Speaker
Description
This study presents an analysis of the manipulative nature of language in modelling crises through the linguistic ploys of Iago in William Shakespeare’s drama Othello and Saruman in J. R. R. Tolkien’s mythopoesis The Lord of the Rings. Both Iago and Saruman utilise illocutionary forces to undermine human relations. Iago creates tragedy through deceitful speech, while Saruman’s rhetoric applies language as a tool of domination to rule over both people and nature. The basic aim of this paper is to uniquely bridge Shakespearean drama and post-modern high fantasy in order to examine linguistic mechanisms which bring about social and moral collapse. The research is grounded in J. L. Austin’s speech act theory and complemented by psychoanalytic insights into the unconscious motives of deceit and power. Different illocutionary forces, which are utterances of betrayal and destabilisation, function as active agents in crisis formation. By employing the qualitative comparative methodology through close textual analysis, this study explores how language operates not merely at the communicational level, but as a form of expressive action which reshapes the ‘worlds undone by words’. The interdisciplinary approach offers a better understanding of the psychological and ethical dimensions of linguistic manipulation. Additionally, it offers fresh perspectives on crisis as fundamentally linguistic and performative phenomena across literary traditions.
| Keywords | illocutionary forces, linguistic manipulation, crisis formation, Shakespeare and Tolkien |
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