Othello is one of the four tragedies of Shakespeare's. The main characters are: Othello the Moor, Desdemona, Imago (the villian), the kind-hearted wife of Iago, Emilia, the upright Casio and Jericho. Story is centered on Othello the main character of this play, whose decisions and attitude changes directs and determines the end of the story.
I would like make a brief analysis of Othello's character. He is a warrior, a brave soldier. He is a general to the Venice army who has gained the state’s respect and trust for his leadership in the successful campaigns against the Muslim Turks. He has excellent military talent. He is a person who upholds integrity and is also open, but he also trusts others too easily which in this play turns out to be his greatest weakness in which he was easily manipulated by Iago as a result. Michael Casio is a young officer, who is very affectionate, and who is well liked by the women around him, and later in the play, is revealed as someone whom Othello is jealous of. In the play, Othello promoted Casio to be his aide-de-camp, which caused an older officer Iago to be greatly discontent with Othello. Sinister Iago devised a terrible conspiracy of revenge on Cassio, Othello and Desdemona. Iago caused Cassio to get drunk and caused him to be stripped of his position and later asks Cassio to ask Desdemona to plead for him to her husband for a favour. But as the same time, he has also provoked Othello’s jealousy so that he will not agree with his wife's request and also will be even more disgusted with Cassio. Until the end of the play Othello have been a person who firmly believe that Iago was an honest man who is full of love and faithfulness. This is a weakness of Othello. His failure to rationally identify the problem in his anger has also made him completely disposable towards Iago’s manipulations. The incident of the lost handkerchief which Othello gave to Desdemona which is a very significant token to their relationship, has also further convinced Othello of Iago’s deception. Actually, we in this event can still find Othello two mistakes. First, he has done badly in resolving his issues with his wife, which are actually rather trivial everyday life problems which everyone will face in their marriages. He could have gave his wife a little bit more trust and the gift of a doubt and e could have also further investigated the matter. There are many ways in which he could have handled the issue better, but because he failed, he has given Iago opportunity to make his plans a success.
The second mistake was that in the play, Othello has failed to consider possible interpersonal issues between himself and the people around him. His actions of promoting a foreigner whom he favoured (Cassio, a Florentine) to the position of lieutenant might be a convenient for him to relate with him, but he has ignored the fact that he has caused discontent to Iago, a native through his actions. He should have realise the possibility of Iago having such motives, but he has failed. However, we can’t say that Othello was a very bad character without any good qualities either, as he was very courageous soldier who has succeeded in the battlefield and who is very honest, but it is also his naïve belief in honesty that has caused him to be bought by Iago’s lies which led him his inevitable mistake which can never be undone. It is also observable that Othello has a yearning to pursue a happy love relationship and he is also daring to admit his mistakes and is willing to bear the consequences for his actions - which is also commendable.
