Description

The destructive effects of jealousy underline the drama of Shakespeare's first manure tragedy. Othello, a man of quality and superior intelligence, is brought down by his suspicions of his wife, the lovely Desdemona. Never before had Shakespeare so vividly pointed to the moral contradictions of love and jealousy. Othello's feelings for Desdemona are tellingly paralleled in the perverted love and jealousy of Othello's lieutenant, the 'honest lago. The play, whose characters display attributes common to the least of mankind, remains perhaps the most approachable of Shakespeare's four great tragedies.