Iago the Villain
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If told to recall any villain from literary works, what comes to mind? Many probably do, but two that stand out for being extremely notorious and evil are Iago from Shakespeare’s Othello and Lord Voldemort from J.K Rowling’s Harry Potter Series. According to a 2008 list, named 50 Greatest Villains in Literature published by the English newspaper, The Telegraph, Iago and Lord Voldemort are in the top five spots one, both in consecutive order. Although J.K. Rowling writes for a genre known as commercial fiction, her characters are not flat or stereotypical; they are all well developed and relatable to. The reader is aware that there are motives and thoughts within each character. With this being said the reader should be able to accept Voldemort as a character of literary merit and worthy of comparison to Iago. From the very beginning of each characters’ story, the reader is aware that Iago and Voldemort are victims to most of the deadly sins. Along with other characteristics, personality traits and actions Iago and Voldemort prove themselves as being notorious villains in literature.
From the very beginning we are aware of Iago’s intentions in the play, in his second soliloquy (II.i.261-89), Iago displays lust towards Desdemona “to diet [his] revenge [and to get] evened with him” (II, I, 270-75). His revenge is mostly fueled by the fact that Othello chose Cassio as lieutenant. Cassio is a mere “arithmetician”(I.i.20) who has never been to war; only read about it from books and other people. Iago on the other hand has been Othello’s friend for such awhile and he has been to war and in battles and he knows what it takes to be lieutenant. Iago’s thirst for revenge gets more and more dangerous after this because he starts planning people’s death in order to start eliminating people who may have known of his plan or became aware of it. He carefully plans out everything and other things are out of his control but very luckily they fall in Iago’s favor. Very similarly we see that Voldemort shows the exact same characteristics of revenge. Voldemort’s wrath is a revenge for death because Harry Potter nearly destroyed him and Harry rises to fame for being the boy who lived and for being one of the only two that are able to defeat the dark lord. Voldemort like Iago can not deal with the idea that there is someone else stronger than them or in a much higher position for not really doing anything. Harry rises to fame for being a baby that survived Voldemort’s attack and Cassio for landing the job because of his connections. In John C. McCloskey’s essay, The Motivation of Iago, he writes, “the basic motivation of Iago is hate. wounded prided, [and] a feeling of personal injustice” all this is applicable to both characters and not just Iago. Both characters’ prides are hurt because for Iago, a mathematician takes his place and for Voldemort a baby out powers him. And they both feel injustice and are owed something because of the position that they lost due to the actions of other people.
The injustices done to both these characters according to Frank Rand’s, The Over Garrulous Iago, led to a “jealousy…that surfaces [all] the evil...that lurks” dormant in all of us. Iago, based on the solely what Shakespeare has written and inferring that Iago is not of a jealous nature the reader can assume that this whole play awakens Iago jealousy when he is not chosen to be lieutenant. From here is that the whole play and jealousy stems from. Everything else about Iago’s lust is just cloudy thinking or over ambition. This is true for Voldemort was not always an evil character but one of humble beginnings and of a very calm nature while in school and everything. After wards he just wanted more and more power and the only way to acquire it was to practice more dark arts even if it meant having to harm others. His jealousy of Harry also leads him to kill many people in search of means to restore his body and become stronger.
If the reader compares Iago and Lord Voldemort’s entourage we see that Iago has Bianca and Roderigo, while Voldemort has his Death Eaters. Iago uses Roderigo for money but he promises that he will get Desdemona to fall in love with him. He uses Bianca to keep tabs on things between Othello and Desdemona and he also uses her to acquire a handkerchief. So Bianca unknowingly is a spy for Iago and does anything for him without questioning. Bianca may love Iago but the feeling is not returned as Iago often insults his wife and just uses her as a means to reach his goal. Voldemort’s death eaters are those that are of much weaker powers and feel that by joining their lives will be spared. They are also the dark lord’s pawns doing as he orders them to. An example to this is Severus Snape. Snape would be a mix of Roderigo and Cassio, Snape must be in good terms with the headmaster like Cassio but at the same time he is loyal to Voldemort, like Roderigo. Even if Roderigo is not seeing any progress with Desdemona he continues to pay Iago for his services. The death eaters too after having been dormant for many years appear once again to the dark lord’s side without any question.
Both Iago and Voldemort are feared villains not only for their way of being able to kill or be the cause of certain deaths and be fine with it, but with the skills that they use to do what they want. They are psychopaths that can lie and turn any lie into a workable truth for their advantage. They can and will do anything to acquire what is rightfully or at least they think is rightfully theirs.
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