Since the beginning of history, there have always been two opposing forces. The protagonist and the antagonist have been at one-another’s neck since biblical times. And as is typical, the story always ends with the good guy being victorious, and the bad guy defeated and demonized. Well, now it is time to show the bad guys some love. After all, what would all the famous heroes be without their respective villains? Nothing, that’s what. And as writer Larry A. Winters claims, “Readers love bad guys. Even bad guys who do the most heinous, horrible, evil deeds. Especially them.” Shakespeare new this, so he came up with some fantastic villains for his plays. In honor of antagonists everywhere, this essay is about the villains of some of Shakespeare’s most famous plays. The villains from Othello, Midsummer, and Hamlet, Iago, Love, and Claudius respectively, can be compared and contrasted in their motives, methods, and downfalls.
Initially, the villains from Othello, Midsummer, and Hamlet can be analyzed through their motives. To begin with, what do Iago, Love, and Claudius all have in common? They are all jealous! Iago is jealous of Michael Casssio getting a promotion that he wanted. Love, through the trickery of Puck and the characters own faults, causes tension between Hermia, Helena, Demetrius, and Lysander. Claudius is jealous of his brother, Hamlet, because he is a king and has a beautiful wife. They are all motivated by superficial things that really aren’t that big of a deal; which basically defines how every villain is made. That is because everyone knows what it is like to be jealous, so everyone can relate to these guys. K. M. Weiland says the same. “Your antagonist needs to summon up reader emotions that are just as strong...
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...Darth Vader? If Anakin was never a bad guy, Luke never would have had to blow up the death star, and what kind of story is that? Who is Jerry without Tom? A common mouse that steals food from the fridge, that’s what! All in all, it’s very important that evil-doers do evil, so that we can enjoy as they get crushed.
Works Cited
Bonnet, Nicholas J. "The Manipulative Nature of Claudius in Shakespeare's 'Hamlet'" RSS. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 Jan. 2014.
Buntig, Joe. "9 Villains in Literature and Film and How to Make Yours Better." The Write Practice RSS. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 Jan. 2014.
Siegel, Lee. "How Iago Explains the World." New York Times. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 Jan. 2014.
Weiland, K. M. "The Story Department." The Story Department. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 Jan. 2014.
Winters, Larry A. "The Importance of Being Villainous." Larry A Winters. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 Jan. 2014.
In most works of literature there is an “evil” character that has conflicting interests with the protagonist. This issue may arise in multiple forms including, but not limited to, abuse and manipulation. In this paper we will be discussing the similarities and differences between Shakespeare’s character Iago from Othello and J.K. Rowling’s character Voldemort from the Harry Potter series.
In Hamlet, Shakespeare developed a character, an antagonist, which produces twists and turns throughout the play. Even though in the beginning of the play, Claudius seemed to be an intelligent man, who has excellent speaking skills that helped him take the leadership of his deceased brother’s kingdom, and marry his wife. But, combining both his intelligence and excellent speaking skills, shows Claudius’s true nature: an astute, lustful conspirator. Through the different settings and situations, Claudius’s character contributes to the overall understanding of the play through psychological, biblical and philosophical methods.
Othello, a play written by William Shakespeare in approximately 1603, focuses on two opposite characters named Othello and Iago. Othello is a respectable army general who tragically dies in the end. The readers believe that his flaw is jealousy, which ruins his calm and makes him believe Iago, a character nobody should trust. The antagonist of the play, Iago, is a cunning liar who lies and tricks almost every other characters in the play to ruin and manipulate Othello. The play starts on the street of Venice where Iago convinces Roderigo to plot against Othello by planning falsely accuse Othello’s wife, Desdemona, of cheating. Interestingly, another specific detail critics usually look at is that Shakespeare choose to make the character of Othello a dark-skinned man, which was not a common feature a hero should have during the Elizabethan. Some of the common themes in Othello are the role of race and racism, the effects of jealousy, and the differences between genders during the Elizabethan.
Whether you hate your King, your Christian rival or a neighboring foe, if you're in a Shakespeare play then you will be punished. In the first act of each play Shakespeare shows a conflict between two groups of people, one is vengeful the other virtuous. After the conflict is introduced, the malignant characters have important parts of their lives taken away and in the end the ultimate penalties of each are inflicted. All of the antagonists are left desolate in the end of the plays by either lost fortunes or their lives. Shakespeare takes good care to give the protagonists of the plays much reward for being on the right side of the spectrum. As the characters hate increases throughout the play they begin to loose what is precious to them, first in small amounts, but in the end, they are stripped of all they love and value.
The meaning of evil has changed throughout history. In today’s world, evil has become a hazy term. What is evil? Who is evil? Men like Osama Bin Laden have been described as the term 'evil' for their atrocities against humanity. Now it seems evil has an exclusively human meaning; when a person violates the rights of others on a massive scale, he or she is evil. In Shakespeare's time, the Renaissance period, evil had a similar, but altered meaning for people. Evil was a being that violated Christian moral codes. Therefore, a man such as Claudius, from William Shakespeare's play Hamlet, a murderer and a ruthless manipulator, who uses "rank" deeds to usurp the thrown is in direct violation with the Elizabethan societal rules, and he is evil. Greed,
There are many literary works that contain villains who play an essential role in the development of the work as a whole. However, I believe that the ultimate villain of this kind is Iago in Shakespeare’s play, Othello. Through manipulation and scheming, he beguiles the other characters of the novel.
“I asked her to wear something revealing, so she showed up in a prophet's toga.”(CITE) Jarod Kintz’s words are an example of miscommunication, or failure to comprehend meaning. In this case, it is implied that one person misunderstood the message of another, but incomprehension also applies to problems other than falsely interpreted requests. Incomprehension can occur when people misinterpret another’s words or intentions, or when a person misreads situations or events. The outcome described in Kintz’s quote is unexpected and unintended, but there are instances of incomprehension that have consequences of greater severity. Perhaps a classic tragedy with a high body count falls under these parameters.
William Shakespeare has yet again created a world of good and evil. In his work Othello, the ideals and principles of this world are just like any other with a twist brought upon by two characters, Othello and Iago. These two characters along with many others employ the central idea of what good and evil entails. However, neither Othello nor Iago possess just one of these traits. Othello is not just the pure perfect guy he is perceived to be and Iago is not just the evil vindictive character he is believed to be but rather both of these men are far more interesting than that. They both have the necessary qualities that get them through life and potentially threaten their lives. Through their actions and interactions with the other characters that they really are is shown.
due to his race are vast, for example at the start of the play when
...d leads to the deaths of many innocent characters and strips away each person’s individuality and trust, all for attaining power and recognition. Othello is not only a tragedy, but also an important reminder of how people are easily deceived to gain power and recognition. Shakespeare’s Othello stands as a warning to all generations. Some historians agree that William Shakespeare may have been one of the first psychologists in human history, since it enabled him to create a devious and Machiavellian character like Iago. Today, we study about psychopathic historic people like Adolf Hitler who annihilated millions of Jews in the name of revenge. It is in human nature to be vengeful and to attain what one desires. As said by Ghandi “An eye for an eye would make the world blind.”
Hatred, in Shakespeare’s Othello, destroyed the lives of so many innocent people, creating an atmosphere of fear and mayhem. Jealousy turned into a deep hatred, and liberated the "beast in man" (Bloom's major dramatists).This mayhem caused a substantial amount of destruction and led to the demise of many.
Amidst the global warming crisis in the Arctic and subsequent lack of food, there have been reports of polar bears eating their own children due to the lack of food. While gruesome, being threatened causes one to take drastic actions to protect oneself. If bears can lose their most maternal instincts for self-protection, how easy is betrayal among friendships? As seen in William Shakespeare’s Othello, Iago’s deliberate and carefully thought out betrayal demonstrates the theme that one often loses sight of humanity in a quest for revenge.
Shakespeare draws an amazing psychological portrait of a man who became a villain by means of ambition, desire and an imbalance of good and evil. “Macbeth” is a play composed of the disintegration of a noble man’s world. The play begins by offering the audience Macbeth, a war hero, with a high regard from Duncan, the king of Scotland. By the end of the play Macbeth transforms into a universally despised man without a place in the social community. Shakespeare draws an amazing face of a man made to be a villain by ambition, desire and an imbalance of good and evil.
Shakespeare wrote different types of plays such as comedies, tragedies, and historical plays. The play Othello is one of his tragedies. It is about a character named Othello who is a Moor, in the service of Venice. Throughout the play Iago, Othello's lieutenant, manipulates Othello to believe that Desdemona, Othello's wife, is cheating on him. Various characters in the play Othello appear to be virtuous, upstanding individuals, but their actions reveal that they are not as they appear to be.
King Claudius, as illustrated in Shakespeare’s Hamlet, displays both charm and eloquence. Claudius is an intelligent person and is able to deceive people into believing he is innocent and morally guided. He is adept at manipulating people in order to advance and maintain his own power and fails to show any remorse for his actions. Claudius utilizes his linguistic skills to portray himself as an innocent and prudent leader; however, upon further inspection his diction is a mere smoke screen that hides his manipulative and cunning nature.