A Response to The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare
Romantic Comedies typically follow certain conventions; the story often uses this basic outline: boy meets girl, boy loses girl, and boy gets girl back. Shakespeare’s comedy The Merchant of Venice not only contains the expected conventions and devices, but it also complicates those conventions, making the “happy ending” a little less happy and a little more bittersweet. Antonio and Lancelot play the prototypical Crafty Slave (a.k.a. the sidekick) characters. Antonio helps Bassanio reach Portia, and Lancelot helps Jessica elope with Lorenzo. In Act I, scene I Bassanio asks to borrow money from Antonio in order to travel to Belmont and win Portia’s hand in marriage. Antonio says, “Neither have I money nor commodity / To raise a present sum. Therefore go forth: / Try what my credit can in Venice do” (I.I.185-7). Then, Bassanio uses Antonio’s name to receive funds from Shylock, which allows him to travel to Belmont for Portia. A second Crafty Slave, Lancelot, acts as a messenger between Jessica and Lorenzo, and he also helps to divert Shylock’s attention while Jessica escapes from her father’s house. In an aside to Jessica, Lancelot whispers, “Mistress, look out at window for all this. / There will come a Christian by” (II.V. 42-3). These two sidekicks help couples come together in marriage during the play, like similar characters do in other romantic comedies.
The Merchant of Venice also features Blocking Figures, who work to separate couples during the play. Portia’s father—one of the Blocking Figures even in death—wrote in his will that her suitors must choose between three caskets, and only one of the caskets results in a marriage with Portia. This task creates an obstacle that Bassanio must overcome in his pursuit of Portia. Jessica’s father, Shylock, plays the major Blocking Figure in the play. He does not want Jessica to marry Lorenzo: “Well, Jessica, go in. / … / Do as I bid you. Shut doors after you” (II.V.52-4). He would rather keep her locked away in the house with the rest of his valuables. The debt that Antonio owes Shylock comes between the two couples in Belmont (Portia/Bassanio and Nerissa/Gratiano). Portia tells Bassanio, “For never shall you lie by Portia’s side / With an unquiet soul” (III.III.319-320); Portia sends Bassanio away with Antonio after their marriage so that he may pay Shylock back.
A father acting as a Blocking Figure creates a generational divide that is typically seen in romantic comedies. The younger generation prevails in the end; in this case, the younger generation defeats Shylock (the older generation) at the trial. Another common element of romantic comedies that appears in The Merchant of Venice is marriage. All of the couples (Portia and Bassanio, Nerissa and Gratiano, and Jessica and Lorenzo) get married during the play. The customary Miracle Recognition—luck to the point that realism breaks down—of romantic comedies occurs when Portia and Nerissa restore the rings to their husbands and reveal themselves as the doctor and his clerk: “There you shall find that Portia was the doctor, / Nerissa there, her clerk” (V.I.288-9). Shakespeare fulfills the expected patterns and customs of romantic comedy (Crafty Slave, Blocking Figure, marriage, Miracle Recognition) in The Merchant of Venice.
However, the play does not always provide the audience with the typical carefree happy ending. There are a number of reasons that The Merchant of Venice could leave audiences uneasy, one of which relates to marriage. Portia and Nerissa gave Bassanio and Gratiano rings at their weddings that symbolized their love. In Act III, scene II Portia explains, “I give them with this ring, / Which, when you part from, lose, or give away, Let it presage the ruin of your love, / And be my vantage to exclaim on you” (III.II.175-8). At the end of the play, actors may portray Portia and Nerissa as genuinely upset about the “loss” of the rings. The betrayal by Bassanio and Gratiano removes the possibility for an unambiguous and simple happily ever after—which is often the case in Shakespeare’s work.
Shylock, as the Blocking Figure, does not entirely fit into the category of villain; the audience may feel sympathy or pity for him by the end of the play. Shylock seems to fall somewhere between victim and villain. At the trial, he says, “[I swore] / To have the due and forfeit of my bond” (IV.I.38). On one hand, he does demand justice—the pound of flesh—and refuse the money that they initially offer him. Portia, as the doctor, asks Shylock multiple times to show mercy to Antonio. On the other hand, she forbids him from shedding Antonio’s blood as he takes his pound of flesh. She cheats Shylock out of the money that Antonio owes him. Portia humiliates Shylock at the trial as well. Portia and Antonio agree that Shylock must forfeit his estate and become a Christian: “Nay, take my life and all. Pardon not that. / … / … you take my life / When you do take the means whereby I live” (IV.I.390-3). Shylock experiences the loss of his daughter, his livelihood, his religion, and his pride during the play. His suffering is very human, and it makes the audience uneasy about casting him absolutely as the villain: “Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions” (III.I.58-9)? Shylock’s character is in the gray area; Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice does not present things as black and white. Concepts like good and bad, right and wrong, or victim and villain are ambiguous and complicated in the play.
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