ENGLISH HONOURS

PROJECT

DESDEMONA AND HER DOWNFALL

SUBMITTED TO,
SUBMITTED BY,

MS. NEHA SOI

TAMANNNA BHARDWAJ

BA 2nd YEAR

ROLL NO: 964

DESDEMONA AND HER DOWNFALL
 Othello is one of the most famous and widely recognized play of
William Shakespeare. He was a well respected soldier and a newly married
man. Othello appears to be in an admirable position. Yet when his supposed
friend Iago puts his hidden agenda into action, he plants a seed of doubt into
Othellos mind over his wifes loyalty until he is ultimately consumed by his
insecurity and suspicion. The intense love between Othello and Desdemona
descends until innocence is corrupted and trust is eroded.

The character of Desdemona has often been

considered as one of the most inadequate female character Shakespeare has
ever written. Desdemonas character had an untimely fate through her inter-
cultural marriage, her honest and sweet character. The part Desdemona played
in losing her handkerchief, her sexual innocence with other characters in the
play and she accepting her fate in an assaulted wife syndrome way.
Shakespeare has given these traits to Desdemona in such a way that it has
made us question, how much of a role her character truly plays in her own
downfall as we watch her relationship with Othello into a tangled web of
jealousy, suspicion and self doubt.
 Shakespeare described Desdemona as a pure and
innocent Venetian girl. At the start of the play there was a controversy
surrounding her secret marriage to Othello, as it is assumed that there is a
considerable age difference between the two. And also the fact that he was a
black man and at that time when they were only seen as slaves. We first saw
that disapproval from her father Brabantio when Iago and Roderigo inform
him that an old black ram is tupping his white ewe and Brabantio
attempts to arrest Othello. His plan fails when Desdemona steps forward and
shows us that she is able to defend her choice of marrying Othello as she saw
Othellos visage in his mind and was able to look past his appearance and
suspected paganism resulting in the arrest falls through.

Despite Othello being based in Italy, it still

contains the views and opinions that would have been strong in an Elizabethan
society. For a young beautiful daughter of a well-respected senator to secretly
elope with a black man who is suspected of being a pagan, would have been
something that was looked down upon a great deal in Elizabethan England
when Shakespeare wrote this play. When Othellos jealousy over Desdemona
grows even more and more stronger, the thought of her dishonesty slowly
starts to seep into his mind. Desdemona originally allowed dishonesty into
their relationship right from the beginning with the secret marriage, which
leads Othello to think that if she could be dishonest to her own father, then
why couldnt she bring it further into their relationship and do it with him.
When it is spun this way the issues and lies Desdemonas cross-cultural
marriage has caused seem to have been brought upon all by herself because in
marrying Othello she chose the option that stirred the most uproar and also
gave Othello reason to believe that his wifes loyalty he once had faith upon
now remains an illusion.
 Desdemona is presented as an honest and
sweet character. Shakespeare depicts her as a model of maidenly honesty since
a maiden never bold and the possessing the qualities of generosity and
kindness as she holds it a vice in her goodness not to do more than she is
requested. It is Desdemonas good that contrasts against Iagos evil
throughout the play and she is thought highly of by many characters. Cassio
describes her as being a perfect vesture of creation while she is also seen as
being fit for a queen as she might lie by the emperors side and command
him tasks. However Desdemonas true likeability is expressed most clearly
through the character of Iagos wife Emilia. While Emilia also played a part in
her husbands scheming to ensure Othello meets his downfall, she ends up
sacrificing her own husband in order to stay loyal to the then already murdered
Desdemona and in the process ends up getting killed herself. This shows that
Desdemona is a character that was intended to be liked by the audience as
represented through the other characters actions and feelings towards her. Yet
there is often much difference of opinion towards these positive and admirable
characteristics Desdemona possess. Some audiences believe that her sweet and
gentle nature comes across like that of a nave and immature girl. However
this can be rebutted as one critic of the play M.R. Ridley points out
Desdemonas character is perhaps played much less mature than Shakespeare
intended her to be with a more child-wife persona. While we see the naivety
and simplicity of Desdemona we can also see her kindness and sweet
personality making her true persona hard to pin down, whether those positive
and likeable attributes are merely a mask covering her true innocence and
inexperience or she is really a strong and courageous character under the
wholesomeness appearance that she obtains.
When Desdemona loses her handkerchief that Othello gave her and lies to him
when he questions her of its whereabouts, many critics of the play say that it
shows the true extent of Desdemonas naivety to have lied to Othello about
losing the handkerchief and instead letting the problem fester. However I
found that Desdemona lying about it to be a natural human instinct and that
she probably did it in the hope it would turn up again especially with all the
sentimentality it had to Othello as an Egyptian to his mother give and upon
her deathbed she gave it to him for when his]fate would have him wive to
give it her. Yet some audiences can find this submissiveness of Desdemonas
character irritable feeling that if she was to have owned up to not knowing
where the handkerchief was in the first place things could have turned out
differently for her. This creates a scene in the play where Desdemonas fate
can go either way and in choosing to be dishonest to her husband this crucial
point of the play has now turned against Desdemonas favour. It also contrasts
how Desdemona is at this point in the play to how she was at the beginning.
While back in Venice Desdemona came forward to her father about her
relationship with Othello and was courageous in taking her husbands side over
her disapproving and livid father we now see her too timid to be honest with
her husband she was so loyal to when off the island of Cyprus. Shakespeare
could have intended this to depict the isolation Desdemonas character feels
being on an island and how she has become dependent upon Othello. Because
of this sense of loneliness and defencelessness that she now has Desdemona
doesnt want to anger the only person she now depends upon.
 Desdemonas character has a sense of sexual naivety about her, which is
shown by Shakespeare through how she relates with the characters Cassio and
Emilia. Othello is livid with Cassio thinking his wife is having an affair with
him. However while Desdemona is completely unaware of this suspicion she
does nothing to help her own case when Othello talks about Cassios
inadequacy and Desdemona tries to defend him purely out of her friendship
for him. It would seem that with Othello acting differently towards her and not
seeming like his usual self that Desdemona would be a bit more wary of what
she was saying around him. This is showing her inability to see the wider
implications surrounding her. When she has a conversation with Emilia and is
told Uds pity, who would not make her husband a cuckold, to make him a
monarch enforcing on herthat the way to hold power over a husband to cheat
on him as it makes him look like a fool Desdemona shows her naivety yet
again expressing how she could never have believed that any such woman
would ever be unfaithful towards her husband showing how sheltered from the
world she really is. This clearly highlights the age gap and extent of
experience between Othello and Desdemona. There is also a lack of
knowledge expressed through Desdemonas character. This is reflected
through her as she goes to Cyprus. She asks to go along on the journey and
accompany her husband when it really wasnt her place, or any womans
place, to do so. This presents her in a way of not knowing the boundaries
between personal and professional and is later reflected in how choosing to
accompany her husband on a trip that was purely for business results in her
feels vulnerable and isolated.
 By the end of the play Othello Desdemonas character has descended to
being a timid woman as if suffering 1 part she would have acted as most
humans would have it appears that right from the beginning she was trying to
take on battles, such as marrying Othello in a secret way, that were too big for
her to conquer having lived such a sheltered life and being a very nave
character. Shakespeare had incorporated into Desdemona from the outside
what would be a picture perfect example of an Elizabethan woman. However
on the inside is a character that cant help but continually drive herself into the
ground more and more creating a presence for Desdemonas character that is
most unlike many of the other females roles in Shakespeares plays such as
Lady Macbeth who blatantly shows her true motives through her actions,
where was Desdemona almost naively stumbles into her own fate without
realizing she was doing so. A character like Desdemonas is good for a play of
William Shakespeares as it is a character who has much debate surrounding
the true nature of herself.