Whole text question- critical interpretation (Iago)

‘He is monstrous because, faced with the manifold richness of experience, his only reaction is calculation and the desire to manipulate… Ultimately, whatever its proximate motives, malice is motiveless; that is the secret of its power and its horror, why it can go unsuspected and why

Helen Gardner

To what extent do you agree with this view?

Viewpoint:

Iago is duplicitous and is full of rich experience in the art of manipulation but his imitate motives for his actions is motiveless malice. He uses this as his secret power to achieve his end goal and does with out being suspected.

Quotations to support this viewpoint (Chronological):

·       “But I will wear my heart upon my sleeve/For daws to peck at. I am not what I am” –Iago is not what he seems on face value, which shows he is a Machiavellian character.

·       “…and something in him is as deeply rebellious and affronted by this as Satan, who in a sense can be called his disciple.” -just wants to rebel and cause pain. Shakespeare shows this through comparing Iago to the devil

·       “Yet that I put the Moor/At least into a jealousy so strong/That judgment cannot cure.” - suggests he is just doing this because he is innately evil and for his own pleasure.

·       “Demand me nothing: what you know, you know;/From this time forth. I never will speak word.” –Iago refuses to say why he did what he did even when his wife and Desdemona lay dead in front of him

Counter argument to this viewpoint:

Iago can also be seen to posses in his mind just reasons for his actions whether they be true or false to why he is working to encourage Othello’s tragic downfall and fuel his own spite.

·       “’I have already chose my officer’”-“One Michael Cassio, a Florentine” – Iago has served alongside Othello and have become war companions but he chose Cassio over Iago to be his lieutenant fuelling his hatred

·       “I hate the Moor;/And it is thought abroad that ‘twixt my sheets/ He’s done my office.” –The Moor has slept with my wife

·       “kill two birds with one stone” –can cause Othello’s downfall due not giving Iago the promotion and can also get a promotion through framing that Desdemona and Cassio have been have an affair through poisoning Othello’s mind.

Conclusion:

Shakespeare presents Iago as both having intentions but also not having any intentions to justify his actions.  Iago is a slighted and almost psychopathic character who enjoys inflicting pain on people. Iago falsely constructs reasons for his actions leading to the conclusion that he simply posses motiveless malignity.