Othello character summary

Othello is the first great black protagonist in Western literature... and he's still one of the most famous

Shakespeare penned Othello with the same insane and still-fresh-centuries-later talent that he employed with his other tragic heroes (that's Hamlet, King Lear and Macbeth).

The play dramatizes this dude's fall from grace – Othello begins as a noble guy (he's a celebrated and respected war hero, a loving husband, and an eloquent storyteller) but, by the end of the play, Othello has become an irrational, violent, and insanely jealous husband who murders his own wife after Iago convinces him that Desdemona has been unfaithful.

A black man from North Africa, Othello has traveled the world, been sold into slavery, escaped, and ended up as the military commander of the Venetian military, guard to a powerful Italian city-state. Not bad, Othello. Not bad at all.

Othello's status in Venice is pretty complicated—he's both an insider and an outsider. On the one hand, he is a Christian (probably) and experienced military leader, commanding respect and admiration from the Duke, the Senate, and many Venetian citizens. On the other hand, being a black Moor and a foreigner in Venice also subjects Othello to some shockingly overt racism, especially by his wife's father... who believes Desdemona's interracial marriage can only be the result of Othello's trickery.

Of course, as we learn, Othello is definitely not the tricky character in this play

According to Brabantio, Othello must have "enchanted" Desdemona with "foul charms" and magic spells. Otherwise, he insists, Desdemona never would have run "to the sooty bosom" of Othello (1.2.82, 92, 89). In the play, Othello's marriage to Desdemona prompts some characters to refer to Othello as "thick-lips," the "devil," and the "old black ram" that supposedly contaminates a white woman (Desdemona) with his hyper-sexuality. At…