A pound of the man’s flesh, taken from a man.
He states that if Antonio does not pay back the loan of three thousand ducats within three months, then Shylock will be able to cut off a pound of Antonio’s flesh.
Antonio is convinced he will be able to repay his debts. That Shylock’s request for a pound of flesh as a collateral strikes him as a joke, and therefore, is not taken seriously by Antonio at all. The sympathy we once felt for Shylock has vanished because of his demand for a pound of flesh. That being the punishment, if Antonio does not pay of his debt, disgusts the audience. As the request is of such an awful nature the audience see Shylock now as the archetypal villain.
Shylocks relationship with his daughter is another interesting situation as again we feel both sympathy and dislike towards Shylock concerning the care of his daughter. He demands that Jessica lock the doors and windows when he hears that there will be a Masque that night. However contrary to his statement in the first act:
But I will not eat with you , drink with you, nor pray with you.
Shylock leaves his house to partake of dinner with Bassanio.
He does not deal with Jessica in a nice, polite fatherly. He speaks to her harshly, giving her orders:
Do as I bid you; shut the doors after you;
We fee dislike towards Shylock as he does not give his daughter any freedom or show her love.
However our Attitudes change when we find out that Jessica has run away with a Christian whom she claims to love taking all of her father’s money. We instantly feel sorry for Shylock as firstly he has lost his daughter but not only that she has run away with a Christian who Shylock despises. She takes Shylock’s prized possessions with her, his money.
Again, however, our sympathy is cut short when we hear of how Shylock grieves equally about the loss of his money compared to his daughter:
My daughter ! Oh my ducats!
Shylock cannot decide what his priorities are whether his daughter is more important to him or his money. This would cause the audience to look on him, in a negative light as he considers his daughter as important as money.
Towards the end of the play we find out that Antonio’s ships have sunk at sea thus he loses all is money meaning he cannot repay Shylock the money he owed him. In Venice at that time a bond was the law and whatever was written in that bond must be carried out, meaning Shylock is owed a pound of Antonio’s flesh. The trial scene is the scene in which the audience’s feelings vary the most towards Shylock. Shylock is legally entitled to a pound if Antonio’s flesh however many people try to persuade Shylock to not go ahead with this:
Pluck commiseration of his state
However, Shylock refuses to back down, he believes that Antonio owes him the pound of flesh and therefore he should receive it. Shylock relishes in the revenge, which he is about to partake in.
Here we really see Shylock as a archetypal villain: being heartless and inconsiderate. We feel no sympathy for him at all. However, our hatred towards Shylock lessens when we hear a speech recited:
Hath not a jew eyes…If you prick us do we not bleed ?
We again feel sorry for Shylock as he is defending himself against the prejudice he has had to deal with. Again, however, he manages to swiftly diminish any sympathy we felt by saying:
And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge.
By saying this Shylock automatically reverts back to the archetypical villain we saw before. It is not necessary for him to threaten Antonio in the way of revenge.
As I have previously mentioned Shylock is legally allowed to receive a pound of Antonio’s flesh. However, in the court a Doctor is called to verify the bond. The Doctor is in fact Portia (Bassino’s wife) dressed as a man. Portia cleverly crushes Shylock by prolonging the realisation that Shylock cannot receive what he desires – the pound of Antonio’s flesh.
And lawfully by this the jew may claim
A pound of flesh, to be by him cut off
Nearest to the Merchant’s heart.
We see from this quotation how the Doctor indeed makes Shylock believe he is lawfully correct. Shylock’s happiness towards the Doctor’s comments are shown in the following quotation:
O noble judge! O excellent young man!
The way in which Portia delvers the news, which will devastate Shylock, is as follows:
But, in the cutting it, if thou dost shed
One drop of Christian blood, thy lands and goods
Are, by the laws of Venice, confiscate.
Shylock’s punishment for not completing what was written in the bond he must give half his estate to Antonio, half his estate to Venice, become a Christian and finally when he dies all that he possesses will be left to Jessica and her husband. We do indeed feel sympathetic for Shylock in this instance, as his worse nightmare has come true. Everything he loves (his money) has been taken away from him and given to the one thing he hates the most (Christianity). This sentence leaves Shylock with nothing whatsoever, all his possessions and adorations have been seized. We see how devastated he is by his exit from the courtroom:
I pray you give me leave to go from hence:
I am not well.
His exit is rushed and he does question his punishment, which we have seen him previously do so often. He claims that he is not well; the realisation of what has been taken away from him is such a shock that he feels physically ill.
From studying the text we can see that shylock could be seen sympathetically, however, this is probably not what Shakespeare would of intended. In Shakespeare’s time Jews were not officially allowed in Britain. . Most had been expelled in 1290 after a series of massacacres, slanders and restrictions of their rights. They were disliked by many people and often had to hide their religion as a way of protecting themselves. Therefore Shakespeare would have probably not wanted the audience to feel any sympathy for Shylock. The audience would indeed not feel any sympathy for him, and would of laughed at his misfortunes. In Shakespearean time Shylock would have been perceived as a comic character, the audience would have relished in his misery. However, in this day and age Shylock is normally seen differently. Due to the holocaust many people would view any anti-Semitic behaviour as wrong. Therefore Shylock is no longer seen as comic character. An audience see that he has a villainies side to him; however, they would also feel sympathy towards him. We would not hate him for being a Jew but dislike him on the basis that his actions are often evil and unnecessary. Since today’s society is so multi cultural, and racism is such a big issue, the fact that shylock is prejudiced against because of his religion would evoke a sense of pity in an audience of today. Not only does the time in which the play is performed affect the way in which Shylock is perceived but the way it is performed does as well. Different actors and producers want to convey Shylock in different manners. Obviously the way in which an actor performs will affect the level of sympathy we feel for him. Antony her was one of the most Villainous Shylocks acted. He wanted to convey to the audience that Shylock was evil however; he was driven to this by the behaviour of his opponents. David Calder’s performance of Shylock however was completely the opposite. He wanted to convey Shylock in a good light; he felt that Shylock puts himself on the line in the name of radical and cultural tolerance. AS an audience member we would feel a great amount of sympathy for Shylock here. The way in which an actor portrays Shylock and the time in which a play is performed will dramatically influence the way in which the audience receive the character of Shylock.0
In conclusion to the essay I would say that indeed The Audience could feel sympathy for Shylock as many devastating situations occur concerning him throughout the play the play. However our sympathy is always short lived. Shylock manages to always act harshly straight after he has been treated badly, and therefore we as an audience do not feel that sympathetic towards him. However in the final incident of the play involving Shylock we are left with a feeling of sympathy towards him after his departure from the play. He has lost everything he once had. He is the archetypical villain and by being this character, the audience cannot feel sympathetic towards him for a long time. His character was written for the purpose of the audience’s dislike, without him the story would be incomplete. Whichever actor performs Shylock the time in which it is performed obviously will affect the amount of sympathy in which the audience feels towards him. However, we cannot distract away from the fact that Shakespeare wanted him to be portrayed in a negative light. And however much sympathy we feel for him he is prepared to cut a pound of flesh off a man. Even if as an audience we do not see Shylock as a villain, we can never see him as a hero
