Who Is Iago's Reputation In Othello

“My lord is not my lord, nor should I know him were he in favor as in humor altered”
(3, 4, 119-120)
Throughout Shakespeare’s play ‘Othello’ we observe Othello’s identity and reputation fall to pieces, the way Othello sees himself and the way others perceive him is transformed completely. His qualities of a decisive, dignified and proud man at the beginning of the play are later overtaken by jealousy, rage and irrational thinking. His life and himself as he knows it is destroyed by love and jealousy, the most dangerous weapons known to mankind. Before we even meet Othello we know of him because of the opening conversation between Iago and Roderigo. They speak of their hate for Othello and portray him as a dishonest and lower class man.
He doesn’t want to believe what Iago is telling but he can’t stop the doubt poisoning his mind. It is at this stage of the play that we see a side to Othello that has not yet been unveiled, irrational rage which he takes out on Iago “Villain be sure thou prove my love a wore, be sure of it, give me the ocular proof, or by the worth of mine eternal soul, thou hadst been better have been born a dog then answer my waked wrath.” (3, 3, 67-71). Othello hasn’t quite turned into the irrational mess of jealousy and anger that we see later on in the play, but we begin to see the
At the beginning of the play we observe that Othello is a respected and admired man. But now others are shocked at what they see in him, they cannot believe that this irrational, angry man is the same as the controlled and dignified man they knew in Venice. A good example of this is when Lodovico says of Othello, “Is this the moor whom our full senate call all in all sufficient? Is this the nature whom passion could not shake?” (4, 1, 259-261). Lodovico cannot believe that this is the same man who is known for his rational thinking and ability not to be phased by anything. The change in him is so vast he is hardly recognizable as the same