Custom Written Term Papers: Othello Is a Tragedy of Fortune

Othello Is a Tragedy of Fortune  Ã‚        Ã‚  Ã‚   In William Shakespeare’s tragedy Othello we find a tragedy of fortune, in which the Moor falls from a great height into dishonor and disgrace. Let us dwell upon this theme in this essay.    H. S. Wilson in his book of literary criticism, On the Design of Shakespearean Tragedy, discusses the misfortunes in the play and the hero’s attitude:    But if a man is betrayed into destroying what he loves most, if he ruins himself through his own folly without understanding what he is doing or being able to help himself, and then is forced to look at just what he has done and acknowledge his fault, his misfortune is harder than most. There is nothing necessarily tragic about the misfortune itself, hard though it is. Terrible misfortunes happen to   people every day. We read about them in the newspaper, and turn over the page. The tragic quality lies not in the happening alone, but chiefly in the human attitude to it. (60)    In her book, Everybody’s Shakespeare: Reflections Chiefly on the Tragedies, Maynard Mack comments on the heroine’s final song, a song of fortune:    The most moving retrospectives come later. Desdemona, preparing for bed on the night that will be her last, remembers her mother’s maid â€Å"called Barbary†:    She was in love, and he she loved proved mad And did forsake her. She had a song of â€Å"Willow;† An old thing ‘twas; but it expressed her fortune, And she died singing it. That song to-night Will not go from my mind. (4.3.25)    Here time present, in which Desdemona speaks and sings, and time future, in which we know she (like Barbary) is to die from an absolute fidelity to her intuition of what love is and means, recede... ... Tragedies. Ed. Clarice Swisher. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 1996. Reprint from Shakespeare: The Pattern in His Carpet. N.p.: n.p., 1970.    Gardner, Helen. â€Å"Othello: A Tragedy of Beauty and Fortune.† Readings on The Tragedies. Ed. Clarice Swisher. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 1996. Reprint from â€Å"The Noble Moor.† British Academy Lectures, no. 9, 1955.    Jorgensen, Paul A. William Shakespeare: The Tragedies. Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1985.    Mack, Maynard. Everybody’s Shakespeare: Reflections Chiefly on the Tragedies. Lincoln, NB: University of Nebraska Press, 1993.    Shakespeare, William. Othello. In The Electric Shakespeare. Princeton University. 1996. http://www.eiu.edu/~multilit/studyabroad/othello/othello_all.html No line nos.    Wilson, H. S. On the Design of Shakespearean Tragedy. Canada: University of Toronto Press, 1957.