Iago Good At Being Bad

Good At Being Bad

William Shakespeare’s play Othello features one of the most intriguing and captivating characters in literature, Iago. His captivating traits, flaws, and other quarks are what make him quite the character. Iago has used many tactics to achieve his goal in the plan to sabotage Othello and his marriage. The tactics which he uses to fulfill his plan and his motivations are what make him such a smart and interesting character. Iago has used many tactics to achieve his status of being good at being bad; these include Manipulating others, Outsmarting everyone else with his superior intelligence, and being able to hide his true intentions.

One defining trait of Iago is his nature of manipulating others. This trait is one of the ways in which Iago was able to complete his master plan. Iago tells many different characters things that will trick them into thinking their loved ones or friends are not really being truthful. One of these such cases is shown with Othello, "The Moor is of a free and open nature, That thinks men honest that but seem to be so,"

"She did deceive her father, marrying you; / And when she seem'd to shake and fear your looks, / She loved them most" here Iago uses his intelligence to come up with a way to secure the idea of Desdemona’s unfaithfulness (III.iii. 206-208). At this point in the story, Othello is still unsure whether Desdemona is really cheating. Due to this Iago asks the question if she has already deceived her father to marry him, what is stopping her from doing the same to him? With Iago’s large intelligence and the ability to think quickly on his feet, he is able to come up with something on the spot to convince Othello of Desdemona’s cheating to further his own plan. Iago’s large intellect is another trait that makes him such an interesting character and is what makes him able to pull off this huge scheme in the first