Othello

Austin Howe
English B 30
Mrs. Schultz “Ultimately, we are products of both our environment and our own actions,” argues Len Morse; “it’s a question of which has more control.” To symbolize a much deeper moral psychological shift in the characters’ personalities and faith, William Shakespeare uses the individual locations in which the play The Tragedy of Othello takes place. From this geographical movement, the audience is shown how Shakespeare relates specific characters to individual geographic locations throughout the play. As a result, the physical geographic movement of the play represents much more than a simple backdrop; it serves to exemplify symbolically the battle between good and evil among the characters Othello, Desdemona, and Iago. In the beginnings of the play, Shakespeare sets up a crucial physical relationship between three main geographic locations: “anters vast & deserts idle” (1.3.139), Cyprus, and Venice. Cyprus is placed in the middle with anters vast & deserts idle on one side and Venice on the other, portraying Cyprus as a frontier between good (Venice) and evil (anters vast & deserts idle). Cyprus is a city on the brink of war between the Venetians and the Turks, a city lacking leadership, logic, and reason. Venice represents all that is true and pure as it is portrayed as a city of beauty, honor, logic, and reason. Anters vast & deserts idle are represented as a barbaric land of the unknown, a place in which purity, honor, and beauty are not known, and ultimately serve as a representation of the character Iago. When Othello is talking to the Duke within the Venetian senate, he speaks of the “anters vast and deserts idle” in which he was taken prisoner by the Turks. Othello uses this phrase to convey the true meaning of the land of the Turks. The phrase “anters vast” produces a visualization of cavernous emptiness and sterility just as “deserts idle” signify a land that is beyond the horizon, consumed by barbarianism and where few men dare to venture. The play begins in Venice, a strong symbolic representation of Desdemona. In the Renaissance period, Venice was an advanced city governed with logic and reason, developed as a city of purity and honor, which in turn becomes the synergistic representation for Desdemona. When Barbantio, Desdemona’s father, is talking to Roderigo outside his bedroom window, he says, “What tell’st thou me of robbing? This is Venice; / My house is not a grange” (1.1.102-03). Barbantio’s use of the word “robbing” show how law and order are principle trademarks in Venetian society, suggesting that robbery could never and would never happen in such a place. This is emphasized by his use of the word “grange,” suggesting that his house is a house of a Venetian senator, not some petty country house prone to robbery and vandalism. Shakespeare uses Othello’s love for Desdemona as a “woman of Venice” as a pathway to invoke Othello’s Venetian-like behavior as a calm, content, orderly gentleman who is altered in the extreme by Iago as the play moves on to Cyprus. The movement from Venice to Cyprus is represented by a shift from an organized regime of law and logic to which all abide to a place of raw nature, a city on the brink of war and chaos, allowing Iago to engage in methodic lies and manipulation of Othello. The representation of Cyprus’s instability as a potential battle ground between the Turks and the Venetians symbolizes a similar battle between Othello’s emotions as they are tormented and manipulated by Iago’s evil and Desdemona’s purity. Othello says to Iago in the citadel of Cyprus, “What? In a town of war / Yet wild, the peoples hearts brimful of fear, / To manage private and domestic quarrel?” (2.3.212-13), giving the audience a true sense of the fear and vulnerability of the people there. Othello’s statement “In a town of war” demonstrates just how susceptible and close to chaos Cyprus is and that battle could break out without warning and consume the city. The use of the term “wild” to describe Cyprus conveys a true sense of the lack of organization, reason, and development of the area and its barbarianism. Cyprus is the exact environment Iago needs to manipulate Othello’s emotions, turning Othello into a barbaric man of rage and jealously towards his wife, Desdemona. Shakespeare ultimately uses Cyprus in its raw nature, along with Othello’s love for Desdemona, as a catalyst for Iago to overcome the threshold of Othello’s jealousy, resulting in the manipulation of an honorable calm-natured man into a jealous barbaric Turk-like evil. It is only after the “honor killing” of his wife Desdemona that Othello realizes he has done a great injustice and been betrayed by those he thought he could trust the most. Before he kills himself, Othello says to those gathered in his bedroom: Speak of me as I am. Nothing extenuate, Nor set down aught in malice. Then must you speak Of one that loved not wisely, but too well; Of one not easily jealous, but, being wrought,
Perplexed in the extreme; of one whose hand,
Like the base Judean, threw a pearl away
Richer than all his tribe; of one whose subdued eyes,
Albeit unused to the melting mood,
Drops tears as fast as the Arabian trees
Their med’cinable gum. (5.2.338-46)
Othello’s realization of the terrible deed he has done is a distinct shift from the barbaric Turk-like man he became in Cyprus back to the calm, logical man he was in Venice. The phrase “like the base Judean” shows just how unrefined Othello became as he refers to himself as a savage, a man with no dignity who thoughtlessly threw away a beautiful pearl, a perfect wife, without seeing its worth. The transition in language from Othello’s harsh Turk-like words to his soothing complex Venetian-like speech can be seen in his description of the Arabian trees. Othello describes himself as a calm, collected man who withholds his emotions, but what has happened in Cyprus is inconceivable; it has driven him to tears, just as the Arabian trees slowly leak out their sappy gum. The movement of the play between the two main geographic locations Venice and Cyprus serves to provide symbolically a pathway in which the characters Othello and Desdemona become the victims of Iago’s heartless manipulation of truth, lies, good, and evil. The weakness of Othello’s emotions, coupled with the lack of order and honor in Cyprus, ultimately results in Iagos sadistic victory in Othello’s killing of Desdemona. As a result, there is a distinct change in Othello’s personality as the play moves from Venice to Cyprus, showing that symbolically, Othello truly is a product of his environment.

Works Citied

Morse, Len. "We Are Products of Our Environment." Helium - Where Knowledge Rules. 30 May

2007. Web. 26 Sept. 2011.