Examining women’s status in military culture by looking at the triangular structure of the female-character relations in Othello

Abstract

This essay explores the complex meanings of the so-called “triangular structure” of three female characters—Desdemona, Emilia, and Bianca—in Shakespeare’s Othello. Desdemona’s tragic fate stems from modelling of her self-image on a heroic model only appropriate to soldiers like Othello. In this view the importance of the close relationship between Desdemona and Emilia has been recognized, but the relationship between Emilia and Bianca has been seen as a matter of only secondary importance. However, in this essay it will be argued here that it is this triangular structure of the female-character relations that gives each female character a pivotal role to play in a male-dominated military culture. From that beginning, the essay turns to ways in which Emilia struggles to mediate between submissive and autonomous realms. While Emilia appears to challenge male domination, she, using the word ‘whore’ to differentiate Bianca from her, fails to justify ontological status of women in a male-dominated military culture. Finally, this essay turns to Bianca who finds herself at the very center of military culture. It is significant to understand the paradoxical nature of the notion of the word ‘courtesan’ as both dangerous threat to morality and an useful agent to ridicule elites’ sexual immorality to consider Shakespeare’s implied intention to create Bianca who is entirely absent in Giraldi Cinthio’s Hecatommithi. As being murdered or abandoned, Desdemona, Emilia, and Bianca have seemingly failed to survive in military culture. However, when we look at their presence in this culture, we can realize that their presence in military culture plays more than a dramatic function, and that their relationships are not spatially separated, but mutually formative and interlocking to challenge the rhetorical and cultural construction of gender identity. This essay will help renew critical and historical attention to marginalized, or suppressed, experiences of women in military culture.