate once Iago starts putting plan in action. In the play however,

We clearly see that the reason why Iago hates Othello is because not only is Othello his superior and gave the promotion to Cassio but he suspects that the Moor slept with his wife. Jealousy is so strong in Othello that it drives him to the point of killing his wife. Although a great military strategist, Othello fails to see that Iago is using the same strategy he himself is supposed to be great at. In the military the art of war is practice many times through deception and this is the one rule Othello forgets because through the entire play he is deceive by Iago. Is sometimes frustrating reading the play without wondering how Othello got fooled so easily. He never actually catches his wife in any wrong doing neither did he have any hard evidence to confirm his suspicion. Once he lets his emotions and jealousy run wild he becomes a completely different character from beginning to end. In the end we see how racism, jealousy, and hate destroys all the characters in the play and how insignificant love actually is in comparison to these other human