Why Is Jealousy Important In Othello

Has jealousy influenced your choices and made you do regretful things? Imagine if everything you did was shaped by jealousy in your mind. How would you feel? How would you act? In the play Othello by William Shakespeare, the characters are plagued with jealousy that influences their actions greatly, and is an accountable reason for such actions. The play is about a Moorish (African American) man named Othello who was working in the army in Florence. Othello elopes with a white woman named Desdemona and their marriage caused jealousy and other emotions to stir in many characters. Roderigo and Iago are both characters in this play who have been influenced by jealousy and have committed actions that are justified by jealousy. Roderigo was jealous of Othello’s marriage to Desdemona, and he hired another person who worked in the army, and that person is named Iago. Iago also had a reason to have emotions toward Othello because he wanted to become Othello’s lieutenant, but Othello chose another man named Michael Cassio instead. Michael Cassio had a relationship with a prostitute …show more content…
Jealousy is the reason most characters in the play do or say certain things, and jealousy influences and justifies the actions of characters. The major actions in this play, that were executed by Roderigo, Iago, Cassio, Bianca and Othello, were all influenced in some way by jealousy. When Roderigo hired Iago it was out of jealousy. When Iago was denied the position of lieutenant it caused jealousy. When Bianca returned Cassio's handkerchief it was out of jealousy. And finally, when Othello hurt Desdemona it was out of jealousy. Because of the connections to jealousy through all of these, all of these were in a way justified by jealousy. The characters all had a connections to jealousy weather it was their own jealousy, or someone else's jealousy that somehow involved