Cultural Context - Power in Society in Othello

Othello is ultimately a play about power, and the insecurity of those who have it. Power dynamics between the characters not only reveal the cultural context, but drive the plot forward.

In my view, there are three main attributes which decide whether one is powerful or powerless in Othello. The first of these is wealth or lack thereof, the second is race, and the third is gender. Many times in Othello, we see characters cause conflict with others in an attempt to protect their power. In Act 1, we see Brabantio’s furious opposition to his daughter, Desdemona, marrying Othello. Brabantio is a wealthy man, and represents the established, powerful men of Venice. Othello on the other hand is a former slave, and a foreigner. As well as this, he is black. In a time where people travelled less and stayed closer to home, this only adds to how foreign Othello seems to a wealthy native of Venice like Brabantio. Here we see a fascinating look into who holds power in the play, and how it is not enough to hold simply one or two of these key attributes in Venetian society. Othello is a man of merit, who earned his rank through bravery and skill. He has earned enough wealth to make him a rich man. However, he hits a brick wall in the eyes of men like Brabantio when the matter of marrying Desdemona comes up. Brabantio is happy to speak with Othello about wars, and clearly respects him on some level for his military prowess. If Othello had been white, there is little doubt that Brabantio would have allowed him to marry his daughter. But simply lacking this one meaningless quality is enough to see him shut out from opportunities a white man would enjoy. Brabantio is clearly extremely insecure about his power. On one level, he demands control over his daughter as her father, and as a man. On another, he is fearful of this previously poor man who does not share his skin colour rising up to threaten his position in society. The cultural context is revealed through his greedy and irrational defence of his power against a perceived threat.

However, wealth and race alone do not decide a person’s standing in the world of Othello. The oppression of women is not only commonplace, but completely normalised. Even Othello, so unfairly attacked by a man irrationally fearful for his power, turns on his wife for, ultimately, the same reason. Not only does he feel betrayed by her perceived disloyalty, he sees it as a personal affront to his standing as a man, someone above her. Othello’s pledge to ‘tear her all to pieces’ is fuelled by the same fear of those below him in society threatening his power that motivated Brabantio to hate Othello himself. He sees it as not only his right, but his duty to kill his wife. Without a cultural context so saturated in inequality, the plot of Othello may have gone in a different direction. If Othello had seen Desdemona as his equal, he likely could have broken Iago’s deception by engaging in one honest conversation with her. In the end, however, he does not, and that is the tragedy of Othello.