It would argue a
disproportionateness, a want of balance, in Desdemona, which Shakespeare
does not appear to have in the least contemplated.'[104] Could any
argument be more self-destructive? It actually _did_ appear to Brabantio
'something monstrous to conceive' his daughter falling in love with
Othello,--so monstrous that he could account for her love only by drugs
and foul charms. And the suggestion that such love would argue
'disproportionateness' is precisely the suggestion that Iago _did_ make
in Desdemona's case:
Foh! one may smell in such a will most rank,
Foul _disproportion_, thoughts unnatural.
In fact he spoke of the marriage exactly as a filthy-minded cynic now
might speak of the marriage of an English lady to a negro like
Toussaint. Thus the argument of Coleridge and others points straight to
the conclusion against which they argue.
But this is not all. The question whether to Shakespeare Othello was
black or brown is not a mere question of isolated fact or historical
curiosity; it concerns the character of Desdemona. Coleridge, and still
more the American writers, regard her love, in effect, as Brabantio
regarded it, and not as Shakespeare conceived it. They are simply
blurring this glorious conception when they try to lessen the distance
between her and Othello, and to smooth away the obstacle which his
'visage' offered to her romantic passion for a hero.
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