Some thoughts on Shakespeare's "Othello"

I was looking for some light summer reading, but couldn’t handle yet another chick-lit read with some neurotic heroine put through a series of humiliating events before she finally gets a man (the pinnacle of achievement for all single women, no?). So I looked on my bookshelves for something I always meant to read, and picked out Shakespeare’s Othello.

Othello, as you probably know, is the story of a man who believes his wife is cheating on him and basically goes postal. Now, I’m no advocate for adultery by any stretch of the imagination, but Shakespeare really goes Taliban with Othello’s reaction. As I was reading all Othello’s speeches about being cuckolded by Desdemona’s evil ways, there was part of me that completely could not relate to such excesses of emotion (I think the sense of a man’s honour being violated by an adulterous wife is a thing of the past in my culture, though not being a man, I can’t be sure), but another part of me saw this play as a window into contemporary domestic tragedies that are played over and over again in all parts of the world. Which doesn’t make Shakespeare great – just human nature unaltered across time and place.

What DOES make Shakespeare great, in my humble opinion, is the voice he eventually gives to his female characters. It is spectacular. For the first four acts of the play, we see the villain Iago plotting the destruction of his superior officer, Othello (I could be wrong, but I think the reason he gives is the age-old office complaint that Othello was promoted above Iago despite Iago’s longer service). Iago informs Desdemona’s father of her elopement with Othello in the most inciteful of ways, and of course Brabantio falls for the bait and freaks out. Othello handles the situation calmly and rationally, and averts that crisis. Then Iago, not yet ready to give up, incites Othello against Desdemona by offering “proof” that she has had an affair with another man. And of course, the formerly rational Othello teeters on the brink of insanity as jealousy consumes him.

The first half of the play builds up Iago’s deception and the audience is fully immersed in Othello’s passionate reaction. But then Shakespeare lets his female characters speak – and I find it so powerful. First, there is Desdemona’s bewilderment and hurt at Othello’s jealous accusations and strange behaviour, and her vows of innocence (which are moving in their simplicity and her helplessness). And then there is Emilia, Iago’s wife, his unwitting accomplice, and Desdemona’s companion. In my opinion, Shakespeare uses her as the voice of conscience (or at least his own voice) in the play.

For example, Desdemona asks Emilia whether there actually are women who would cheat on their husbands (underlining, of course, her innocence). Emilia’s response is that there definitely are, and moreover:

But I do think it is their husbands’ faults
If wives do fall. Say that they slack their duties
Or else break out in peevish jealousies,
Throwing restraint upon us? Or say they strike us,
Or scant our former having in despite?
Why, we have galls, and though we have some grace,
Yet have we some revenge. Let husbands know
Their wives have sense like them. The see, and smell,
And have their palates for both sweet and sour,
As husbands have. What is it that they do
When they change us for others? Is it sport?
I think it is. And doth affection breed it?
I think it doth. Is ‘t frailty that thus errs?
It is so too. And have not we affections,
Desires for sport, and frailty, as men have?
Then let them use us well; else let them know,
The ills we do, their ills instruct us so.

I dunno. Maybe the concept of women being human and subject to the same frailties, affections, and jealousies as men wasn’t all that radical in Shakespeare’s time, but it’s such a departure from all Othello’s and Iago’s speeches, I have to believe Shakespeare’s really trying to make a point here. And once Othello murders Desdemona, the playwright gives Emilia lots of opportunity to call Othello a fool and a dumbass … LOL

It all makes me wonder about places where women are considered chattel today … are there artists who are speaking out with their art about the value and humanity of women? Perhaps they’re not able to do so overtly for fear of repercussions. But maybe there are some who are able to - at least I hope so.