William Shakespeare’s “Othello” is a tragic play that consists of jealousy, manipulation, distress, and death that leads to the down fall of Othello. You might be surprised to hear that a handkerchief was actually the cause of this doing, but how could a small piece of cloth cause so much distress between characters?

Although, the handkerchief appears to be an irrelevant object in the play, it affected many characters one of them being Othello. To start with, the handkerchief was given to Othello by his mother for him to give to his future wife. His mother received this gift from an Egyptian “charmer”, and its purpose was to make her amiable and subdue her husband entirely to her love, but if she ever lost it or gave it to another man his love for her would die (3.4.66-79). So, believing that the handkerchief had the capability to do this, he gives this token of love to Desdemona. Everything goes well until Desdemona loses the handkerchief. Othello begins to act like a madman, and suspects that she is not being faithful towards him because he later discovers from Iago that Cassio is of possession of the same strawberry-embroidered handkerchief. Discovering the that handkerchief is in the hands of another man not only breaks Othello’s heart, but also brings him to the conclusion that he must murder Desdemona (5.4.105). Not only does he end up murdering Desdemona, but he ends up ultimately committing suicide. As a result the handkerchief caused many situations that could have been avoided in Othello’s life; it lead him to murder Desdemona for no reason, and to commit suicide; all this because of a handkerchief.

 

The handkerchief affected Othello in many ways for sure, but how did it even escape the hands of Desdemona, and end up in the hands of Cassio? It was all Iago’s doing, and his intentions were not pure; he had an agenda. Iago’s main goal was to make Othello miserable, and sabotage his marriage with Desdemona, and the only way he would be able to do this is by using the handkerchief to his advantage. Iago throughout the play manipulates Othello into believing he is good guy when he really isn’t, all he wants is for him to trust him so can play with feelings. He then manipulates Othello into believing that Desdemona is guilty of infidelity. Since he knows he does not fully convince him with verbal proof, he then turns to using ocular proof which in this case is the handkerchief. Iago tells Othello that Cassio and Desdemona are sneaking around together, and that she also gave Cassio the handkerchief that she all of a sudden has lost, so they must be having an affair. Without the handkerchief Iago would have never played it off; “honest Iago” would not have existed. So, because of the handkerchief Iago succeeded in ruining Othello’s life, but his wife Emilia ended up ratting him out leading to his execution.

 

Exposing Iago of his plans not only ends in his death at the end of the play, but also in Emilia’s. Emilia was convinced by her husband Iago to take the the the napkin from Desdemona to bring it to him. Although, she knew Iago was up to no good, she did not know exactly what he was plotting to do. After retrieving the handkerchief back to her husband, he finally had the proof that he needed to convince Othello of Desdemona’s infidelity. Even though he did succeed in making Othello go crazy, he got exposed of his plans by his own wife. Emilia admits to Othello that she was the one who gave Iago the handkerchief exposing Iago of all his lies; Iago then murders Emilia because of her betrayal (5.4.266-281). So, if Emilia had never listened to Iago about taking the handkerchief, she would have still been alive, same with Desdemona.

 

Desdemona was the love of Othello’s life up until she lost the handkerchief that he gave her, and culprit for this loss is Iago. Iago kept whispering untruthful lies to Othello about Cassio and Desdemona sneaking around together when in all reality all Cassio was trying to do was gain back Othello’s respect. So because of Iago wrongfully accusing Desdemona, she ends up losing Othello’s trust completely along with his love altogether. When Othello murders her she does not struggle, she allows him to kill her because she knows she did not do anything wrong, and she just wants to make him happy. As result, Desdemona loses her first love, and is murdered by her first love because of the handkerchief.

 

“Othello” overall proves that the handkerchief actually played a major role in the play; it was not just some inanimate prop in the background. Throughout “Othello” the handkerchief was handled by all the characters mentioned, and they all, maybe by coincidence, were affected by it in some drastic way; either it being death, or losing someone you love, the handkerchief always seemed to be at fault.

 

Works Cited

Mabillard, Amanda. Shakespeare’s Othello Act 3 Scene 3. Othello. 8 October 2018. 6 December 2018.

Paternoster, Leon. Strawberry Handkercheif. Testament to Emilia, The Handkerchief Question, and Iago the Mysogynist Pt. 2. 21 May 2015. 6 December 2018.

School Work Helper. Shakespeare’s Othello: Iago’s Manipulation of Others. 2017. 6 December 2018.

Shakespeare William, Russ Mcdonald. The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice. New York: Penguin Books, 2001. Print.