Othello

Iago is passed over for a promotion by his commander, Othello, a Moor and a general in the service of Venice, and he vows revenge. Othello has just married Desdemona, the daughter of Brabantio, a Venetian Senator, and Iago enlists the aid of Roderigo, a rejected suitor, to tell Desdemona's father about the marriage. Brabantio goes to seize his daughter but is interrupted by news of a Turkish attack on Cyprus. The Duke and the …

…fascinates us, but we suffer with his victims, whose very strengths--Othello's trust and Desdemona's purity--are used against them. For all their virtues, they are helpless, because what Iago represents is nullity, chaos, and nonbeing. He does not defeat his victims so much as unmake them. "When I love thee not, / Chaos is come again" (III.iii.92-93), the Moor says of his wife, and it is chaos, embodied in "honest Iago," that wins the day.