The Merchant of Venice

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The Merchant of Venice

Shakespeare wrote 'The Merchant of Venice' in 1596, a time of fiercely held Christian views when all Jews were discriminated and persecuted. They suffered huge prejudice during the Middle Ages when they were wrongly accused of killing children and causing the 'Black Death'. Massacres of Jews occurred and eventually in 1290, the entire community was expelled from England and not re-admitted until the mid-seventeenth century, just because of their religion.

The Jewish villain was a stock character in medieval literature and re-enactments of the crucifixion of Jesus always portrayed the disloyal disciple Judas, as a stereotypical Jew. Subsequently, authors such as Christopher Marlow and William Shakespeare always cast Jewish characters as villains. They cashed in on the fact that Elizabethan audiences would lap up the racial discrimination towards Jews, because of the huge conflict between the two religions, by writing 'The Jew of Malta' and the 'Merchant of Venice'.

'The Jew of Malta' written first by Christopher Marlow, portrayed Barabas as the revengeful Jewish moneylender, which became a huge success. Shakespeare followed suit and used Barabas as the prototype for Shylock-also a revengeful Jewish moneylender.

Shakespeare was probably not even interested in Shylock's Jewishness. In fact, he had probably never been acquainted with a Jew. He used the prevailing anti-Semitic stereotypes to characterize his play's villain. Because of this, the audience would have judged Shylock even before he first spoke, just the way they would have judged any Jew.

Venice provided Shakespeare the perfect setting for his play, as the Venetian Christian attitudes towards Jews were much the same as the Elizabethan's. In this particular city, Jews were forced to live in ghettos, separate walled parts of the city which were locked at night, and the only jobs they were allowed to occupy were that of moneylenders. The people of Venice pretended that Jews didn't even exist.

The hatred between Shylock and Antonio had accumulated over many years. Shylock had been verbally and physically abused for his Jewishness by Antonio,

"You call me a misbeliever, cut-throat dog and spit upon my Jewish Gabadine"

This discriminating and harrowing treatment towards Shylock explains his immense desire for revenge against Antonio. So when Antonio enters a bond with Shylock to borrow three thousand ducats for Bassanio, Shylock introduces a forfeit. If Antonio doesn't repay the amount within three months, Shylock will be allowed to cut a pound of flesh from any part of Antonio's body. When Antonio's ventures seem to fail, Shylock claims his forfeit and they both end up in court.
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Act 4 Scene 1 is the key scene of the play, which is set in court. This is the scene where the several subplots of the main storyline, (the 'pound of flesh' bond, the casket test and the ring bond) come together and reach their climax. It is also the climax of the relationship between the Christians and the Jews with Antonio and Shylock representing each.

The setting is in a huge, grand court room, creating a very tense and intimidating atmosphere, especially for Shylock. He is the only Jew present in the court-he has no one ...

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This essay is very detailed and does describe a huge range of features of the Native American's way of life. It would be even better if at the start the writer had set out which aspects of their life they were going to examine. It would have been a good idea to focus on the aspects of their life that were significantly challenged by the arrival of the European settlers.