Although the exact date when Shakesapeare composed The Merchant of Venice is unknown, scholars believe it was written in 1596-98. One of the most prominent topics explored in this play is the place of Jewish people in European societies in the late 16th century. To understand the play’s approach to this topic, it is important to contextualize the sentiments toward Judaism in Europe at the time. The main antagonist, Shylock, is Jewish, and throughout the play, various characters, including the eponymous merchant of Venice, Antonio, actively antagonize Shylock as a result of his ethnicity and religion. Throughout the play, the Christian characters seem to think Judaism bears connotations of evil. 

It is worth noting that Jews were not legally allowed in England at the time, and while this law was not always upheld, Jews in England were expected to remain quiet about their background. In general, Jews were considered strange and exotic others rather than typical human beings, and they were barred from many professions. Further, only two to three years before the play was written, Queen Elizabeth had allegedly been the target of an attempted poisoning by her physician, Roderigo Lopez, a Portuguese man of Jewish descent. Lopez’s public execution, warranted or not, illustrates that the common attitude toward Judaism in Elizabethan England was cold at best.

This is perhaps why Shakespeare’s portrayal of Shylock is conflicted and ambiguous. Shylock is framed as the antagonist of the play, and some of his priorities are certainly questionable, but he is also a deeply relatable character. We know, for instance, that many of the Christian characters have been cruel to him in the past, placing his grievances in context. And in the third act, in one of Shakespeare’s more famous monologues, Shylock humanizes himself, asking how different he is from Christians. As a human being, he is subject to the same joys and sorrows as others, and his desire for recompense is thus framed as an essentially human motive. We also learn that he is a widower, aggrieved by the loss of the ring that his wife left him, a fact that reveals greater emotional depths. 

Shylock’s punishment is indeed harsh and unjust: he must convert to Christianity, he must change his will to bequeath all of his possessions to his daughter who has betrayed him and the man she eloped with, and he is not remunerated for his loan to Antonio in any way. However, four hundred years ago, the general attitude was likely much more biased against Jews in England, and so this punishment may not have been understood as unjust by Shakespeare’s original audience. Still, Shakespeare attempts to humanize Shylock, and scholars suggest that his presentation of Shylock was progressive for its time. Although the play employs problematic stereotypes, it also portrays Shylock as a human being, not merely an outsider.

Tied closely to the question of Judaism is the question of the value of money. Much of the hatred towards Jews in 16th century Europe centered around usury, the lending of money with interest, a practice which is discussed several times throughout the play. Shylock, a usurer, is careful with his money, and the play contrasts his attitude with the incautious spending that other characters indulge in. The events of the play begin because Bassanio has not been careful with his money, and Antonio is overly eager to lend Bassanio money that he does not have. Portia similarly gives her money freely to save the life of a man that she does not know, and Jessica and Lorenzo spend the money that they have stolen from Shylock over the course of several days, mostly on indulgent items like gondola rides and a monkey. They spend their money so quickly that they must be taken in by a friend of a friend, Portia. 

It is the supposed villain in this play who keeps close watch on his money and attempts to control his expenditures. While the central conflicts of the plot would seem to implicitly argue for fiscal maturity, the fact that the play ends happily for the fiscally careless Christians and poorly for Shylock suggests otherwise. Thus, the play may be commenting on the lack of importance money should have in human life: money is fluid, and it is the experiences and relationships that money affords us that should be treasured over money itself. It is out of love that Portia and Antonio offer money to their companions. 

By this logic, Shylock represents a warning. He values his relationship with his daughter no more than the ducats that she stole from him—so much so that he would rather see her in a coffin with the ducats than to have her back. Similarly, when the Moroccan and Arragonian princes choose their chests, they choose based in part on the value of the material the chests are made from, and they lose their opportunity to marry Portia. The scroll in the gold chest, in fact, reminds us that all that glitters is not gold. 

Throughout the play, it is those who value relationships over money who are rewarded, while those who value money over relationships are punished. However, it is most accurate to say that the play condones a kind of middle ground with regards to the importance of money. Early in the play, Nerissa suggests that those with too much have too many worries, but those with none also suffer. It is best, she says, to be content. Given the radical difference between characters like Shylock and Lorenzo, Nerissa’s comment about moderation is well made.

There may not be a play more misnamed in Shakespeare’s entire canon than The Merchant of Venice. Though he is certainly an important character, Antonio—the merchant in question—merits, at best, fourth billing. The main lovers in the play, Portia and Bassanio, command a great deal more attention, and, as most commentators suggest, Shylock is ultimately the main attraction. Although the Jewish moneylender “appears in only five of the play’s twenty scenes, and not at all in the fifth act, everyone agrees that the play belongs to Shylock” (Barnet 193-4). His dominance is such that, in certain productions (particularly in the nineteenth century), the last act has been “omitted entirely” (Myrick, “Introduction” xxii). Yet, despite his somewhat lesser role, Antonio proves crucial to both main plots of The Merchant of Venice. His agreement to serve as collateral for Shylock’s loan to Bassanio facilitates the latter’s courtship of Portia, and the risk to his life which results from this arrangement generates much of the plot’s complications. Shakespeare’s decision to make him the title character perhaps stems from an acknowledgment of Antonio’s structural importance to all the various story lines, as well as from an effort—perhaps unsuccessful—to balance the audience’s attention equally between Shylock’s thirst for revenge and the romance of Portia and Bassanio.

Antonio’s importance as the hinge between the play’s two main plots may reflect the fact that Shakespeare had no one particular inspiration for The Merchant, but rather drew primarily on two different sources. Both the story of the three caskets and the story of a usurer’s demand of a pound of human flesh apparently derive from Oriental folk-tales (Myrick, “Sources” 142-3; Barton 250), though it is likely that Shakespeare encountered them from Italian and Latin sources. A collection of Italian stories, Il Pecorone, is usually suggested as Shakespeare’s source for the pound of flesh, while Gesta Romanorum, a book of medieval Latin stories (first translated into English in 1577), was very likely his introduction to the three caskets (Myrick, “Sources” 142-3). As with most of Shakespeare’s plays, the exact date of composition is unknown, but contemporary references prove that it had been performed at least by 1598. “In 1598 and in 1600 the play was entered in the Stationers’ Register. It was first published in a quarto (Q1) in 1600" (Myrick, “Textual Note” 139).

The most prominent cultural issues in The Merchant, both embodied in the character of Shylock, are the Elizabethan attitudes toward Jews and usury (moneylending). Although “[e]laborate arguments have been mounted to demonstrate that The Merchant of Venice is not anti-Semitic”—presumably stemming from critics’ desire to defend the ethics of the man many consider to be the greatest poet of the English language—”it is no good to try to discard the hate that energizes the play” (Charney 47). “Jews had been officially banished from England for three centuries” by the time Shakespeare was writing, and there was a lingering hatred of the Jewish race and religion among Christian societies (Barton 250). Such a Christian grudge against Jews allegedly stemmed from the latter group’s rejection of Christ, and this sad mixture of racial and religious prejudice is by no means absent from the play. The anti-Semitic mood of England was further fueled by the trial and execution of Roderigo Lopez—a Portuguese Jew and physician to Queen Elizabeth—who was accused of attempting to poison his employer in 1594, a few years before Shakespeare’s play was written (Barton 250). The association of Jews with usury is a stereotype unfortunately still familiar to us today; apart from such racial animosity, however, the Elizabethans despised moneylending for interest in and of itself. The practice was technically illegal in England at the time, although there were various ways—some officially-sanctioned—around the law (Myrick, “Introduction” xxvii-iii). The possibility of Antonio’s death as a result of his financial dealings with Shylock no doubt reflects the contemporary fear about the exorbitant interest rates usurers sometimes charged.

The stage history of The Merchant of Venice has largely been the history of the interpretation of Shylock. How Shakespeare staged the play and the part is unknown; the absence of extensive reference to it throughout the 1600s suggests it wasn’t originally one of the author’s most popular works (Barnet 194). George Granville staged a notable adaptation of it in 1701, featuring a bumbling, comic Shylock, and this interpretation appears to have been the standard one until 1741, when Charles Macklin radically transformed the character into a terrifying, almost monstrous villain (Barnet 194-6). The next major revision in the acting of the role occurred in 1814, when Edmund Kean presented a Shylock who “evoked not simply terror but pity”; Shylock was seen as justified in his rage, due to his ill-treatment at the hands of the Christians (Barnet 196-7). The evolution of a kinder, gentler Shylock culminated in 1879, when Henry Irving played the character as “a sympathetic and tragic figure,” a heroic victim of the increasingly unseemly Christians (Barnet 119). As the dominant Christian culture in England and America has gradually mollified its attitudes toward Jews, Shylock has been portrayed in an increasingly sympathetic light, and subsequent interpretations have oscillated between the various elements of horror and pity, comedy and tragedy, available to the role.

Perhaps the most important aspect of Shakespeare’s writing—one which no study guide can presume to replace—is his linguistic style. Indeed, though this may be an obvious point, it is Shakespeare’s language (rather than, say, his characters or plots) which has earned him his reputation as the pre-eminent English poet. The large number of expressions or sayings from his plays that have found their way into everyday speech, testifies to the English-speaking world’s fascination with Shakespeare as an architect of language. Ironically, however, it is the very strangeness or poetic quality of Shakespeare’s language that many beginning students find to be the chief difficulty in coming to terms with his plays, and a few remarks on this subject may serve to clarify some of the peculiarities of Shakespeare’s version of English.

It is important to note at the outset that the English of Shakespeare’s time and that of our own are relatively the same. That is, both fall under what is broadly designated “Modern English,” as opposed to “Old English” (such as one might find in the epic poem Beowulf) or “Middle English,” (as in Chaucer’s ). Be that as it may, some mitigating factors tend to estrange the present-day The Canterbury Tale sreader or audience member from Shakespeare’s language. The most obvious of these is age. The Merchant of Venice, for example, is roughly four hundred years old, and while its language may be substantially the same as ours, a great many words, phrases, and even whole syntaxes have altered over the course of time. This can be shown in the following example:

In Act II, scene 1, when the Prince of Morocco attempts to persuade Portia of the value of his dark skin, he remarks, “I tell thee, lady, this aspect of mine/ Hath feared the valiant.” There are a number of minor differences easily dispensed with; most English speakers will know “thee” and “hath” are the equivalents of “you” and “has” respectively. The word “aspect” may seem a somewhat unusual or archaic way to refer to “complexion” or “face,” but presents no serious difficulty. What is strangest about this sentence is that, for the present-day reader, it seems to say the opposite of what it means. In current usage, to say that someone “feared the valiant” would be to indicate that the person was “afraid of” valiant people. In Shakespeare’s time, however, the verb “fear” could also be used to indicate “make afraid” or “cause to fear,” a usage which has since died out in our everyday speech. The sense of Morocco’s utterance is apparent only in the context of his whole speech, where “afraid of the valiant” wouldn’t fit into a list of his complexion’s attributes. Such moments may cause a reader confusion in certain passages, but a little detective work usually clears the matter up. A good edition of the play will most likely footnote such passages and explain the disparity.

Not all of the differences between Shakespeare’s English and our own are strictly chronological, however. The Merchant of Venice, like all of Shakespeare‘s plays, is written largely in verse, and as such, is estranged from any variety of spoken English. (Although we can make very educated conjectures, we can’t, in any case, be positively sure of how English was spoken in Shakespeare’s day based on written documents alone. This is, of course, the only evidence available.) Much of what a present-day reader might find estranging in Shakespeare’s language is simply due to his poetic techniques. A reader must be prepared to grant Shakespeare a great deal of leeway in his use of language; otherwise the encounter will end in frustration. Sometimes, for example, Shakespeare will concoct a usage of a word different from, but related to, its previous senses. Shylock, in Act II, scene 6, complains of the laziness of his former servant, Launcelot Gobbo, with the remark “Drones hive not with me;/ Therefore I part with him…” A present-day reader is probably not used to seeing “hive” as a verb at all; although it has such uses in Shakespeare’s time, he seems to have invented this particular one. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the earliest recorded usage of “hive” in the sense of “To live together as bees in a hive” is this same example from The Merchant of Venice (Compact Edition OED 1312). Shakespeare frequently bends previous senses of his words to accommodate his poetic desires, sometimes initiating new trends in the word’s employment.

Shakespeare is at his best (though for the new student most difficult) when he makes words perform tasks they ordinarily don’t do, and this is often manifested in more subtle and complicated ways than merely inventing a new-but-related sense for a word. The final example is from the same scene as the previous one and is also spoken by Shylock. In cautioning his daughter Jessica to ignore the Christian revelries taking place on the street below, Shylock says:

Lock up my doors; and when you hear the drum
And the vile squealing of the wry-necked fife,
Clamber not you up to the casements then…”

The phrase in question here is “wry-necked fife,” which—strictly speaking—doesn’t make sense. A fife is one cylinder-shaped piece; nothing on it could be called its “neck.” The phrase might thus be taken to refer to the fife-player, whose neck would be so twisted in order to play the instrument. “Fife” would then be a synecdoche for “fife-player,” much as one can refer to a king by saying “the crown.” The trouble with this reading is that it doesn’t fit with “vile squealing,” which would refer to the sound of the fife not the player, and a reader may also be inclined to take “fife” as the instrument in parallel with the reference to “drum.” The best solution to this dilemma is to say not that “fife” must refer either to the player or the instrument, but rather that Shakespeare accesses both with his grammatical violation. Both player and instrument are needed to fill out the sense of the sentence, which, though perhaps difficult for new readers, can hardly be construed as a flaw since the poet manages to say two things for the price of one, in a remarkable feat of “verbal economy.” Such moments, once the reader is familiar and comfortable enough with the language, become transformed from the poet’s greatest difficulty to his chief attraction.

A twentieth-century philosopher, attempting to grasp the significance of and his own difficulty with the most renowned of English poets, once wrote: “I do not believe that Shakespeare can be set along side any other poet. Was he perhaps a creator of language rather than a poet?” (Wittgenstein 84). This is perhaps a useful way to conceive of Shakespeare, inasmuch as his plays often create their own rules for language usage and readers must be willing to loosen their hold on their sense of “correct English” in order to partake of them. If anything justifies Shakespeare’s reputation as the greatest of English poets, it is such “creative power,” the poet’s ability to fashion linguistic objects which are not only unprecedented in our language but which subsequently become part of that language.

Venice

*Venice. Major Italian port whose commercial activities are the play’s focus. William Shakespeare’s Venice is a busy mercantile center, in which businessmen are concerned about their cargoes at sea and who are often at the mercy of usurious moneylenders, such as Shylock. A wealthy Jew, Shylock has a deep-rooted animosity toward Christians, who chronically insult him and his religion. Although Venice is dominated by money, with its foundations resting on commerce, trade, and family inheritances, there is a society of exclusiveness under its busy mercantile surface—which is symbolized by the Rialto Bridge, a common meeting place for businessmen. Venice’s people include reviled Jews and anti-Semitic Christians, and Venetian law has the inveterate power to turn individuals into scapegoats.

Belmont

*Belmont. Town near Venice in which the wealthy young Portia lives. In contrast with Venice, Belmont is a place of beautiful material luxury and pleasure. Portia’s beauty, wit, and grace distinguish her home, but it is actually a world of idleness, frivolity, music, and romance. Portia and her waiting-maid Nerissa seem to do little but gossip about Portia’s eager suitors and show much anxiety about Bassanio’s chances at winning her hand. A scene in which Portia’s suitors must choose among treasure caskets to win her hand in marriage is pregnant with the symbolism of wealth and moral implications.

Shylock’s house

Shylock’s house. Venetian home of Shylock the moneylender. Shylock’s daughter Jessica and his servant Launcelot Gobbo complain about the hellishness of the place, where thrift is practiced, where doors and windows are shut against the masked Christian revelers whom Shylock regards as threats to his religion and his property.

Shakespeare also uses generalized street scenes or scenes in front of Shylock’s to demonstrate the anti-Semitism of Solario, Salerio, and Gratiano, and to contrast the shallowness of these men and of Launcelot Gobbo with the wisdom of Portia and the considered judgment of Antonio, the rich and generous merchant of the play’s title.

Court

Court. Venetian court of justice that is the setting for the all-important trial scene, in which the problem of Shylock’s bond is resolved by Portia’s ingenious cleverness and a bargain that Shylock is forced to make with Venetian law in a crystallization of opposite forces: lofty Jewish concept of right and Christian “mercy.”

The Merchant of Venice is regarded as one of Shakespeare's problem comedies, partly due to its elements of anti-Semitism. A problem play presents moral quandaries without providing clear or comforting resolutions. In The Merchant of Venice, the Christian Antonio and his companions beg the Jewish Shylock to show mercy toward Antonio. However, when the roles are reversed, and Antonio and his friends have the opportunity to show Shylock mercy, they choose not to. Instead, they strip him of his possessions and force him to convert to Christianity. Given the scarcity of Jews in Shakespeare's England, his portrayal of Shylock likely stems from stereotypes rather than personal experience. Shylock is characterized as a Jewish moneylender who profits through "usury," charging excessive interest on loans. He despises Antonio because Antonio lends money without interest, undermining Shylock's business. Solanio reports that upon discovering his daughter and money missing, Shylock roams the streets lamenting, "My daughter! O my ducats! O my daughter!" (II.viii.15). Solanio suggests that Shylock values his daughter and his wealth equally, reinforcing another stereotypical image of Jews in Elizabethan times.

Shakespeare's audience would have expected such stereotypes and likely approved of Shylock's harsh treatment by the Christians in the play. However, modern audiences find this treatment of Shylock neither humorous nor justified. In fact, we often perceive a certain hypocrisy in the discrepancy between the Christians' words and actions. Despite their talk of "mercy," they offer Shylock none when they have the chance. Shakespeare, however, provides glimpses of Shylock's humanity beneath the stereotype. Shylock poignantly asks, "Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions?" (III.i.59-60). When his friend Tubal informs him that one of his stolen jewels was traded for a monkey, Shylock reveals that the jewel was a gift to his wife, Leah. He states, "I would not have given it for a wilderness of monkeys" (III.i.123). These moments suggest that Shylock has experienced deep love and genuine pain.

In The Merchant of Venice, Shakespeare explores the contrast between "law" and "mercy" within the Judeo-Christian tradition. Shylock embodies the strict adherence to law as emphasized in the Old Testament, while Portia and the other characters represent the mercy linked with Christianity and the New Testament. The play's message suggests that laws are essential but should be balanced with mercy and compassion. Shakespeare underscores the importance of adhering to the "spirit" rather than the "letter" of the law. For example, the spirit of the agreement between Shylock and Antonio is to ensure repayment of the loan—Antonio will see that Shylock's ducats are returned. Shylock should have accepted Bassanio and Portia's offers to double or triple the loan amount. Instead, he demands a pound of Antonio's flesh, which would likely have resulted in Antonio's death. This adherence to the letter of the bond would have amounted to state-sanctioned murder, undermining the legal system designed to protect Venetian society. The play's emphasis on the spirit over the letter of the law is evident not just in the main plot but also in the subplots.

In the subplot involving the caskets, Portia is bound by her late father's will, which dictates she must marry the suitor who correctly chooses a specific casket. Although Portia may bend the letter of her father's will by aiding Bassanio in his choice, she honors the spirit of it. The test was likely intended to find Portia an intelligent and financially stable husband with good values. If the goal was to ensure Portia's happiness, it is doubtful her father would have been displeased with Bassanio's success, even if it came through Portia's manipulation.

In the subplot of the rings, Bassanio and Gratiano have sworn never to part with their wedding rings. Technically, they haven't broken this promise since Portia and Nerissa, disguised, receive the rings. The men argue correctly that they haven't violated the commitment of love and devotion that the rings symbolize. Today, Portia's actions might be considered entrapment—coaxing someone into committing an act they did not intend to commit. Portia and Nerissa forgive their husbands because they recognize that Bassanio and Gratiano did not betray their trust by giving the rings to the "young doctor"; their intent was to reward perceived kindness. This act of forgiveness highlights the play's theme of considering intentions when judging actions.

The focus on the letter and spirit of the law depicted in The Merchant of Venice is not unique to Shakespeare's era. Even today, we recognize that laws are essential to prevent chaos and maintain peace and order. However, we also understand that no law can foresee every possible situation and intention. Simultaneously, we realize that creating an excessive number of laws to address every scenario would undermine our freedom. The solution to this issue is to apply each law with common sense, always keeping in mind the spirit or intent behind its creation.

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