Iago Innovator Essay

Iago The Tragic Innovator
“It is our choices that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.”- J.K Rowling The play “Othello”written by William Shakespeare is a famous piece of literature written using Shakespeare’s well known approach of a tragic denouement. Revenge is a recurring theme between the characters Othello, Roderigo and Iago which drives them all to make their decisions. As the characters begin to let their thoughts of envy and hatred consume their perception they tend to act impulsively when making decisions on how to deal with their feelings resulting in a conclusion made with a lack of conscience ending in a tragic denouement. Iago can be seen as the innovator of harmful decisions among Othello and Roderigo owing to the fact that Iago has an immense amount of envy and hatred toward Othello. In the first scene of the play we learn that Sergeant Othello makes the decision to choose to promote Cassio to lieutenant rather than choosing Iago for the position. Conclusively this upsets Iago, he is offended by Othello’s decision in view of the fact that Othello believes Cassio is a stronger soldier, Iago is hurt and believes he is worth a
This is a superior example of appearance versus reality. Igo is evidently the cause of tragic conflict because he believes he was treated unfairly by Othello which sparked his anger. “Iago claims to Roderigo that his hatred of Othello is based on the general having unfairly promoted Cassio to lieutenant when Iago was the one who merited the post, since he has seniority.” (Iago, Secondary Source) We see here by the occurrence of this event, Iago makes a choice to destroy Othello. Iago’s decisions on how he deals with his feelings shows us readers that he has very little self control his feelings of envy and hatred for Othello consume his