The Character of Don John in Much Ado About NothingMuch Ado About Nothing by William Shakespeare is a comedy in which he uses one of his most peculiar villains. The antagonist in this play is Don John, Don Pedro's bastard brother. In this article I will discuss Don John's role, his motivations, and the character himself. I will also delve into Shakespeare's use of Don John as an antagonist. I will compare Don John to the other characters in the play as well as the other villains in Shakespeare's plays. Although Don John doesn't spend much time on stage in Much Ado About Nothing, he still plays an integral role in the opera's plot. The plan he sets in motion is one of the opera's two main stories (the other is the battle of wits between Beatrice and Benedick). Don John, as I said before, is Don Pedro's bastard brother. His illegitimacy is one of the factors that make him completely vile and hateful. He is bitter because of his social position and at the beginning of the play he is directly bitter and jealous of Claudio. We might find some explanation as to why Don John hates Claudio from what he says when he talks to Barrachio and Conrade in the first act. When he learns of Don Pedro's plot to help Claudio win Hero's hand, Don John says, "Come, come; let us go there: this may prove fodder for my sorrow. That young beginning has all the glory of my overthrow : If I can counteract it in any way, I bless myself in every way." (Shakespeare 16) Although Shakespeare never distinguishes specific reasons for Don John's hatred of Claudius, we can infer one of two possibilities from his use of the word "overthrow." The overthrow he is referring to could be a military overthrow... middle of paper... in Don John's face. The character of Don John is not a very complicated character. He's not a character who spends much time on stage either. There is no denying, however, that he is one of the most evil and twisted characters Shakespeare ever invented. I think Don John is the perfect villain in every aspect of the word. Works CitedHunter, GK William Shakespeare: The Later Comedies. Great Brittian: Langman's Green & Co. Ltd. 1962Shakespeare, William. Much ado about nothing. Cambridge: At University Press 1962Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. New York and London: WW Norton & Co., Inc. 1963 Shkespeare, William. Much ado about nothing. New Haven: Yale University Press 1917 Spivack, Bernard. Shakespeare and the allegory of evil. New York: Columbia University Press 1958