In Othello, Why is Act 3 Scene 3, the Pivotal Scene

Joe Kelly

“Othello” is written by William Shakespeare in 1602. The leading roles of the performance are Othello who is the main protagonist, Desdemona who is Othello’s wife and Iago Othello’s so called friend and ancient but also the iconoclast, but throughout the course of the play we find this very much untrue. Othello is another tragic hero created by William Shakespeare to join others such as “Hamlet” and “Macbeth”. He has been titled “the tragic hero” because at the beginning of the play we see him as a kind, loving husband who cares for deeply for his wife which was special as at that time a man who respected his wife as much as Othello did to Desdemona was very rare. In the play we also see how Iago treats his wife and the massive differences between these two men, but in the end Othello’s persona is manipulated into someone who is evil and hatred-filled man, this is when we see similarities between himself and Iago. In this essay I will discuss why Act 3 Scene 3 is such an imperative part of the play.

For an undecided reason we see the antagonist Iago desperately try and ruin the life of our beloved and harmonious Moore Othello, he uses a range of different schemes and ploys to bring Othello around to the same mindset that he has. The first and most important tactic that Iago uses to fool Othello is to pretend to be his faithful companion, which leads to Othello thinking he has a loyal servant, he confides in Iago about his relationship with Desdemona but while Othello is telling Iago of his problems Iago will use the valuable and destructive information as ammunition later on to try and control Othello. Another tactic that Iago used frequently was to constantly drop hints about Desdemona’s fidelity or as Iago saw it infidelity. To be betrayed by a woman at that time showed that you had no control over her making you weak and lesser than a man. Iago continued to play on the fact that Desdemona has a close relationship with Michael Cassio but it is one of purely friendship, Iago knows this but he continues the character assassination of Desdemona, at this point of the scene Othello is furious and doesn’t know who to believe. Iago is supposed to be his best friend and is only telling him the truth but Desdemona is his wife and in his heart of hearts he knows that she would not cheat on him because they share such a great love, yet Iago’s perverse look on the truth still denies Othello enough sense to see what is going on in his presence.

In the play we were never told what Iago’s motives were and he was never shown to have a real reason to destroy the lives of Othello and Desdemona. He mentioned very briefly at the end Act 1 that he heard rumours that Othello had had sexual intercourse with his wife, Emilia, and he says Othello “twixt his sheets” but this was never proved and therefore he had no clear or justifiable reason, but there may have been the fact that Roderigo was paying Iago hefty sums of money to make Desdemona love him and Iago must have thought that ...

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Iago’s real personality began to shine through in Act 3 Scene 3 but we had seen some glimpses of this before right at the start in Scene 1 where he and Roderigo are talking to Brabantio, Desdemona’s father, and Iago has just found out that Othello and Desdemona are having sexual relations and he shouts out to Brabantio “the old black ram is tupping your white ewe” this is racial slur on Othello and it means they are having sexual intercourse, today there would be uproar if a quote like this was used in a sitcom or soap but in the time this was made this statement would have been totally acceptable because black people were seen as inferior to white people, this quote represents how Iago uses bestial language when referring to or a person’s racial origin.

A key feature of Act 3 Scene 3 is the handkerchief as it acts as a personification of the love between Othello and Desdemona; also it plays a central part in Othello’s downfall. The handkerchief was first taken by Iago’s wife Emilia and she gave it to Iago to give it back but nut instead planted it on Cassio as a crucial part of the plan, he went and told Othello that Cassio has the handkerchief because Desdemona gave it to him as a sign of their love for each other. Othello was not only angry because she had given it to another man but it was a handkerchief that was given to him by his mother and he gave it to Desdemona as a sign of his undying love for her, and to think she would give it someone else would kill him. As we know though Desdemona did not do this it shows the lengths Iago would go to destroy Othello. Othello went straight to Desdemona and demands she shows him where the handkerchief is, when she not give him an answer Othello falls into a trance like state where repeats the words “the handkerchief” over and over each time louder and more forcefully. At this point the audience would be in a state of some kind of shock because we have seen Othello’s boil over in front of them but they knew there would be more heartache for Othello to come.

At this point of the scene Othello is in a fragile state of mind after what has happened with the handkerchief, but Iago was not going to finish there and wanted to push the point even further. He changes the subject back to Cassio and he talks about how when he and Cassio were in the army together he would call Desdemona’s name during the night as if they were making love. This incensed Othello and he said that now he wanted to kill Cassio himself whereas at first he wanted Iago to do it so Iago got what he wanted again without having to get his hands dirty himself.

Seeing as Act 3 Scene 3 was an intense scene they would try and relieve tension by sending people on dressed comically and they would do silly things such as falling over. This also gave actors some time to prepare for another big scene that was coming up.

The outcome of the play was predictable because we knew how angry he was and it would eventually end up in a confrontation between himself and Desdemona. Othello killed Desdemona and also Iago killed his own wife Emilia to keep her quiet, he stabbed her from behind which proved he was a coward, when Othello killed Desdemona he turned back to the man he was before Iago influenced him, he suddenly realised he had been duped by Iago but it was too late and that was the point where he killed himself. Iago’s plan had worked perfectly because he got revenge on Othello.

Act 3 Scene 3 was pivotal in this play because we see Othello change from a noble, loving man to an angry, frustrated, murderous tragic hero.