Innocence versus Immorality in Othello In William Shakespeare's tragic drama Othello we find a wide range of moral and immoral behavior, a full range of goodness and badness in life. Let's look in this article at the specific types of each and how they affect the outcome. In Shakespeare's Four Giants Blanche Coles comments on the lack of truthfulness in Iago's speech: The story which Iago tells Roderigo of Cassio's promotion over him is not true, though it has been accepted by many discerning scholars. Imprudent reading alone can explain this misunderstanding, imprudent reading which for the moment attenuates their attention towards one of the most essential requirements of Shakespearean character analysis. That requirement is that the reader must never accept, or always be prepared to dispute, the word of any character unless that character's veracity has been established, or unless the statement is accepted by more than one person of proven honesty. (76)Iago's lying is a type of immoral conduct that the ancients practice from the beginning to the end of the play. But is lying his main motivation for evil? Roderigo's opening lines to Iago in Act 1, Scene 1, bring us to the root of the problem: Tush! never tell me; I take it very hard that you, Iago, who took my purse as if the strings were yours, should know. (1.1) In other words, the rich playboy repaid the old man for the soldier's intercession with Desdemona on Roderigo's behalf. This reward is ongoing before the show begins and continues in Cyprus as well. Yes, it would seem that money is at the root of Iago's moral downfall, and all three... cards ...... cards of evil, namely his supposedly false wife. But Emilia is the one who, by affirming the innocence of her murdered lover, resurrects morality in this comedy. Emilia refutes the false ideas that Othello believes motivated him to kill; she counters Iago's lies (“Did he give it to Cassio? No, alas, I found it, / And gave it to my husband.”) and blames Desdemona's murder on him. And he sacrifices his own life for the truth; she dies a martyr, stabbed by the evil Iago. Othello is also in a certain sense a martyr, paying in full for the crime he committed. WORKS CITED Shakespeare, William. Othello. In Electric Shakespeare. Princeton University. 1996. http://www.eiu.edu/~multilit/studyabroad/othello/othello_all.html No lines nos.Coles, Blanche. Shakespeare's Four Giants. Rindge, New Hampshire: Richard Smith Publisher, 1957.