Julia Borrell Pozo
In William Shakespeare’s Othello, Iago is one of Othello’s most trusted officers and, simultaneously, a destabilizing, untrustworthy force. Scholars have disagreed as to whether intentional malevolence or irrational hatred drives Iago’s actions. Iago’s ambiguity is manifested by his constant deception, misrepresentation and double-dealing. Iago, pretending to pursue one set of intentions while acting affected by another, attempts to become something greater. Although Iago’s double-dealing instigates chaos and drives other characters’ destruction, Iago, himself also trapped by the consequences of his actions, is incapable of recognizing who he really is. In fact, neither the reader nor Iago is capable of constructing his identity. Shakespeare portrays Iago’s self-deception by depicting him with a double identity; his emotional instability and facade of outer confidence masks his inner vulnerabilities, and his words and actions result in chaos and destruction.
Iago has the striking ability to be perceived as an honest and trustworthy man, while also sharing with the audience his malevolent intentions. Iago has a blurry personal identity. The Oxford English Dictionary describes personal identity as “the condition or fact of being one person, or remaining the same person throughout the various phases of existence; continuity of the personality.”[1] According to this definition, Iago is not a single individual. His public identity differs significantly from his inner feelings. As a way of illustration, in the second-act soliloquy, Iago confesses to the audience his intention to manipulate Othello in order to convince him that Desdemona is cheating on him: “I’ll pour this pestilence into his ear: / That she repeals him for her body’s lust” (2.3.351-52). Even as Iago’s malicious intentions are explained to the audience, other characters, such as Cassio and Othello, refer to him as “honest Iago” (1.3.295ff.). The audience has two different impressions of Iago, his inner version, when he speaks to the audience in his soliloquies, and the outer version when he interacts with other characters. These two perspectives contribute to his double identity.
Iago is, metaphorically, a double-faced character, just like Janus, the two-faced Roman god who can look in different directions at the same time. At the beginning of the play, Othello asks Iago if the officers are entering, and Iago responds: “By Janus, I think no” (1.2.33). The mythological interpretation is subject to the play’s context; Othello and Iago are in the dark, lighted by the officer’s torches. Since Othello is being followed because he married Desdemona secretly, Iago may suggest that Brabantio and the Duke do not know the reason behind Othello’s marrying Desdemona. Ayanna Thompson interprets Iago’s response to Othello as, “the god who sees what others cannot see because it is dark” (134). Iago’s response is analogous to his character: Iago is similar to Janus because Iago’s double identity enables him to see a situation from a different pair of eyes, which enables him to manipulate others. In effect, Iago is two-faced in his motives and behavior, just like Janus.
The audience also sees the “two-faced” persona of Iago as a double identity because we are not capable of deciphering where his actions lead. Scholars have struggled to analyze Iago’s actions because his double identity confuses our interpretation of his actions. Some scholars, like Samuel Coleridge, argue that Iago does not have a clear reason behind his actions, that he is a singular character capable of spontaneous improvisation (Thompson 53). On the other hand, A. C. Bradley disagrees with this interpretation, arguing that Iago has a clear motive for his actions: destroying Othello’s life (61). Bradley argues against Coleridge because Iago’s actions are guided by his desire to get revenge on Othello. Alexander Leggatt brings together the opposing arguments by offering that Iago is “clear about his tactics but he is vague about what he actually hopes to accomplish” (112). Leggatt’s statement matches with Iago’s double identity. Iago’s two different faces looking in different directions means that it is not always clear that what he says matches what he means. Iago is not a god but a human. Therefore, he is not able to look in two directions at once, like Janus, without being hypocritical and having hidden motives.
The function of Iago’s mask is to project confidence, but it only exists in the external, in his alternate identity. Benjamin Beier argues that Iago is self-aware, and he clearly uses the art of persuasion to shape his goals (39-40). However, Beier fails to consider how Iago’s self-awareness is challenged by his torn and divided identity. Beier’s description of Iago as a secure character with clear motives is not persuasive because Iago’s external security is foreshadowed by his internal conflicts. Paul Cefalu challenges Beier’s point of view, arguing that Iago is an insecure character who creates an external identity as a “way of organizing his perceptions that offers him the stable self and peace of mind that he envies in others” (273). Cefalu questions Iago’s self-awareness and suggests that Iago creates an external identity in order to satisfy his inner insecurities. Iago’s interior vulnerability plays a key role in understanding his impulsive actions; he hides his own anxiety behind a mask of a stable, secure, confident, and honest person.
Iago’s inner vulnerability ignites suspicion and spreads chaos. There is a parallelism between Iago’s own failures and how he manipulates Othello and Cassio to take certain actions. Since Iago presumes that Othello slept with his wife, Emilia, he instigates Othello to suspect his own wife, Desdemona, of sleeping with Cassio. In this way, Iago projects his insecurity regarding his own relationship onto Othello. Likewise, Iago plans to remove Cassio from his position of lieutenant because Iago suffered humiliation after being passed over for the position. These correlations emphasize the play’s main theme, the effect of jealousy and humiliation. As Cefalu points out, “Nothing of what he predicts of others is based on extrapolations from his own mind, that is, of mental simulations that typically follow empathy or simply putting oneself in another’s place” (274). Cefalu underlines that Iago’s ability to manipulate others is drawn from his own experience. Therefore, Iago’s inner suffering and vulnerability are the vehicles for action, and throughout the play, disgrace and shame take control of the narrative.
One function of Iago’s double identity is to demonstrate the weaknesses of self-deception. Iago’s ambition to destroy Othello is subjected to a more profound and fundamental truth, his ego defense. If one has a purpose in life, it is assumed that one has established goals and a clear vision of oneself, yet Iago, after planning his malicious acts and reaching his objective, reveals his internal insecurity. Scholars have analyzed Iago’s statement “I am not what I am” (1.1.65) from multiple perspectives. For example, Cefalu states that for Iago this statement is an alternative to “a much more corrosive, if unspoken and disturbing, belief—that all people are not what they seem to be” (273). Cefalu analyzes how Iago’s statement is strictly connected to his judgment of other characters. Cefalu maintains a well-founded argument: Iago extrapolates from his own susceptibility in order to manipulate others; hence, since he is not what he seems to be, he also distrusts others’ identities.
However, other scholars, such as Stephen Greenblatt, focus on Iago’s dilemma as a declaration of self-division that reveals the character’s mask: “I am not what I am” suggests that this elusiveness is permanent, that even self-interest, whose transcendental guarantee is the divine ‘I am what I am’ is a mask” ( 41). God does not have to wear a mask because a mask is used to hide oneself and, by definition, God is truth. For example, at the end of the play, Iago does not disclose any particular reason for his actions. He states, “Demand me nothing. What you know, you know” (5.2.300). His futile revelation at the end of the play emphasizes the deep sense of powerlessness he feels when trying to accept the consequences of his actions: “the only possibility in his case is not revelation but silence” (Greenblatt 41). Iago is trapped between believing his own lies and accepting who he really is. In her introduction to Othello, Thompson quotes T. S. Eliot: “Nothing dies harder than the desire to think well of oneself,” which he calls “bovarysme, the human will to see things as they are not” (62). Even though Eliot here is analyzing Othello’s behavior, the same point applies to Iago. Iago has the ultimate desire to consider things to be as they are not. As Robert Watson notes, the ambition of becoming a memorable individual and excelling oneself beyond a given destiny is a natural human inclination. However, this ambition can turn into a tool of self-destruction, leading to a “betrayal of nature and origins that invites primal punishment” (162). Iago’s human desire to be converted into something greater than he is turns into a nightmare where self-deception leads to a deconstruction of his identity.
By the end of the play, Iago’s personal identity is unclear, and this lack of clarity ultimately leads to his destruction and everyone else’s. Iago, through his persuasive manipulation, changes the personality of other characters. For example, Othello at the beginning of the play is a loyal, faithful and virtuous individual, whereas at the end, he is depicted as an evil person capable of killing his innocent wife. Iago challenges the status of Cassio and Othello in Venetian society and progressively transforms them, driven by the power of ambition and jealousy. Iago is a genius of destruction. He is capable of influencing other characters’ identities, from meaningful to meaningless, and Iago, too, is associated with a meaningless identity because of his own double identity. Therefore, many academics have argued that Iago diverges from the nature of God, which is pure meaning and creation. For example, Leggatt argues, “this is as close as we get to the heart of Iago, pure destruction as God is pure creation, issuing from non-identity, as God is pure identity” (124). At the end of the play, Iago’s fate is torture and execution by Montano. When Othello commits suicide and falls on his bed next to his wife, Desdemona, Ludovico demands Iago look at the consequences of his evil acts. Iago loses everything he had: his life, personal identity, social prestige, and the trust of others. Iago’s double identity, self-deception, and ambition to become something greater are the causes of his evilness.
Shakespeare exposes the weaknesses of human self-deception through Iago’s double identity. Even if Iago tries to mask his inner instability, by hiding his motives he ultimately destroys himself and those around him. Iago is not a God, like Janus; therefore, he is not capable of possessing a double identity without being self-deceived. Iago is condemned when his mask is discovered; it turns out that others can see he is not the “honest Iago” he has appeared to be. However, Iago is not merely an evil character that causes harm; he also embodies a profound moral lesson: self-deception leads to destruction. Much of the scholarship determining whether Iago’s intentions are truly evil dismisses the moralistic and philosophical approach behind his character. Shakespeare creates a character who illustrates a paradox, applicable to all of human existence, that gaining power or prestige rests upon destroying others. However, Iago’s apparent self-deception regarding his own desires and his belief that he can only fulfill his agenda through others’ ruination results in his own destruction.
Works Cited
Beier, Benjamin V. “The Art of Persuasion and Shakespeare’s Two Iagos.” Studies in Philology, vol. 111, no. 1, 2014, pp. 34-64. Project MUSE, doi:10.1353/sip.2014.0002.
Cefalu, Paul. “The Burdens of Mind Reading in Shakespeare’s Othello: A Cognitive and Psychoanalytic Approach to Iago’s Theory of Mind.” Shakespeare Quarterly, vol. 64, no. 3, 2013, pp. 265-294. Project MUSE, doi:10.1353/shq.2013.0039.
Derrin, Daniel. “Rethinking Iago’s jests in Othello II.i: Honestas, imports and laughable deformity.” Renaissance Studies vol. 31, no. 3, 2016, pp. 365-382. Wiley Online Library, https://doi.org/10.1111/rest.12219.
Greenblatt, Stephen. “The Improvisation of Power.” William Shakespeare’s Othello, edited by Harold Bloom, Chelsea House Publishers, 1987, pp. 37-60.
Honigmann, E. A. J., editor. Othello by William Shakespeare. Arden 3rd Series, Revised Edition, The Arden Shakespeare, 2016.
Leggatt, Alexander. Shakespeare’s Tragedies Violation and Identity. Cambridge UP, 2005.
Orlin, Lena. The Renaissance: A Sourcebook. Palgrave MacMillan, 2009.
Thompson, Ayanna. Introduction. Honigmann, pp. 1-116.
Watson, Robert. “Tragedies of Revenge and Ambition.” Shakespearean Tragedy, edited by Clarie McEachern, Cambridge UP, 2002, pp. 171-94.
[1] Oxford English Dictionary, “personal identity” a.