In the production of 'Merchant of Venice' that you watched, did the trial scene affect your opinion of Shylock? Would Elizabethan audiences have reacted in the same way?

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Paul Gallagher 11HY

In the production of ‘Merchant of Venice’ that you watched, did the trial scene affect your opinion of Shylock? Would Elizabethan audiences have reacted in the same way?

        The play ‘Merchant of Venice’ was written in the 1600’s by William Shakespeare it is a comedy and is based in Venice. One of the main characters is Shylock, Shylock is a loan shark who lends money to people and when they pay it back they pay a lot more than what they borrowed. He is also a Jew and in those times Jews were hated by most Christian’s because of the vicious rumours, which escalated claiming that Jews poisoned wells and drank the blood of Christian children and so the audiences would not have took a likening to them and would have liked to see them embarrassed and humiliated. Jews where only aloud back into England after they had been banished for 350 years. Many of the people in the audience and even William Shakespeare would never have met a Jew so their influences came from the rumours and other plays such as Christopher Marlow’s ‘The Jew Of Malta’ in which there is a terrible Jew called Barnabas, who gets boiled to death in the play. As he is a Jew the audiences would have cheered when he gets killed especially as it is such a gruesome death.

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        We first meet Shylock when he agrees to lend Antonio, a Christian, money in accordance to a ‘merry bond’ which entails that Antonia would have to give shylock a pound of flesh if he does not pay him back in three months. This made me feel like Shylock is a very evil man because he was willing to cut a pound of flesh form Antonio’s body. This would have been the same for the Christians in the audience. He also hates Christians, “I hate him for he is a Christian” this would have made the audience hate him even ...

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