Racism in Shakespeares Othello Essay -- GCSE English Literature Cours

Racism in Othello Samuel Taylor Coleridges Literary Remains is fitting wizard of the essays that presents an attack on Shakespeare for his lack of realism in the monstrous picture show of a marriage between a beautiful Venetian girl, and a veritable negro, in Othello. He sees Shakespeares transformation of a barbarous negro into a respected soldier and master of stature as ignorant, since at the time, negroes were not known further as slaves. (Appendix) The extract seems to raise two questions - how central is the taboo of miscegeny to the play, and to what extent is Othellos disposition able to counter this prejudice? It is certainly not hard to cogitate that Othello is probably Shakespeares most controversial play. There is a clear group of racism throughout, one which was firmly embedded in the Venetian order which rejects the marriage of Othello and Desdemona as erring, against every(prenominal) rules of nature, 1.3.102 Nothing separates Othello from, the wealthy cur led darlings of our nation, 1.2.68 except skin-color - he matches or even exceeds them in reputation. At the start of the play, he appears confident that, OTHELLO My parts, my title, and my perfect soulShall manifest me rightly.Othello 1.2.31-2 when he is called in strawman of the court on charges of witchcraft, yet the malevolent Iago is able to call on Othellos deep-rooted insecurities about his race in order to play Othello and Desdemona against one another until their marriage fails. Essentially, Iago is a representative of the white race, a pre-Nazi code who tries to inform the public of the impurity of Othello and Desdemonas marriage. He demonstrates how this miscegenation is threatening to the subsisting socia... ... that nothing could be made too marked for the senses of his interview, had practically pass it, -- would this prove aught concerning his own intention as a poet for all ages? Can we imagine him so utterly ignorant as to defy a barbarous negro plead royal b irth, --at a time, too, when negroes were not known except as slaves? -- As for Iagos language to Brabantio, it implies merely that Othello was a Moor, that is, black .... No doubt Desdemona saw Othellos visage in his legal opinion yet, as we are constituted, and most surely as an English audience was disposed in the beginning of the seventeenth century, it would be something monstrous to study this beautiful Venetian girl falling in love with a veritable negro. It would argue a disproportionateness, a want of balance, in Desdemona, which Shakespeare does not appear to have in the least contemplated.