Squaring the Circle: The Role of the Trials

The Merchant of Venice presents a world in conflict in which the characters need to navigate between opposing and conflicting values.  They need to attend to their romantic interests as well as their financial and legal obligations, to balance justice and mercy, to juggle their friends and their lovers. Each of the three trials in the play (the trial of the caskets, the trial of the contract of the pound of flesh and the trial of the rings)  is an attempt to resolve these dilemmas.  Each trial confronts a seemingly irresoluble conflict -- only to miraculously solve the problem.  In the world of comedy, we can have our cake and eat it, too.

Choose ONE of the trials.  What are the values at stake?  How is the conflict resolved?  What is this trial telling us the nature of these values?  Are they really conflicting?  Is there a strategy to resolve the problem?  Or is it only in the never, never land of the play that we can ever hope to square the circle?

Shylock: Villain or Victim?

The character of Shylock has fascinated actors, audiences and scholars for generations.  On the one hand he exhibits stereotypical characteristics of the villainous "Jew": he is obsessed with money, he is an implacable enemy of his Christian neighbors, and he insists on following the law even when common sense dictates mercy and pity.  On the other hand he is shown to be himself the victim of the prejudice and cruelty of his Christian  neighbors.  No better evidence for Shylock's victimhood and the plays portrayal of his humanity is his speech from Act 3, Scene 5.  As his Christian neighbors question his pursuing his rights in taking a pound of Antonio's flesh, Shylock retorts:

     I am a Jew.  Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions,
     senses, affections, passions? Fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons,
     subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by
     the same winter and summer as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed?
     If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die?  And if you wrong
     us, shall we not revenge? (3. 1. 57-66).

What do you think?  From your reading of the play is Shylock supposed to be a villain or victim (or perhaps a bit of both)?  Is he a  Jewish stereotype or a fully developed character that happens to be Jewish or somewhere in between?  What is your take on the character of Shylock?

"In truth I know it is a sin to be a mocker": Comedy, Mockery and the Outsider

In Act 1, Scene 2 of  The Merchant of Venice Portia complains about her potential suitors to Nerissa.  Although she admits that "In truth I know it is a sin to be a mocker"(1.2.57), that admission doesn't prevent her mocking the foibles of her suitors to great comic effect. Her suitors are all foreign-born outsiders who fail to conform to the proper etiquette and standards of Belmont (and presumably to Shakespeare's audience as well).  One way Shakespeare's comedy operates seems to be to expose and satirize the outsider (not unlike some television sitcoms like The Big Bang Theory that satirizes geeks, another outside group)

What about the other outsiders in this play such as Morocco, Shylock and perhaps even Portia herself?  Are they too held up to ridicule for refusing to conform to conventional norms?  Are they merely stereotypical figures (the Black African, the Jew, the Single Woman) that serve as the butt of the play's jokes?  Or is there something else going on?  Do these characters have a different role in the play?  Do they rise above being a stereotype?

Amor Vincit Omnia?

In Act 1, Scene 1 of The Merchant of Venice Bassanio finds himself in trouble: He is in debt up to his ears and he needs to escape his creditors.  His plan is to ask the person whom he owes the most to lend him even more money for a new "get rich quick" scheme.  As he explains to Antonio:

                              But my chief care
     Is to come fairly off from the great debts
     Wherein my time, something too prodigal,
     Hath left me gaged.  To you, Antonio,
     I owe the most in money and in love,
     And from your love I have a warranty
     To unburden all my plots and purposes
     How to get clear of all the debts I owe. . .
     I owe you much, and, like a willful youth,
     That which I owe is lost.  But if you please
     To shoot another arrow the self way
     Which you did shoot the first, I do not doubt,
     As I will watch the aim, or to find both
     Or bring your latter hazard back again,
     And thankfully rest debtor for the first. (1.1.134-41;153-9)

Notice how Bassanio characters his relationship to Antonio.  They have a bond of "money" and "love" and their interaction is both affectionate and financial.  This interconnection of money and love further emerges when Bassanio revels his scheme to erase his debts: to marry Portia and her fortune.

Is Bassanio "in love" with Portia or is he just "using" her to pay his debts?  Is he really a friend of Antonio or just his "gravy train"?  Or is it more complicated?  What is this play saying about the values of money and love?  Are the two opposing values?  Is one more important than the other?  Does, as the saying goes, "love conquer all"?

The Joker vs Richard III: Evil in Shakespeare and Popular Culture

The movie The Dark Knight stages an epic battle between the forces of good (as represented by Batman) and the forces of evil (as represented by the Joker).  Much like Richard III, the Joker is the embodiment of evil.  Both characters are physically, if not emotionally deformed.  Both characters scheme and deceive to gain power over others.  They both are willing to use violence and murder to achieve their ends.  Yet, there are also significant differences between these two characters.  Do these differences make a difference?  Is one of these characters a more realistic portrayal of evil?  Does one of these texts demonstrate a more insightful understanding of evil, its nature, its sources, it consequences?  Or chose another exemplar of evil from popular culture (such as Hannibal Lector from Silence of the Lambs or Tony Soprano from The Sopranos or Walter White from Breaking Bad).  Does the portrayal of evil differ from Shakespeare's in significant ways? Is it more or less valid than Richard III?  Who understands evil better, Shakespeare or popular culture?

"O Coward Conscience"

The night before the Battle of Bosworth Field, Richard has a dream in which he is tormented by all the people he had killed to achieve and secure his throne.  Upon awaking he exclaims: "O coward conscience, how dost thou afflict me!"(5.3.191).  In the rest of the speech Richard argues with himself over his guilt in the murders -- and whether he should be pitied.  Consider as well the speech of the Second Murderer about conscience in Act 1, Scene 4.  When the Second Murderer feels a spasm of conscience and hesitates to carry out the murder of Clarence he complains about it;
      I'll not meddle with it.  It makes a man a
     coward: a man cannot steal but it accuseth
     him; a man cannot swear but it checks him; a man
     cannot lie with his neighbor's wife but it detects
     him (1. 4. 139-42).
In fact that Murderer does not participate in the murder or even the rewards of the deed. Given the many acts of treachery, deceit and murder in this play, what is the play saying about conscience and morality?  Is it an impediment to success?  A necessary bulwark against immorality?  Important but ineffective?  Effective but problematic?  Are these two speeches in agreement -- or this a debate across the acts of the play and social classes of the characters?  What the point of "coward conscience"?

Spiders and Tigers and Boars -- Oh My!

The enemies of Richard III -- and there are many of them in this play -- often compare him to an animal.  Anne, a widow by Richard's hand (and later his wife) taunts him by saying "Never hung poison on a fouler toad"(1.2.161). Queen Margaret, widow of Henry VI who was also killed by Richard, warns her replacement about him: "Why strew'st thou sugar on that bottled spider, / Whose deadly web ensnareth thee about?" (1.3.256-7).  Later she warns Buckingham: "O Buckingham, take heed of yonder dog!/Look when he fawns, he bites; and when he bites, / His venom tooth will rankle to the death." (1.3. 308-10).  Queen Elizabeth, on hearing that her brother and son have been imprisoned by Gloucester, exclaims, "Ah me! I see the ruin of my house. /  The tiger now hath seized the gentle hind"(2.4.54-55).  What is going on with all these animal metaphors?  Is there a pattern?  A deeper significance? Is it telling us something important about Richard's character?  Or is there an irony her (since it is the language of his enemies)?  What is the purpose of animal imagery?

Politics, Privilege, Power

In Richard III various characters claim and discuss various rights and privileges that they do or should possess.  Queen Margaret, the widow of Henry VI, tells the current queen,"
This sorrow that I have by rights is yours, / And all the pleasures you usurp are mind"(1.3.178-9).  Richard complains (before becoming king) that

      . . . The world is grown so bad
     That wrens make prey where eagles dare not perch.
     Since every Jack became a gentleman,
     There's many a gentle person made a Jack (1.3.71-4).

Each of these characters asserts a world in which each possesses a right to rule. Yet, the various characters who profess and utilize these rights and privilege acquire them through treachery, deceit and often murder.  Consider how Edward the current king, obtained the throne.  His brother Richard, acting on his behalf, murdered the previous king and his son.  His other brother, Clarence, is also implicated in the death of Edward, despite taking a vow to defend the king and his family.  What is this play saying about political power?  How is it related to justice or morality?  Does might make right?