Analysis of Othello and Desdemona and Their Relationship

During his career, William Shakespeare became known for creating intense, thought provoking works of art. Shakespeare’s play, Othello, while initially seems like a romance story between Othello and Desdemona, is a tragic tale of self-doubt and deception, as well as gender and racial prejudice. Desdemona and Othello have a very strong, deep love for each other, however Othello struggles with believing that her love is pure. Throughout the play Othello continues to listen to the nefarious whisperings of quite possibly the most monstrous anti-hero in all of Shakespeare productions, Iago. During most of the play its rather difficult to determine what Iago’s motivations are for the pain and torment he has caused for Othello, and ultimately Desdemona. Iago continuously tells Othello that Desdemona’s love for him isn’t real, and that she has been unfaithful and shouldn’t be trusted. “She did deceive her father, marrying you,” Othello initially fights against this, and even defends Desdemona honor and becomes angry with Iago for even thinking such thoughts, but unfortunately his own insecurities get the best of him, and he eventually falls to Iago’s word, and begins to believe that what he is saying is the truth. By the final act of the play, Othello has essentially gone mad from the constant anxiety and pain he feels believing that his wife Desdemona has been unfaithful, and betrayed him. He finds her asleep in their bed, and is convincing himself that she must die.

“It is the cause, it is the cause, my soul.

Let me not name it to you, you chaste stars,

It is the cause. Yet I’ll not shed her blood,

Nor scar that whiter skin of hers than snow

And smooth as monumental alabaster.

Yet she must die, else she’ll betray more men.” 

Desdemona hears Othello, and wakes up, frightened by his current state and begs him not to kill her, holding strong that she has not been unfaithful or done anything that would warrant Othello wanting to harm her. Unfortunately, Othello is so lost in his emotions that even if Desdemona swears and pleads that she is innocent of what she is being accused of, he warns her that she will not be able to change his mind. Even in her last dying moments, Desdemona swears her love for Othello, “Commend me to my kind lord. Oh, farewell!”.

W. E. B. Du Bois was an American Sociologist and Historian who was best known for his work on three main books; Black Reconstruction, The Crisis, and The Souls of Black Folk. Within The Souls of Black Folk, DuBois introduced a concept known as double consciousness. “It is a peculiar sensation, this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one’s self through the eyes of others, of measuring one’s soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity. One ever feels his twoness, — an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts, two unreconciled strivings; two warring ideals in one dark body, whose dogged strength alone keeps it from being torn asunder.” The concept seems to be the manner in which there is the separation between the consciousness of how we perceive ourselves, our own true thoughts, and the way that we are outwardly perceived by others as well. In DuBois’ work, the purpose of the term was to show the deep-rooted othering that black people tend to feel in a majority white society. The constant feeling of being othered, pointing to the double lives that every African American person is forced to live in this country, being as both an American and as a black person. Dubois brings to attention that, even if it’s not accepted or talked about, there are two very distinct social worlds occurring in our society. Throughout Othello there are quite a few examples of double consciousness in action, but the question is would we, as the reader, still be able to achieve such a deep understanding of the racial implications of the play without first understanding the work of DuBois?

The Concept of Double Consciousness Through Othello and Desdemona Relationship

Throughout the play, Othello profoundly struggles with his own identity, and the self-doubt worries that he has given that he is a black man, married to a white woman of high birth. Othello feels that he is up against not only himself, but the opinions of everyone around him, including Brabanzio, Desdemona’s father, the people of Venice, and even Desdemona herself. Is the love she has for him honest and pure? Or does she only love him because it is the ultimate act of rebellion against her father to marry a black military man. In Act 1 scene three, Brabanzio is convinced that Othello must have used some kind of magic to get Desdemona to marry him, that there is no way she would choose this on her own and that she has essentially been stolen from him. Brabanzio voicing these accusations, whether he meant to or not, highlights his own deep-rooted racist ideations. During the Elizabethan Age, there was a kind of fear that white people had towards black people, believing that they were born with odd gifts, making them almost supernatural. While this may sound like a positive thing, unfortunately is wasn’t at all. These assumptions at the time, and sadly up until maybe the last century, have been used by white people all around the world to essentially demonize black people and give them a validation for their hatred towards an entire group of people. Because of this, Brabanzio making such accusations, and making them so publicly, brings to light the sort of unspoken theme of racism that runs through the majority of this play. It is woven in to the interactions between Desdemona and Othello, and also seen in Toni Morrisons adaption Desdemona, between Desdemona and her nurse.

In relation to Othello, we see the concept of double consciousness in the interactions between Desdemona and her nurse maid in Toni Morrison’s Desdemona. The nurse, whom Desdemona calls Barbary, is hardly mentioned throughout the play Othello. The important moment where Desdemona mentions her in the play is towards the end of Act IV, after an altercation she has just had with Othello. Desdemona tells Emilia that she feels shaken up, and that she can’t seem to get a certain song stuck out of her head, which she learned from Barbary.

“My mother had a maid called Barbary,

She was in love, and he she loved proved mad

And did forsake her. She had a song of “Willow,”

An old thing ’twas, but it expressed her fortune

And she died singing it. That song tonight

30Will not go from my mind. I have much to do

But to go hang my head all at one side

And sing it like poor Barbary.” 

Morrison's Look At Othello and Desdemona's Relationship

In Toni Morrisons’ Desdemona, we are given a further insight to Desdemona’s relationship with Barbary. On the other side of that, we are also shown Barbary’s, or rather Sa’ran’s as she reveals her true name to be, thoughts on their relationship, if she would even call it that. In chapter 2, Desdemona talks of Barbary as someone that she loves and admires, almost in the way someone would speak on a mother figure. “She was more alive than anyone I knew and more loving. She tended me as though she were my birth mother; braided my hair, dressed me, comforted me when I was ill and danced with me when I recovered.”  It is very clear that Desdemona greatly values her connection and relationship with Barbary. However, later in the book we are given Sa’ran’s point of view, and she paints a vividly different picture of their relationship. In chapter 9, Sa’ran tries to get Desdemona to understand the true dynamic of their relationship. Yes, she was there for Desdemona when she needed someone to be. Yes, she took care of Desdemona when she was ill and needed tending to. However, this wasn’t because she loved her, but because it was her job to. After Desdemona continues to insist that Sa’ran was her best friend, Sa’ran tells her “I was your slave.” Throughout this interaction between Sa’ran, Desdemona seems almost unaware to the significance that Saran was a black slave appointed to a high-level white woman. Desdemona speaks to Sa’ran as though they are equals, that she knows and understands the hardships that Sa’ran feels every day, because they are both women, because she chose to love and marry a black man. “Because of your skin? It is you who lack knowing. Think. I married a Moor. I fled my home to be with him. I defied my father, all my family to wed him. I joined him on the battlefield.” I believe one of the more interesting things about the interactions between Desdemona and Sa’ran in Morrisons Desdemona, is that we are shown that the strongest emotional bond that Desdemona had with anyone was in her connection with Sa’ran. Especially given that we are barely given in insight in to their relationship during the play Othello. There is an unwavering connected between these two women, even just from the tragic connection they share of both being murdered by their outraged lovers. In this supernatural afterlife conversation, these two women find a way to strengthen their bond even further as Sa’ran realizes that while she was her servant, Desdemona never once abused her.

Morrison also gives readers another, hidden look in to the relationship between Desdemona and Othello, and also the vast differences in the portrayal of Desdemona in both works. Shakespeare’s Othello shows Desdemona as essentially the perfect woman, as her loyalty for her husband is proven to be unbreakable. Even after dealing with the horrible mistrust and pain she felt by Othello’s actions, and after Othello has accused her of being unfaithful and betraying him, she still remains silent in the hurt she feels, and she continues to deny that she has done anything wrong and pleading for him to believe in her love. Conversely, Morrison portrays Desdemona in a much different light, and shows us that Desdemona isn’t quite as submissive as Shakespeare would like us to believe. We are shown a woman who is fiercely imaginative, someone who has many hopes and dreams. Almost as if there were invisible chains wrapped around her throughout Shakespeare’s play, and Morrison allowed her to break free from that hold, becoming tremendously emotional and passionate. During her afterlife conversation with Othello in chapter 10, he questions why Desdemona allowed him to murder her, “why did you let my rage run free?”. And with what I imagine to be an unwavering level of strength, Desdemona tells him that the man she loved was already gone, “what was left to struggle for?” (Morrison 50) She felt she had already lost him the moment he lost faith in her, and he knew that there was so use in trying to pull him back as he was already too far gone. Within this conversation, Morrison allows these two past lovers to finally rest within the safety of their forgiveness, and the power of their unbreakable bond, even after everything that Othello has done to Desdemona. This experience, and the extreme pain caused by it, has allowed both of them to see where they went wrong and accept their fault but also love each other for those faults.

“When two being meet,

Each brings to the other a bit of themselves.

So we learn, we construct ourselves, we evolve.

I bring what makes me different from you.

Give me what you are.

But do it with gentleness and tolerance.”

Desdemona, while she was hurt by the actions of Othello, shows that in a way she was given new perspective through this experience and given a deeper look in to the unbreakable bond she shares with her husband.

Final Thoughts

It’s always understood that each person who reads any book or play will always have their own interpretation of the symbols, themes and meaning of the story. Throughout the play Othello there are countless moments of character development, and opportunities to get a closer look in to the motives and understandings of Iago, Othello and even Desdemona, unfortunately Shakespeare’s attention to certain characters and relationships is rather limited. In Othello, race is quite obviously a central theme to the play, as there are constant mentions to Othello’s racial otherness, as shown when Roderigo says “What a full fortune does the thick-lips owe / if he can carry’t thus!” As the reader though, by having a full understanding of DuBois’ double consciousness from The Souls of Black Folk before diving into Shakespeare’s Othello we are able to achieve a deeper understanding of the internal struggle of feeling othered that Othello experiences in his community, and how those thoughts ultimately cause him to be so susceptible to Iago’s influence. Before Iago began manipulating him, Othello was actually quite confident with himself, however further in to the play he struggles with his identity, and with the anxieties that people only judged him by the color of his skin and not by his honorable actions. Along with that, Shakespeare’s characterization of Desdemona is quite limited as her traits are only revealed through her reactions with the other characters, as opposed to coming from within herself. In Toni Morrison’s adaptation, Desdemona, she has reimagined this incredibly strong, silenced female character who deserved so much better. I believe that without reading Desdemona in partnership with the original play, you are not fully able to understand the complexity of Desdemona’s character and vigor. Both Dubois and Morrison, creating a connection across 108 years, prove that it is not enough to simply hear what the characters are saying, but to fully understand and absorb them as well.  

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