The Themes of Love and Hate in William Shakespeare's Othello
Shakespeare's Othello contains many themes typical of a Shakesperian tragedy. Love, Hate, Appearance, Revenge, Jealousy, Deceit, Politics …show more content…
So from the outset one of the main themes is shown already - the theme of appearance (alongside the theme of race).
The theme of hate is insinuated through Iago's passion and drive for revenge in act one. It is shown that Othello obviously trusts Iago and regards him as a close friend. However, Iago as well as obviously being aggrieved about being overlooked for promotion, we can already see that iago's character is not to be trusted. Iago is intent on revenge because of Cassio's promotion. Iago has "love and duty" so that he can get close enough to him to plot against him. Iago talks about himself a lot in lines 55-65 of act one - the pronouns "I" and "my" are used a lot - showing the character to be self absorbed and self involved and obviously focused on his intentions of destruction on Othello. So his hatred is shown quite strongly here. A little later in act 1 scene 1 we are again shown the theme of racism when Othello is referred to as "thicklips" in line …show more content…
This is also not the only reason shown. Although Iago does make comments regarding revenge upon Othello there is also an underlying idea of racism presented. This is an important theme in Othello as it has been questioned to whether it matters in the play whether Othello is a black man or not? In my opinion it does matter. Shakespeare shows many derrogatory remarks regarding Othello's race spoken by Iago and characters. If Othello was a white man would Othello be acussed of using magics and witchcraft to steal Desdemona's heart? - "Damned as thou art, thou hast enchanted her, for I'll refer me to all things of sense, if she in chains of magic were not bound?". Brabantio would probably not react so extremely if it were a WHITE general marrying his daughter being that a general was someone of high status who a father of the time would be proud to have his daughter marry. I think that the racist comments are made throughout to empashise this point and it further shows one of the reasons for Iago's hatred of the general.
Iago is also associated with ideas of hell, evil and the devil. In
Shakespeare's Othello contains many themes typical of a Shakesperian tragedy. Love, Hate, Appearance, Revenge, Jealousy, Deceit, Politics …show more content…
So from the outset one of the main themes is shown already - the theme of appearance (alongside the theme of race).
The theme of hate is insinuated through Iago's passion and drive for revenge in act one. It is shown that Othello obviously trusts Iago and regards him as a close friend. However, Iago as well as obviously being aggrieved about being overlooked for promotion, we can already see that iago's character is not to be trusted. Iago is intent on revenge because of Cassio's promotion. Iago has "love and duty" so that he can get close enough to him to plot against him. Iago talks about himself a lot in lines 55-65 of act one - the pronouns "I" and "my" are used a lot - showing the character to be self absorbed and self involved and obviously focused on his intentions of destruction on Othello. So his hatred is shown quite strongly here. A little later in act 1 scene 1 we are again shown the theme of racism when Othello is referred to as "thicklips" in line …show more content…
This is also not the only reason shown. Although Iago does make comments regarding revenge upon Othello there is also an underlying idea of racism presented. This is an important theme in Othello as it has been questioned to whether it matters in the play whether Othello is a black man or not? In my opinion it does matter. Shakespeare shows many derrogatory remarks regarding Othello's race spoken by Iago and characters. If Othello was a white man would Othello be acussed of using magics and witchcraft to steal Desdemona's heart? - "Damned as thou art, thou hast enchanted her, for I'll refer me to all things of sense, if she in chains of magic were not bound?". Brabantio would probably not react so extremely if it were a WHITE general marrying his daughter being that a general was someone of high status who a father of the time would be proud to have his daughter marry. I think that the racist comments are made throughout to empashise this point and it further shows one of the reasons for Iago's hatred of the general.
Iago is also associated with ideas of hell, evil and the devil. In