Helen Gardner's The Noble Moor

Heroism vs. Royalty

o Heroism in literature is becoming clichd Original content is dead "On the contrary, their very frequency
deprives them of any imaginative potency."
o The absence of realistic Elizabethan royalty (Tudors of the time) undermines the royalty behind characters.
"A feature of Shakespearian studies in the last twenty years has been the interest in the Histories and the
comparative neglect..."
o Allegories and poetic form are considered unnecessary for a stage performance, they particularly undermine and
lose meaning to the values portrayed by Desdemona.
"Desdemona's truth is the devotion of her whole heart to the husband of her choice, and is quite consistent
humanly, but not allegorically, with her marked tendency to economize with truth. And how can one attempt to
allegorize a heroine whose companion is Emilia? The attempt to treat plays as if they were poems cannot succeed with
a work which so signally exemplifies Ezra Pound's distinction..."
o Compares heroism against royalty:
Othello Desdemona
Heroism Royalty
Admiration Sympathy
To be imitated To be avoided
Extraordinary characteristics Merely a royal representative
o Othello is an 'Alien hero' who is not from the Venetian world. Being foreign (in terms of his black skin and being from
[most likely] African descent) sparks inquiry as to why he is in command and not a local.
"He is a stranger, a man of alien race, without ties of nature or natural duties. His value is not in what the world
thinks of him, although the world rates him highly, and does not derive in any way from his station. It is inherent."
o Linear shift of Othello's consideration to murdering Desdemona in each soliloquy. First soliloquy it is not even a
consideration, he has too much faith in her. Second soliloquy he becomes ignorant of murdering Desdemona as a
consideration. His third soliloquy is confirming that Desdemona should be murdered. "The choice of death is
forbidden by religion in the first soliloquy; later it is seen as a choice made impossibly by our ignorance of what we
choose in choosing death, so that the puzzled will cannot be absolute for life or death. At the close the hero finds
death at another's hand, and not by choice."
Freedom in Character
o Eloquence of poetic form builds the initial nobility in Othello.
o Freedom in Othello's character resonates to free Desdemona's character. Yet she only realizes this through her
death. "He is primarily a man of faith, whose faith has witnessed to itself in his deeds." This faith has made him,
ultimately a free man. He gains freedom in his heroic character, she gains freedom through royalty. "He is free;
she achieves her freedom, and at a great cost"
o Gardner considers that Othello could've been doubting Desdemona's trust all along since she disobeyed her father in
the beginning. "Her disobedience and deception of him perhaps cross her mind at Othello's ominous."
o Othello and Desdemona's free spirited unity contradicts literature about love. A supernatural love.
"That love as the union of free souls, freely discovering each in the other, is a mystery, inexplicable in terms of
nature and society, is the assumption underlying the endless riddles, quibbles, paradoxes and conceits of love poets."
o Shift of love throughout the play, using the analogy of night and day in Dane's essay. In the day time, at the start of
the play, they exist in a free spirited love for each other. Yet at night, at the end of the play, their love is torn apart just
as the blackness of the sky ceases day.
o Gardener continues this analogy and questions, what their love would be considered during morning, and
afternoon/twilight. She questions what the state of their love is in-between ultimate passion for each other to the point
where that passion is torn apart.
o Critics argue through literature that love is boundless, however, day and night is limited. Therefore, playing on the
analogy, Gardener questions whether or not their love is boundless. Or perhaps it is an infatuation which does have
boundaries, just as night and day does.
"The play is not only concerned with passion and love, but with what Montaigne and other experienced observers
have though incompatibles: love and constancy."
Iago as a Question of Power
o Unreal standards of the situation make Iago's power extraordinary.
o Reader becomes a cynic of Iago's claims to honesty. "It is not merely out of their latent 'cynicism' that the
listeners are meant to feel a certain sting of truth in Iago's claim to honesty."
o Iago gains power over Othello through ignorance of Othello's romantic views.
o He manipulates Othello through false logical deductions from isolated or irrelevant facts. "What Iago injects into
Othello's mind, the poison with which he charges him, is either false deductions from isolated facts - she deceived her
father - and from dubious generalisations - Venetian women deceive their husbands - or flat lies."
o Iago does not have a point of view, he is a liar because he is interested. o Other people only exist to him to be used
by him. o His history of being a soldier manifested a reaction in him of a desire to manipulate. "Iago has not a
point of view at all. He is no realist. In any sense which matters he is incapable of speaking truth, because he is
incapable of disinterestedness. He can express a high view or a low view to taste. The world and other people exist for
him only to be used."
o Iago questions Othello on his relationship with Desdemona. As Othello loses faith, him and Desdemona become
virtually strangers (due to the lack of communication, they are only bound by passion and a superficial marriage bond)
yet Iago is still good friends with Othello. They become virtually strangers as they begin to lose each other. As they
forget each other (as inferred before) their relationship exists through a lust for each other.
"Iago ruins Othello by insinuating into his mind the question, 'How do you know?' The tragic experience with which
this play is concerned is loss of faith, and Iago is the instrument to bring Othello to this crisis of being. His task is made
possible by his being an old and trusted companion, while husband and wife are virtually strangers, bound only by
passion and faith; and by the fact that great joy bewilders, leaving heart apt to doubt the reality of its joy."
o Iago's power arises when Othello threatens him with death in act III. This is the point of no return for Iago. Iago turns
heroism into the unnatural which is observed in Othello's morally decaying, 'heroic', character.
o Othello is tormented by his own conscious, not by Iago. By having feelings (observable in his 'love' for Desdemona),
Othello is susceptible to moral disparity.
o Othello, the man of faith, cannot tolerate a world without faith. "The man of moral imagination and human
feeling will suffer the extremity of moral despair and human isolation. The man of faith is most able to experience
what loss of faith is: but he is also unable to endure existence in a world where faith is dead."
o The audience does not want to see a hero falter. Rather, they want to see them succeed.