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Merchant Of Venice: Shylock the Antagonist?
In The Merchant of Venice, by William Shakespeare, there appears Shylock.
He is a Jew, that much we are told in the cast list. But, as the play
unfolds Shylock is seen to be the villian. He is protrayed as being cold,
unbending, and evil. But is he? Is Shylock really the antagonist in this
play or can he also be viewed as persecuted individual who resorts to
revenge only after he has been pushed too far.
To fully understand the character of Shylock we must first look at
Elizabeathen attitudes towards Jews. In the sixteenth century Jews were
rarely if ever seen in England. In the Middle Ages Jews had fled to
England to escape persecution in France under the Normans. They were
granted charter in England by Henry I in return for a percentage of their
profits from trade and moneylending. It is here that the stereotype of
Jews lending money was started. Because of the tariffs placed on them by
the crown Jews took to charging high interest rates to secure profits for
themselves. Here we see echos of Shylock with his usury. Finally the Jews
were ordered out of England in 1254 by Edward I. They did not return to
England until the later half of the seventeenth century. (Lippman 3-4) Jews
were also viewed as devils by Elizabeathan audiences. Old stories
portrayed them as "blood-thirsty murders" that poisoned wells and killed
Christian children for their bizarre Passover ritu! als. (Stirling 2:1)
These were the stereotypes which Shakespeare's audience held in regard to
Jews. Shakespeare himself had never seen a Jew but he goes to great
lengths to humanize Shylock even while perpetuating the stereotype.
In Act 1:3, before Shylock ever says a word to Antonio, he lets the
audience know in an aside that he hates Antonio. He hates him for having
hindered him in business and for having humiliated him in public by
spitting on him and calling him names such as "dog" and "cutthroat Jew".
Shylock tells the audience he hopes to exact revenge on Antonio both for
his own humiliation and for the persecution that the Jews have long
suffered at the hands of the Christians. I hate him for he is a Christian;.
. . If I can catch him once upon the hip, I will feed fat the ancient
grudge I bear him.He hates our sacred nation . . . Curs‚d be my tribe if I
forgive him (I,iii,40-49) Shylock then tells Antonio that he wants to be
friends with him and will conclude the bond for a pound of flesh as a
"merry sport." In the second act, however, he still seems to bear a deep
grudge against the Christians, for he tells Jessica that he is going in
hate and not in friendship to dine with them. "But yet I'll go in hate to
feed upon the prodigal Christian. . . .I am right loath to go." (II,v,14-
16) After Jessica's elopment, Shylock suspects Bassanio and Antonio of
abetting her escape, and this suspicion increases Shylock's animosity
toward Antonio. We learn later in the play that Antonio has personally
rescued a number of debtors from Shylock's bonds when Antonio says "I oft
delievered from his forfeitures; Many that have made moan to me."
(III,iii,23-24) We also discover that Shylock cannot or will not explain
his reasons for demanding Antonio's flesh. "But say it is my humor," is
all the reason he is able to show. The sum of Shylock's motives for hatred
is gi! ven in the rarely quoted lines b efore the famous "Hath not a Jew
eyes": "He hath disgraced me, and hind'red me half a million; laughed at
my losses, mocked at my gains, thwarted my bargains, cooled my friends,
heated mine enemies_and what's his reason? I am a Jew." (III,i,49-54)
(Lippman 2)
Shylock himself is an alien in a society geared towards Christians. His
clothes, customs and race make him an object of scorn in Venetian society.
We as a modern audience are bound to feel some sympathy for him. When
Jessica runs away from home we realized that Shylock's most trusted prop
has failed him, he placed absolute confidence in his daughter with his
house and wealth. The fact that he cries out for his ducats as well as his
daughter should not obscure the sense of keen personal loss he feels. " I
say my daughter is my own flesh and blood." (III,i,34) We also see this
when Tubal tells Shylock that Jessica has traded one of his rings for a
monkey. Shylock's lamentation for his lost turquoise ring that he had "of
Leah when I was a batchelor," shows us that indeed he does have
sentimentality in him and he wouldn't have parted with that ring "for a
wilderness of monkeys." (III,i,110-113) Here Shakespeare attaches a small
snippet of humanity to a character seen as i! nhuman for the most part.
Howev er, our sympathy for Shylock does not reach its heighth until the
famous speech:
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? (III,i,54-59)
At this point in the play it seems that Shylock is no different from any
other man except for the fact that his religion has made him in outcast
from society. Our understanding of this fact does not lessen the horror we
feel at his cruelty towards Antonio, but we are able to remember that the
passion for revenge is a common human failing and not the unique
characteristics of a ferocious and inhuman monster as the Elizabeathans
believed. (Lippman 3)
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