The Merchant of Venice | Dualities

In this excerpt, Marvin Felheim identifies several dualities in The Merchant of Venice, including joy and sadness, Venice and Belmont, Jew versus Christian, and Old Testament justice against New Testament mercy. Felheim also examines three significant episodes in The Merchant of Venice—the bond plot, the casket plot, and the ring plot—describing their significance to the overall structure of the play.

Marvin Felheim
[Felheim identifies several dualities in The Merchant of Venice, including joy and sadness, Venice and Belmont, Jew versus Christian, and Old Testament justice against New Testament mercy. According to the critic, the play opens with inexplicable sadness, primarily present in the characters of Antonio and Portia. Bassanio, Salerio, and Solanio interrupt the initial seriousness of the dramatic action with some mirth, Felheim continues, but for the most part a strain of melancholy pervades the play. Perhaps the most concrete example of this duality is...

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