English Coursework- Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice

Authors Avatar

November 8th, 2002

Mallory Warrington

English Coursework- Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice

        

In the following essay I will portray my opinion of whether or not Shylock was treated unfairly. To do this I will go through the main scenes concerning Shylock and express my opinion for that particular scene. This is because it would be impossible to sympathise with Shylock on a whole because throughout the play he shows completely different sides to his character. Shakespeare has a great ability to twist complex characters therefore in one scene Shylock is considered the villain and in the next he would be considered the victim. In some scenes he shows his power hungry, manipulative side and in other scenes he shows himself as a broken man, demoralised by the racist, predominately Christian, society of Venice. At the time the play was written, there was great opposition between Christians and Jews. Shakespeare took a big risk in this play as he portrayed the inhumanity showed to Jews and could have lost his life, if he portrayed Jews so well that offended the queen or if the audience disliked it and took offence.

        The first scene I’m going to look at is Act one, Scene three; this is where Shylock is introduced in the play. In this scene I do not sympathise with Shylock at first because Shakespeare portrays his first appearance as smug, patronizing, confident and in control. He shows this by repeating the amount of money and the details of the bond consecutively in a belittling manor. In the production I saw (Channel four- The Merchant of Venice), the way Shylock was positioned suggested he was the dominant one and very happy about the situation and also seemed pleasured by Antonio and Bassanio’s obvious feeling of discomfort. Shylock quickly explains why his attitude is so smug, it’s because he hates Antonio (who is usually in control) who now needs his help. Shylock goes on to say why he hates Antonio, “I hate him for he is Christian”, and because “he lends out money gratis and brings down the rate of usance here with us in Venice”, (Antonio lends out money free where Shylock makes his living off interest). I start to sympathise with Shylock when Antonio uses animal imagery in vivid imagination to offend him, such as calling him a “cut-throat dog” and when he demonstrates the everyday abuse he receives from Antonio as shown in the following quotations,  

Join now!

“Fair sir, you spat on me Wednesday last,

You spurned me such a day, another time

You called me dog, and for these courtesies

I’ll lend you thus much moneys?”

Antonio demonstrates his hatred of Shylock be replying with,

“I am as like to call thee so again,

To spit on thee again, to spurn thee too”.

After the scene shows Shylock’s demoralised side, Shakespeare twists the character and portrays Shylock’s need for harsh revenge,

“let the forfeit

Be nominated for an equal pound

Of your fair flesh, to be cut ...

This is a preview of the whole essay