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04.The Merchant of Venice
a.The Merchant of Venice is a play of William Shakespeare.
i.It eulogizes the friendship between Antonio and Bassanio, idealizing Portia as a heroine of great beauty, wit and loyalty, and exposing the insatiable greed and brutality of the Jew represented by Shylock.
ii.But people today tend to regard the play as a satire of the Christian's hypocrisy and their false standards, their cunning ways of pursuing worldliness and their unreasoning prejudice against Jews. The allusion “pound of flesh" comes from this comedy.
b.The first theme of this work is justice versus mercy.
i.The play suggests that like Portia, all men must be merciful although human mercy should follow the divine mercy. Portia’s appeal to Shylock at a great length shows her Christian patience, mercy, and generosity in contrast to Shylock' s Jewish disobedience, inhumanity, and hatred from revenge.
ii.Actually, it implies an irony here of an injustice for the Christian mercy: a forced conversion and monetary punishment are believed as necessary in order to regain harmony for the Christian world.
c.The second theme of this work is material values versus love, or friendship.
i.The play shows that true love and friendship are much more worthwhile and commendable than money and material values.
ii.Antonio would like to sacrifice his life for his friend ' s love while Shylock, the wealthy merchant, even can not tell which is more important for him---his daughter or his money. The latter is the very embodiment of the corrupting influence of gold and money.
iii.Finally love and virtue overcome greed, cruelty, hatred and revenge as Shylock gets punished, Antonio regains his ships and lovers win their true love.
d.Shylock is a Jewish usurer who has been at odds with Antonio because of the competition and discrimination he has suffered at his hands.
i.Shylock portrays an archetype of vice. He is a villain. And he is grotesque, malicious, cruel, vindictive, and subtle and complex in emotional makeup. When Antonio borrows money from him, the Jew decides to loan him but asks him to sign a bond that demands a pound of flesh from him if he fails to pay it back. And the demand for a pound of flesh shows the cruel feature of Shylock.
ii.But he is also a character who evokes sympathy. Shylock is the victim of racial discrimination. But he is courageous in the face of adversity. When at court and in front of a devastating defeat, Shylock behaves not as a coward and loser. He fights back though he knows his doom is sealed. His loud lamentation at court is a moving show of his “undefeated”mindset. But we should know that Shylock is essentially a malicious man.
