Throughout Othello, animal imagery is repeatedly used in association with sex and violence in a motif that highlights man’s uncontrollable passions. In the very opening scene, Iago uses animal imagery to describe the vulgarity of Othello and Desdemona’s relationship. Telling Roderigo of his daughter’s marriage in Act 1, Scene 1, Iago says:
Even now, now, very now, an old black ram
Is tupping your white ewe
This graphic image uses the comparison of a ram and a ewe to present Othello and Desdemona’s relationship as base and animalistic, with the couple’s relations showing a lack of proper restraint and an indulgence in primal desires. Iago refers to Othello as a “Barbary horse” in the same scene, extending this motif.
However, the animal motif is not used indiscriminately and contains both racist and misogynistic connotations, as evident in the example given. The emphasis on the color of the black ram and white ewe reflects the controversial aspect of Othello and Desdemona’s interracial relationship, and the reference to a Barbary horse, a North African breed, centers the comparison on Othello’s non-whiteness. The characterization of them as animals plays on racist and sexist stereotypes that dehumanizes them and suggests they lack the self-control that makes a civilized person. Othello’s race in the play is somewhat ambiguous, with his birthplace never named and his description as a “Moor” possibly referring to him being an African, a Muslim, or a South Asian Indian.
The frequent comparisons of characters to animals also highlights the fine line that separates man from beast, specifically in how quickly Othello’s rationality dissolves into violence. Such an idea is captured in this exchange between Iago and Othello in Act 4, Scene 1, after Othello has had a fit:
Othello: Dost thou mock me?
Iago: I mock you not, by heaven! Would you bear your fortune like a man!
Othello: A hornèd man’s a monster and a beast.
The image of the horned man alludes to the symbol of a cuckold, a man whose wife has been unfaithful to him. The implications of being a cuckold on a man's honor were deemed very great at the time, with the image of a horned man reflecting debasement and degradation. Othello’s self-alignment with this figure, half man and half beast, reflects the effect Iago’s deceit is having on him, with his belief in his wife’s infidelity causing him to start to lose his humanity. Othello’s frenzied state in this scene, with him falling into fits of madness, reflects his loss of his rational mind and his descent into his primal instincts of passion and violence.
Othello is littered with images of eyes, a motif that stresses the unreliability of appearance. Othello’s increasing figurative blindness is at the center of this motif.
Othello’s tendency to always take things as they seem proves to be his downfall, with his trust in sight ultimately obscuring reality. When wanting solid proof of Desdemona’s alleged infidelity, Othello demands Iago bring him the “ocular proof”:
For she had eyes, and chose me. No, Iago,
I’ll see before I doubt
However, the satisfaction of this need to see proof, with Iago showing Othello Cassio’s possession of Desdemona’s handkerchief, proves to be further distorting, with this appearance of betrayal turning out to be false. Cassio does have the handkerchief, but only because Iago has planted it there. Othello’s reliance on sight, on “ocular proof,” thus proves to be misleading.
Indeed, the unreliability of appearance is referenced multiple times throughout the play through reference to eyes. Brabantio’s phrasing when he tells Othello to look to Desdemona “if thou hast eyes to see” purposefully avoids taking for granted the fact that all eyes give sight, highlighting how some eyes indeed do not see what is in front of them. Of more prominence is the striking image of the “green-eyed monster” that is so significant in the play, with this idea of tainted vision adding to the motif of sight's distorting nature.
Throughout "Othello," images of black and white are used as a motif to reflect the pertinence of race in the play and the damaging consequences of racial stereotypes.
In particular, images of black and white in the play are bound up with the dichotomy of good and evil. Specifically through the characters of Othello and Desdemona, images of black and white are used to emphasize the contrast between the characters’ virtue, with whiteness tied up with Desdemona’s faithfulness and blackness with Othello’s violence. In this way, the motif also serves as a way to set up Othello and Desdemona as foils.
Emilia, after Othello kills Desdemona, calls him “the blacker devil,” and the association between Othello’s blackness and sin is referred to multiple times in the play. By contrast, Desdemona’s whiteness is connected with images of purity—“a maid so tender, fair and happy” and an “angel.” Such associations play into dangerous racial stereotypes that prove potent in “Othello.” Iago’s allusion to Othello and Desdemona’s sexual relations through the imagery of an “old black ram” tupping a “white ewe” makes the racial prejudices contained within the play clear from the start.
Black and white imagery is also used by Othello himself, in a way that suggests his own internalized racism. Referring to his belief that Desdemona has betrayed him, Othello says:
Her name, that was as fresh
As Dian's visage, is now begrimed and black
As mine own face
Here, Othello himself ties up images of whiteness and blackness with virtue and vice, and indeed explicitly in the context of skin. Othello’s use of this imagery suggests that he himself may have internalized the racial prejudices of his peers. Such internalized racism may be part of the reason why Othello is so easy to trick, with his own insecurities about his worthiness of Desdemona making her unfaithfulness easier for him to believe.
Throughout Othello, animal imagery is repeatedly used in association with sex and violence in a motif that highlights man’s uncontrollable passions. In the very opening scene, Iago uses animal imagery to describe the vulgarity of Othello and Desdemona’s relationship. Telling Roderigo of his daughter’s marriage in Act 1, Scene 1, Iago says:
Even now, now, very now, an old black ram
Is tupping your white ewe
This graphic image uses the comparison of a ram and a ewe to present Othello and Desdemona’s relationship as base and animalistic, with the couple’s relations showing a lack of proper restraint and an indulgence in primal desires. Iago refers to Othello as a “Barbary horse” in the same scene, extending this motif.
However, the animal motif is not used indiscriminately and contains both racist and misogynistic connotations, as evident in the example given. The emphasis on the color of the black ram and white ewe reflects the controversial aspect of Othello and Desdemona’s interracial relationship, and the reference to a Barbary horse, a North African breed, centers the comparison on Othello’s non-whiteness. The characterization of them as animals plays on racist and sexist stereotypes that dehumanizes them and suggests they lack the self-control that makes a civilized person. Othello’s race in the play is somewhat ambiguous, with his birthplace never named and his description as a “Moor” possibly referring to him being an African, a Muslim, or a South Asian Indian.
The frequent comparisons of characters to animals also highlights the fine line that separates man from beast, specifically in how quickly Othello’s rationality dissolves into violence. Such an idea is captured in this exchange between Iago and Othello in Act 4, Scene 1, after Othello has had a fit:
Othello: Dost thou mock me?
Iago: I mock you not, by heaven! Would you bear your fortune like a man!
Othello: A hornèd man’s a monster and a beast.
The image of the horned man alludes to the symbol of a cuckold, a man whose wife has been unfaithful to him. The implications of being a cuckold on a man's honor were deemed very great at the time, with the image of a horned man reflecting debasement and degradation. Othello’s self-alignment with this figure, half man and half beast, reflects the effect Iago’s deceit is having on him, with his belief in his wife’s infidelity causing him to start to lose his humanity. Othello’s frenzied state in this scene, with him falling into fits of madness, reflects his loss of his rational mind and his descent into his primal instincts of passion and violence.
