Loss of Identity: A Key Tragic Trope

The protagonists of Othello (Othello), Death of a Salesman (Willy Loman), and Keats’ poetry (notably Lamia from Lamia and the knight from La Belle Dame Sans Merci) all suffer, to an extent, a loss of identity. However, it is not necessarily true that the characters’ loss of identity is instigated by their tragic fall, but might instead be a cause of it.

Othello

Othello’s Moorish identity is a significant part of Othello, especially due to the constant racism he faces from characters such as Iago (who calls him a “barbary horse” and “devil”) and Brabantio (who accuses him of using “magic” to win over Desdemona). Early in the play (Act 1, Scene 2 and Scene 3), Othello does not outright reject his identity but acknowledges its limitations, understanding that his “parts… title and… perfect soul” are necessary to counteract racial prejudice in his trial. However, some rejection of his identity is inherent to his role as a general in the Venetian military; as a Moor, he almost certainly comes from a part of the world that has been damaged by colonial policy, however he fought colonial wars against “cannibals” in many “battles, sieges”. Othello’s interpretation of his own identity is largely irrelevant to his downfall, however in Act 4 it does appear that Othello is beginning to resent his identity, suggesting that he believes Desdemona to be unfaithful “haply, for I am black”. Therefore, it is evident that Othello’s ethnicity has led to him being somewhat insecure, and therefore susceptible to manipulation from Iago. In the instance of Othello, the tragedy is caused more by the loss of identity rather than vice versa.

Death of a Salesman

Willy Loman is clearly far more aligned with the natural world and with manual labour than he is with life in urban New York in white collar work. He demonstrates this during his card game with Charley, who he calls “disgusting” because “a man who can’t handle tools is not a man”. Furthermore, he is constantly distracted by the “scenery” of rural New England, and describes it as “so beautiful up there… the trees are so thick, and the sun is warm”, suggesting that he is inclined towards the natural world. However, Willy chooses to exist within New York, which has been urbanised since he has lived in his house (“there’s not a breath of fresh air in this neighbourhood”) due to his naïve belief in the American Dream and his ability to thrive within a capitalist society. This is in contrast to his natural identity, and this is a significant cause, not consequence of, his downfall.

Keats

Lamia is arguably the tragic hero that suffers from the most explicit loss of identity in Keats’ poetry, as it is categorised by a physical transformation. She begins the poem as a wondrous serpentine creature of the immortal world, “striped like a zebra, freckled like a pard”, however undergoes a painful transformation in to a mortal woman able to fulfil her mortal desires but with significantly less power. Due to this transformation, she is vulnerable to the world of rationality and science, embodied by Lycius, which leads to the ultimate tragedy of Lamia’s disappearance and Lycius’ death, and therefore the loss of identity was in part responsible for the tragedy. The knight from La Belle Dame Sans Merci has an equally significant but perhaps less obvious loss of identity than Lamia does, and it occurs as a result of the tragedy. After the “faery’s child” leaves the knight “on the cold hill’s side”, he undergoes an internal transition from being a proactive and forceful patriarch from a hyper-masculine world of war and killing, and becomes a physically weakened, “ail[ed]” character with a “lily on [his] brow” and “on [his] cheeks a fading rose”. Regarding this poem, it is certainly true that the tragedy of La Belle Dame Sans Merci instigated the loss of the knight’s identity.

With thanks to KW in year 13

Women as Tragic Victims

‘In all three texts women are often depicted as tragic victims, suffering abuse at the hands of their male partners’

• Othello:
• Desdemona & Othello
• Emilia & Iago
• Death of a Salesman:
• Linda
• Keats:
• Isabella
• Lamia 

Unlike today, during Shakespeare, Miller and Keats’ eras, women were still treated as individuals who lacked intelligence and were too unstable to maintain financial autonomy due to having a ‘weaker’ personality. In addition, women were either portrayed as the seductress ‘Eve’ or the mild and meek ‘Mary’. Readers experience these misogynistic views being illustrated in the representation of female characters as well as the male characters in their writings.

From “Othello” written by Shakespeare, all we see is Desdemona being a loyal and a loving wife towards Othello. The love she feels for her husband, “the Moor”, is strong enough for her to choose to be Othello’s wife, over the “divided duty” of being an obedient daughter to her father. Shakespeare illustrates how Desdemona’s “heart’s subdued Even to the very quality of my lord”, which shows the clear submission Desdemona allows for Othello. This is an unnerving read through the lens of feminism. As feminist today, females cannot think of anything worse than being objectified and owned by anyone. Owned as a pretty antique that is put on display for pride and glory. However, this “fair warrior”, accepts her inferiority and her blinding love towards her husband, leads to her downfall. However, the “green eyed monster” was easy to indoctrinate Othello into thinking that Desdemona was cuckolding him. And we can all guess where that ended up. It ended with Othello mistreating his wife as he “strikes her” and making Desdemona anxious within herself that she has done something wrong that might have upset her ‘loved one’. Shakespeare makes use of the handkerchief which represents the deterioration of Othello’s and Desdemona’s wedding.

Another tragic victim is seen in ‘Death of a Salesman’, Linda, who is also the only main female character. Not only do we experience Willy treating Linda as insignificant and that her actions are never pleasing. But, the audience also experience, Linda not being enlightened by the fact that her, oh so loyal husband, is in fact not really that loyal. We see how Willy treats the other woman as he “grabs her and kisses her roughly” showing intimacy between these two which leads to the downfall of the marriage. Linda is seen as a typical housewife, who waits for her husband’s arrival while she looks after the children and the house. However, what’s different from Linda to the other characters is that she’s the only character suffering by the hands of a man, who in fact is also a female. The male guilty for this is Willy, her husband. Even though Linda has an unconditional love and loyalty towards her husband, the audience still feel the sense of suffering that Linda tries her very best to hide. This is illustrated from the crippling bills that Linda needs to take care of from all the materialistic objects that Willy tries hard to achieve in order to conform and fit in a capitalistic state. The fridge, washing machine, and more. These expectations from society is what it led to Willy to cause the suffering on Linda. Having the affair with another woman, meant that he has the opportunity to sell more.  In addition, buying all the materialistic objects may be due to the desire to try and impress Linda with the money he earns from his job. However, this led to the suffering that Linda has to endure for most of her life. And when Willy dies, Linda is seen to feel more suffering due to her unblinking love towards her husband was still present even though, most of her suffering was caused by Willy’s selfishness and longingness to reach the expectations that society has laid out for Willy Loman.

A key female tragic victim is Lamia in Keats’ “Lamia”. Lamia was originally stripped from her powers due to her request to be united with a human that she claims to love. Her blinding love led Lamia to be ripped away from her potency as she requests to “place me where he is”, the human she loves, Lycius. Therefore, at the very beginning of the poem, we can already see how Lamia is suffering by the hands of a man and is left vulnerable due to wanting to reach the expectations she herself created depending on Lycius’ wants. However, this is argued that Lycius is innocent in this situation and that actually he did not even know that Lamia existed, therefore, the claim that he has caused this suffering to a female tragic victim is incorrect. However, Lamia is not only seen to suffer in this scene. After Lycius and Lamia were united, Lycius was greedy and egotistic enough to ignore his wife demands and organise a big wedding, in order to show off his so beautiful wife with the town.

In addition, even though, Lamia in her passiveness accepted the big wedding, she specifically instructed her other half to not invite Apollonius. But guess what? He ignored that demand as well. Surprised? Not really. So here is where it goes downfall, and the already suffering Lamia, is conveyed to suffer even more. After Apollonius smelled that something was fishy. More like snakey… he revealed who Lamia truly was. This led to Lamia be banished from the town and Lycius to mourn for his vanished partner who is seen to have suffered from the greedy abuse he has caused her. This is a tragic view from a feminist point of view due to Lamia being objectified from her own beloved. Objectified for her beauty, Lamia ends up being taken advantage of and being abused, leading to the worst suffering of all, betrayal from her husband which causes great suffering and heartbreak from all the potency she had lost for greedy Lycius. However, as a readers we experience the dependency Lamia poses on Lycius, therefore, losing Lycius himself, is seen as the greatest suffering of all.

In conclusion, from these eras it is depicted that women are largely the tragic victims. However, we still need to remember, that even though female are portrayed as the most suffering, we must not forget that males also suffer. In addition, the suffering is not always caused by males as seen above, but females sometimes self-inflict pain on themselves, or on the other hand, the disunity of females can lead to a great suffering on females themselves as well.

• With thanks to Pippa year 13

The Villainy of Iago

“For many, Iago is the ultimate villain: calculating, manipulative, clever and ruthless. He becomes a mouthpiece for the state, removing those who transgress its unwritten laws.”

Iago can be labelled as a notorious villain. Some of Iago’s qualities that make him such a renowned villain are his jealousy, his hatred, manipulation, duplicity and his need for revenge. For the most part Iago seems to believe that all his actions are providing good for society and he is only removing those who stray from society’s implied rules, but whether or not that is true is debatable.

Jealousy

• Iago believes that Othello slept with Emilia, his wife
• Othello’s position of authority is a thing of jealousy for Iago
• Iago tries to have Roderigo kill Cassio due to his jealousy of Cassio’s position
• Iago plays on Othello’s jealousy to instigate his downfall

Manipulation

• Iago has been called a puppeteer due to his scheming
• Iago plants seeds of doubt in Othello’s mind which cause him to believe Desdemona is being unfaithful
• Iago tries to manipulate Roderigo to kill Cassio but fails
• The handkerchief is a way for Iago to manipulate Othello’s jealousy

Duplicity

• Iago’s duplicity is a key part of his villainy
• Iago must constantly be duplicitous in order to keep control and manipulate everyone
• From the very start of the play Iago indicates his duplicitous nature by referring to the two-faced God “Janus”

All of Iago’s actions are in an attempt to take down Othello since societal prejudice tells Iago that Othello should not be allowed to hold power and because he believes Othello slept with Emilia which is an unwritten rule of society.

Firstly Iago tries to get Brabantio to stop Desdemona and Othello from marrying. Iago also believes he should have been made Othello’s lieutenant since Cassio is a strategy man rather than muscle so Iago thinks that the wrong choice has been made.

To correct this mistake Iago manipulates Roderigo’s jealousy and tries to have him kill Cassio. Iago repeatedly takes issues into his own hands to try and right everything he believes to be wrong around him.

Iago is almost a mouthpiece for the state since he is attempting to remove those that contradict its unwritten rules but Iago fails to see that sometimes there can be exceptions to society’s unspoken laws such as Othello being in a position of power.

• Thanks to Jessica Sinfield year 13

Marriage in ‘Othello’

“Othello and Desdemona’s passionate love and progressive marriage poses a threat to the established order, it challenges ideas about class, race and the conformity of women and is thus dissolved for the social order to continue.”

As opposed to modern day views and beliefs, the Shakespearean era was the pinnacle of discrimination, predominantly pinpointed on class, race and women in which in this play, all elements of this are displayed which inevitably results in Othello and Desdemona’s marriage posing a threat to the established order.

Very early on in the play, we can see the imminent threat that is Othello and Desdemona’s marriage as Desdemona speaks words that only serves to foreshadow the fate of their marriage later on in the play. Desdemona speaks of having a:

“noble father, I do perceive here a divided duty. To you I am bound for life and education. My life and education both do learn me how to respect you. You are the lord of my duty; I am hither to your daughter. But here’s my husband.”

Her speech shows her thoughtfulness, as she does not insist on her loyalty to Othello at the expense of respect for her father, but rather acknowledges that her duty is “divided.” Because Desdemona is brave enough to stand up to her father and even partially rejects him in public, these words also establish for the audience her courage and her strength of conviction. As an implication of this strength and courage, it encourages her to want to help Cassio later in the play which will then fuel Othello’s jealousy, and because of this, Iago’s poisonous words will blind that of Desdemona’s honesty, resulting in Desdomona’s death and Othello’s tragic downfall.

Secondly, because of the strong relationship that Othello and Desdemona have, it diverts Othello’s attention, making the order weaker and vulnerable. Othello must:

“beware… of jealousy! It is the green-eyed monster which doth mock, the meat it feeds on.”

 Again, the theme of jealousy plays a vital role here as Iago makes insinuations about Desdemona’s adultery and Othello pressures him to reveal what he knows, Iago warns Othello against succumbing to jealousy. Of course, Iago issues this warning with a false earnestness. That is, he knows that saying the word “jealousy” and conjuring an offensive visual image will intensify Othello’s concern. This jealousy that is brewing inside Othello makes him much more vulnerable as his strong feelings for Desdemona makes him blind and therefore, results in him ‘ending’ the relationship.

In essence, Othello is made weak by Desdemona and therefore, due to Othello’s responsibilities, Iago’s lies result in him throwing everything away due to his ignorance, reinforcing the fact that Othello and Desdemona’s relationship must be dissolved for the social order to continue.

• With thank to Jordan Roberts (year 13)