Desdemona and Her Downfall

Othello is one of William Shakespeares most famous and widely recognised plays. A
well respected soldier and newly married man, Othello appears to be in an enviable
position. Yet when supposed friend Iago puts his hidden agenda into action he plants
a seed of doubt in Othellos mind over his wifes fidelity until he is ultimately
consumed by his jealousy and suspicion. The intense love between Othello and
Desdemona descends until innocence is corrupted and trust is eroded as the
relationship is sent into a downward spiral. The character of Desdemona has often
been considered one of the more inadequate female characters Shakespeare has
written as her chaste persona and naivety does nothing for the audience when being
compared to that of the menacing, manipulative nature of Lady Macbeth in the play
Macbeth. While this is an issue argued amongst critics it can be questioned how
much of a part Desdemonas character plays in her untimely fate through her crosscultural marriage, her honest and sweet character, the part she played in losing the
handkerchief, her sexual naivety with other characters in the play and Desdemona
accepting her fate in a battered wife syndrome way. Shakespeare has bestowed
these traits upon Desdemona in such a way that it has us questioning how much of a
role her character truly plays in her own downfall as we watch her relationship with
Othello cascade into a tangled web of jealousy, suspicion and self doubt.
Shakespeare describes Desdemona as being a pure and innocent Venetian girl,
which sets us up with her nave nature right from the beginning. At the start of the
play there is controversy surrounding her clandestine marriage to Othello as it is
implied there is a considerable age difference between the two and also the fact that
he is a black man at a time when they were only seen as slaves. We first see this
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 fall through because 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 virtuous
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 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 fidelity 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.
A pivotal scene in the play Othello is 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 convosation with Emilia
and is told Uds pity, who would not make her husband a cuckold, to make him a
monarch enforcing on her that 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 from battered wife syndrome. At the start of the play there
was a sense of her and Othello being equals in their relationship through how she felt
it was acceptable for her to ask to accompany him on his trip to Cyprus. There was
none of that power struggle like what we see in Iago and Emilias relationship.
Desdemona ultimately ends up like the battered wife and accepts her fate. Instead of
thinking what caused her and Othellos marriage to turn sour she automatically
blames herself thinking it was her not being able to save Othello and questions as to
what she did. From questioning as to why things have turned out this way she ends
regretting her marriage to Othello and after her expressed admiration for Lodovico it
seems that she might have been better off with a white cultured Venetian. Othello
throws Desdemona away like the bare Indian threw a pearl away, N cher than all his
tribe yet still she blames herself for the failed relationship. It also shows the naivety
that both of them had at the beginning of the relationship possessing a love will
conquer all attitude when in the end it was Othello passionate and volatile love that
drove him to kill Desdemona as she didnt meet the expectation of the pedestal he
had placed her on now seeing her as nothing more than The cunning whore of
Venice. John wain says of Othello Othello and Desdemona can still fall in love. And
when they do it, it is the difference between then, the uncharted gulf they have to
cross in order to communicate, that brings them to destruction. This indicates that
many audiences may feel that right from the beginning Othello and Desdemonas
characters were far too different to have ever worked out as Desdemona was too
sheltered and nave to have been able to cope with a husband like Othello as when
he was so wrapped with jealousy she couldnt even recognise that their relationship
was descending into a downward spiral of destruction.
William Shakespeares Othello creates a character out of Desdemona that has
sparked much debate amongst critics of the play questioning whether she
contributed at all in the role of her downfall. While it may appear on the outside that it
was scheming Iago and Jealous Othello that did all the work, when looking into it
more closely it is clear that Desdemona did have some role in her own death. While
for the most 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 clandestine 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 realising 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. As A.C. Bradley says of her character Desdemonas
suffering is like that of the most loving of dumb creatures tortured without cause by
the being (s)he adores.