Who was Portia and how did Bassanio know he was a welcome suitor?
Portia was a wealthy noblewoman who lived in Belmont. It was made known she was going to inherit a sizable fortune which made her a desirable candidate for marriage. In order to accommodate all the suitors vying for her hand, a system was devised so that potential husbands had to choose from one of three caskets, made of god, silver and lead. Each casket contains a poetic message that is read aloud once they are opened. Bassanio is welcomed as a suitor because when the two meet for the first time Portia reacts favorably and he notes that she looks at him with interest.
How does Bassanio know he is a welcome suitor in The Merchant of Venice?
In Shakespeare's play The Merchant of Venice, Bassanio is in love with the beautiful lady Portia. He feels that he must make expensive gestures to win Portia's love, not realizing that she already loves him. Portia is speaking to her maid, Nerissa, early in the play about how she dislikes all of her current suitors and how much she enjoyed a previous visit from Bassanio:
NERISSA: Do you not remember, lady, in your father's time, a
Venetian, a scholar and a soldier, that came hither
in company of the Marquis of Montferrat?
PORTIA: Yes, yes, it was Bassanio; as I think, he was so called.
NERISSA: True, madam: he, of all the men that ever my foolish
eyes looked upon, was the best deserving a fair lady.
PORTIA: I remember him well, and I remember him worthy of
thy praise.
Meanwhile, her current suitors try to win Portia's hand by passing a strange test her father mandated in his will: anyone who wishes to marry Portia must choose one of three caskets (gold, silver, and lead). If he chooses the casket which contains Portia's portrait, he can marry her; otherwise, he must leave. No suitor has yet passed this test, and there are some scenes showing suitors picking the wrong caskets (gold and silver). Portia is very tired of this whole charade, so when Bassanio arrives at her house to declare his love and try the test, she is sad, as she doesn't want to lose the possibility of marrying him:
PORTIA: I pray you, tarry: pause a day or two
Before you hazard; for, in choosing wrong,
I lose your company: therefore forbear awhile . . .
I would detain you here some month or two
Before you venture for me.
Bassanio nevertheless is determined to try, saying "Let me choose / For as I am, I live upon the rack," tormented by his love for Portia. Portia very reluctantly agrees to let him try, but "with much, much more dismay / I view the fight than thou that makest the fray."
To their joy, Bassanio passes the test by choosing the casket with Portia's portrait inside—the lead casket which the other suitors automatically passed over in favor of the gold and silver caskets. Bassanio is not taken in by the more expensive caskets, indeed he reasons:
ornament is but the guiled shore
To a most dangerous sea . . .
The seeming truth which cunning times put on
To entrap the wisest. Therefore, thou gaudy gold,
Hard food for Midas, I will none of thee;
Nor none of thee, thou pale and common drudge [silver]
'Tween man and man: but thou, thou meagre lead,
Which rather threatenest than dost promise aught,
Thy paleness moves me more than eloquence;
And here choose I; joy be the consequence!
Bassanio is not deceived by appearances but believes true beauty is more than mere outward spectacle. He is correct, and he wins Portia's hand in marriage.
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