7Race



Merchant of Venice - Race
Shakespeare's London had a large population of resident aliens, mainly artisans and merchants and their families from Portugal, Italy, Spain, Germany, and France. They were accorded some legal and economic protection by the government but were not always welcomed by the government or the people.

Medieval England's Jewish population, the recurrent object of persecution, extortion and massacre, had been officially expelled by King Edward I in 1290, but Elizabethan England (Shakespeare's time) had a tiny number of Jews or Jewish converts to Christianity who were treated with suspicion and hostility. Few if any of Shakepeare's contemporaries (people living in his time) would have encountered on English soil Jews who openly practised their religion.

Shakepeare's England also had a small African population whose skin colour was the subject of debate. Elizabethans frequently regarded blackness as a physical defect and treated black people as a kind of curiosity. In Merchant of Venice, the Prince of Morocco would have been dark skinned. Note in the film the way Portia is kind of stunned and surprised by the behaviour of the prince. She seems amused more than anything else.

The word "Jew" echoes throughout The Merchant of Venice. The play has generated controversy for centuries. Is it anti-semitic? Are the Christians right to call Shylock (the Jewish moneylender) a "devil", an "inexorable dog" (cur) or is he just the understandably resentful victim of their racism? Perhaps these questions are more important for us now than for Shakespeare because of the Nazi and other forms of genocide. Nevertheless, the biblical story of the betrayal of Jesus by the Jewish people seems more important then than now. There were even false stories that Jewish people were responsible for the black plague because they supposedly poisoned water wells.

As a town of traders, Venice was full of foreigners: turks, Jews, Arabs, Africans, Christians of various nationalities. By 16th century standards, the city was unusually tolerant of different peoples. This was intimately linked to the city's wealth; its legal guarantees of fair treatment were designed to keep its markets running smoothly.

As Antonio tells Solanio "The Duke cannot deny the course of law,/For the commodity that strangers have/With us in Venice, if it be denied,/Will much impeach the justice of the state,/Since that the trade and profit of the city/Conisteth of all nations." (Act 3, Scene 3, lines 26-31).

The Christian's generosity, grace and self assurance have a racist tinge. The good friend, yet depressed Antonio, proudly acknowledges kicking and spitting on Shylock. The charming Portia rejoices in the failure of her black suitor to choose the correct casket: "Let all of his complexion [skin colour] choose me so." (Act 2, Scene 7, line 79). That is, he chooses wrong and she is glad he did.

Shylock, unable to trust to love and generosity, relies instead on legally enforceable promises and networks of mutual need. He tends not to spend but to conserve his wealth. He is an isolated figure, shunned by his daughter, abandoned by his servant. He has little reason to be generous with the Christians who despise him, and every reason to believe that he cannot depend on others to rescue him from misfortune.

The judgement upon Shylock at the end of the trial has disturbed many critics and audiences. After the Christians have what they want, Portia seems to be taking the revenge that she had previously deplored. Her legal ground is provided by a previously unmentioned law against any alien who plots the death of a Venetian citizen. The law in which Shylock trusted, because it seemed to provide a refuge from prejudice, turns out to have predjudice embeded in it from the start. In this respect, it resembles the casket test - everybody seems to get the same chance, but in fact the test is weighted toward the insider.