The Military Commander in Othello Essay -- Othello essays

The Military Commander in Othello The character of the general in William Shakespeares tragic drama Othello is kind of noble, although plagued by the shortcoming or weakness of gullibility. Let us in this essay look at all(a) the features, both good and bad. of this ill-fated hero. David Bevington in William Shakespeare Four Tragedies describes many fine virtues which reside within the general Othellos blackness, like that of the natives dwelling in heathen lands, could betoken to Elizabethan listenings an innocent proclivity to accept Christianity, and Othello is one who has already embraced the Christian faith. His first appearance onstage, when he confronts a party of torch-bearing men coming to arrest him and bids his followers sheathe their swords, is sufficiently reminiscent of Christs arrest in the Garden of Gethsemane to convey a fleeting comparison between Othello and the Christian God whose charity and lenity he seeks to emulate. Othellos blackness may be used in p art as an emblem of kick the bucketen man, but so are we all fallen. His age similarly strengthens our impression of his wisdom, restraint, leadership. (220) Is it his gullibility which leads to his downfall? Morton W. Bloomfield and Robert C. Elliott in Great Plays Sophocles to Brecht posit the lack of insight of the hero as the cause of his tragic fall Othellos lack of insight, cunningly played upon by Iago, leads to his downfall. And as the full enormity of his deed dawns upon him in the great scene of tragic self-revelation at the end, the audience may perhaps experience catharsis, that purgation of the soul brought about by an almost unbearable pity for him and his victims, and by terror at what human... ...han all his community . . . . He dies a noble death, just as he has lived a noble life. Michael Cassios evaluation of his end is our evaluation This did I fear, but aspect he had no weapon / For he was great of heart. WORKS CITED Bevington, David, ed. William Shakes peare Four Tragedies. New York Bantam Books, 1980. Bloomfield, Morton W. and Robert C. Elliott, ed. Great Plays Sophocles to Brecht. New York Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc., 1965. Coles, Blanche. Shakespeares Four Giants. Rindge, New Hampshire Richard metalworker Publisher, 1957. Jorgensen, Paul A. William Shakespeare The Tragedies. Boston Twayne Publishers, 1985. Shakespeare, William. Othello. In The Electric Shakespeare. Princeton University. 1996. http//www.eiu.edu/multilit/studyabroad/othello/othello_all.html No line nos.