The Merchant of Venice I

1. The Merchant of Venice I Dating: 1597-98, some two or three years after MND. No fairies, comic mechanicals; rather the hard-headed world of trade, money-lending, law. Even Bassanio’s motivation: “In Belmont is a lady richly left.” Even conclusion of love story threatens nightmare: Portia: “Since he hath got the jewel I loved . . .” V, I , 224. The “Tragedy of Shylock” embedded in the comedy.

2. The interpretive challenge of the play: • After the Holocaust, or Shoah, any anti-Semitism must take on a different meaning for our world. • So any modern production must mean differently from what the play meant to Elizabethans. • More than any other of Shakespeare’s plays, we see changes, alterations of meaning. • But play itself seems to suspend contradictory meanings. • Thus a wonderful test case of what we might mean by “classic.”

3. Shylock and anti-Semitism • How did Elizabethans understand Judaism? • Few Jews in Elizabethan London – they had been expelled three centuries earlier. But doubtless some in London. • Usury and moneylending. • Case of Rodrigo Lopez in 1593, a converso Portuguese Jew. • Marlowe’s The Jew of Malta. Barrabas as villain.

4. Interpretive challenge of Shylock • How to interpret anti-Semitism historically? • Anti-Semitism of Gratiano. • But also of Antonio and Bassanio. • Shylock’s hatred of Antonio: I, 3, 38ff. • Shylock in court scene. • Shylock’s “conversion” at end of court scene.

5. Shylock as oppositional figure • Antonio’s generosity vs. Shylock’s usury. • Shylock as figure of locks, keys, bonds. • Shylock as “heavy” father – like Egeus in MND. • Wants to kill Antonio. • Genre: comedy drives out the villain.

6. But the logic of Shylock’s position • “Signor Antonio, many a time and oft . . .” I, 3, 103. • Jewish money-lending as a system within Christian economy. • The logic of interest. • Charging of interest up to 10% legal in England. • “Usury”.

7. Shylock’s initial intent? • “I hate him for he is a Christian.” I, 3, 39ff. • Do we know what does he intend in “this merry bond”? Simply humiliation?

8. “A wilderness of monkeys” • Shakespeare’s “narrativizes” Shylock’s hatred. • Jessica’s elopement, II, 6. • Solanio’s mockery of Shylock, II, 9: “my daughter, oh my ducats, my daughter.” • Salarino and Solanio’s taunting of Shylock, III, 1, 21ff. • “what’s his reason? I am a Jew.” • His bitterness at Jessica’s betrayal. • “It was my turquoise; I had it of Leah when I was a bachelor. I would not have given it for a wilderness of monkeys.”

9. Merchant as a play of ideas • Reinserting Shylock into the larger play. • Shylock as part of the Venetian system. • His opposition to Antonio structural. • But he undergirds the Venetian economy. • Bassanio in Belmont depends on Shylock’s money. • Isn’t Shylock absolutely right about the contradictions in Venetian/Christian economy? • Venetian law must underwrite Shylock’s bond – otherwise?

10. The bond • 3,000 ducats for 3 months, no interest. • But default means 1 pound of flesh. • Flesh, death, becomes equal to the interest? • Pay or you die: Antonio takes this risk. • “Merry bond” turns unmerry. • What’s missing on both sides?

11. Shylock and Portia/Balthasar • “Which is the merchant here and which the Jew.” IV, 1 172. • “Then the Jew must be merciful.” • Why? • “The quality of mercy is not strained . . .” • Self-annihilation of absolute justice – this necessitates mercy. • Absolute denial of mercy – no physician standing by.

12. Justice and Mercy • Denial of mercy leads to Shylock’s undoing. • Is he shown mercy? • His “conversion”. • Does Elizabethan unfamiliarity with Judaism allows this as mercy? • Idea consuming character at this point? • No more heard of Shylock until Nerissa’s letter at end of play.

13. But this leads to the “ring plot”. • How does the ring plot connect to the bond plot? • And how is Belmont different from Venice?