Tragic Heroes And Their Downfalls In Shakespeare's Othello

Tragic Heros and Their Downfalls in “Othello”

Northrop Frye once said, “Tragic heroes are so much the highest points in their human landscape that they seem the inevitable conductors of the power about them, great trees more likely to be struck by lightning than a clump of grass. Conductors may of course be instruments as well as victims of the divisive lightning.” Othello is the pillar of tragic heros, first playing the part of a loving husband with a beautiful wife, then being manipulated into believing his wife was cheating on him and killing her. Throughout the play, he played the part of the protagonist, everyone hoping he would figure out Iago was lying to him. Othello being the protagonist made the fact he was also a villain bittersweet. His apparent love for his wife Desdemona, his ‘just’ reasoning for killing her, and Iago’s deserving end all contribute to the tragic work as a whole.

According to John Ruskin, “It is better to lose your pride with someone you love rather than to lose someone you love with your useless pride.” Pride is a main component in Othello, with the main character Othello being so full of pride that he cannot even ask his wife if she is being faithful to him. He claims he loves her but he has to know and be comfortable with his wife Desdemona, and that means talking to her about her alleged cheating, not jumping to conclusions and killing her. He could not look into his wife’s eyes and smother her if he truly loved her. Othello only loved the idea of his wife, someone who only loves him and worships his every word. When his wife didn’t fit his perfect image, he felt his only option was to kill her, when it clearly was not. He tried to convince himself he had to kill her, but when the realization hit that he was wrong again he felt the need to take drastic measures.

While it is no longer acceptable to hit your spouse, there was a time when anyone could commit domestic abuse and it was socially acceptable. In the time of Othello you could accuse your wife of anything and have a ‘just’ reason for killing her. Just because Othello thought his wife was cheating on him he thought it gave him the right to execute her. He became the judge, jury, and executioner, all without a trial or evidence in Desdemona’s defense. Had Othello simply asked Desdemona about her alleged affair, she would have explained her innocence and it would have prevented numerous deaths.

Some tragic fates are well deserved, and Iago’s fate is one of these cases.

Iago was the cause of his own demise by manipulating everyone around him and not caring who he hurt in the climb to the top of power. He only made decisions based on if it benefited him, not thinking, or caring, if it caused other’s pain. The fact Iago ended up in jail only reinforces the idea that the punishment fits the crime. Instead of getting to end his suffering and be reunited with his wife in death, Iago had to live his life in jail, thinking about what he did and never getting to feel freedom again.

Dictionary.com defines a tragic hero as “a great or virtuous character in a dramatic tragedy who is destined for downfall, suffering, or defeat,” Othello is the obvious contender for the tragic hero in Othello, but Iago could also be considered a tragic hero. He starts off as a possible protagonist, but we quickly learn due to his antagonistic qualities that he is destined to be defeated in a grand way. Iago was eventually defeated in a grand way, he was sent to jail for

life.

Jane Austen wrote, “Vanity and pride are different things, though the words are often used synonymously. A person may be proud without being vain. Pride relates more to our opinion of ourselves, vanity to what we would have others think of us.” Othello cared much more about what other people like Iago thought of him because Cassio was having an affair with his wife than the actual ‘affair’ his wife was having. Had Othello actually cared about his wife, he would do everything he could to get to the bottom of the apparent affair, not just plan her death. His vanity was the cause of his downfall, had he not cared so much about what others said about him, he would still have a wife, a job, and be alive.

Jealousy can be deadly if you don’t know how to deal with it. Othello did not know how to deal with Desdemona’s apparent cheating, he was very jealous of Cassio for having an affair with his wife, and Iago for having a stable relationship with his own wife. So jealous in fact that he calls Cassio a “monster in his thought too hideous to be shown” (3, 3, 123-124) to proclaim his mistrust of Cassio and his thoughts about Desdemona.

Othello is the perfect example of a tragedy, with the theme of the play being don’t jump to conclusions. The main character, Othello’s actions lead to his own downfall, which would make him a tragic hero and add to the already tragic nature of the drama. He made others suffer, and even killed his wife over an unproven allegation of cheating. If Othello had just made rational decisions, and not been an instrument of destruction by killing his wife, himself, and setting off a chain reaction of anger and killings, he would have not made the play a tragedy, it would have a happy ending. Othello’s emotions were being manipulated by Iago, and it is ironic that Iago was also feeling the same manipulated emotions as Othello. Both were feeling jealous, betrayed, and angry, but for different reasons. Othello was being tricked into these feelings while Iago was selfishly finding reasons to be like Othello.

A lot of emotions fueled Othello’s overall rage, one of the most prominent being a sense of betrayal. He thought had a loving, faithful wife but when he thought she was cheating he felt betrayed, that is when he really first felt the need for revenge. That feeling hurt Othello so much he thought the only way to get rid of the feeling was to get rid of his wife. Iago too felt betrayed, but for selfish reasons, he wanted a promotion someone else got at work. That is when Iago too felt the need for revenge, but his was more sinister than Othello’s in the fact that he meant to hurt Othello and anyone else who got in his way with no remorse. Iago was a bit of a psychopath, and no one seemed to notice until the very end of the play when they figured out the plot behind Desdemona’s alleged affair. It is suspicious that a group of military leaders did not notice Iago’s mental problems, and it was not even brought up by his wife. The relationships Iago had were so broken that they did not pick up on any signs that Iago had a mental disease, or the plan to get Othello to murder his wife and Cassio just for Cassio’s job. The feelings of people Iago had a relationship with allowed them to overlook him. The entire scheme of Iago’s should have been figured out, and the fact that it wasn’t only makes the argument that emotion clouds judgement stronger.
Othello could have prevented his tragic downfall by not thinking only of himself, recognizing that he did not love Desdemona, and not using drastic measures to solve his problems. If he had simply tried talking to her, Othello would have found out Desdemona was not in fact cheating on him, and the whole ending of the play, and countless deaths could have been prevented. Othello feeling that it was okay to kill Desdemona, Iago getting the ending he deserved, and Othello trying to convince himself he loved Desdemona contributed to the overall tragic nature of Othello.