Iago's Motives In Othello

Iago character and motives
In the play Othello, the character Iago proves to be one of the most interesting and mysterious character of any Shakespearian play. In Othello, Iago attempts to ruin the high ranking military officer, Othello, and Othello's wife through a series of manipulation and cruelty. However, throughout the play, Iago never completely explains his desire to ruin Othello and certainly doesn't provide legitimate cause to put so many of these characters through such torment. This is what makes Iago such an interesting character, providing countless room for discussion and analysis. In the beginning of the play, we view a conversation between Roderigo, a love-struck chump, and Iago. Roderigo requests that Iago find a way that Desdemona would love Roderigo but Iago sees this as an opportunity to use Roderigo as a cog in Iago's overarching plan. This is the reader's first taste of Iago's talent of manipulation and common acts of helping people for his own selfish purposes.
It is clear in this scene that Iago wants to infuriate Brabantio as he uses a vulgar and bare description of "an old black ram is tupping your white ewe". The delicately placed "black" adjective in this description is said in hopes to spark the wide distrust that people have of black