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I read Merchant of Venice in school, and i kinda get it and kinda don't get. It suppose to be a comedy and i don't find it really funny, but it's kinda sad. I felt sorry for Shylock. Anyways, i just got a question to ask, what ideas does Merchant of Venice suggest about Justice and Mercy? It's a L.A thing i'm kinda stuck on. I got some ideas, but i'm abit lost. Hope you can help me, thanks alot.
hey poor person no1 has replied to your thread.
ok justice and mercy... well just explain about shylock not wanting to let antonio off on his bond. if he was was merciful he would but he doesnt want to.
the law says that shlyock should be allowed to cut a pound of antonio's flesh, but is this justice for whatever crime antonio commited?
There are many examples of justice and mercy in this play. Generally speaking, we can use this in Shylock's situation in MoV. Shylock insists that his bond be taken seriously and to the full extent of the law. Portia shows mercy by offering Shylock the chance to show mercy in (I believe) Act 4, Scene 1 (If this is wrong, it's at least the scene that takes place in court). Shylock continuously refusing, demanding that Antonio be forced to allow him to cut out the single pound of his flesh. Throughout this scene, Portia knows that she has a way of keeping Antonio from his death, but she chooses to show mercy, rather than inflict cold justice immediately upon Shylock, in order to give him a chance to redeem himself.
This entirely revolved around the notion of justice and mercy. Justice is cold, precise, unkind, and unfailing. Mercy may be difficult, and rough to handle, but it is warm, and forgiving.....If I had my notes, this may make a bit more sense, I think.
i say too much justice and too much mercy...
Too mcuh overall in the play? I rather like it.
Actually, I interpreted this scene a little differently. I believe that Portia went into the courtroom knowing Shylock would never give up his bond. It would have been obvious, right? He was very steadfast. I think she gave him so many chances because she knew that she could burn him with it later. She's playing with him, the way a cat plays with a mouse. The cat knows the mouse can never escpae, but also knows the mouse will never give up. She is batting Shylock back and forth, enjoying it.Quote:
Originally Posted by ¤dreamer¤
Well, surprisingly enough, my class recently had a lengthy discussion in regards to the mercy/justice vs. malice portrayed in this play...and this was my take on it:
I believe that there is little pure mercy portrayed in this play because often when "mercy" is bestowed, it is due to selfish and malicious reasons. Hence, I believe such selfish motives cause the mercy to be flawed and malicious. Basically, I believe that the act of mercy is often merely a guise to implement malice.
The one instance that I do believe mercy is implemented in the court scene is when the Duke says that he'll pardon Shylock from his sentence of being killed [Duke: "I pardon thee thy life before thou ask it" (IV.i.365)]. The duke does not seem to have any malicious intent in letting Shylock live in return for Shylock's goods. Therefore, I do believe that the Duke is merciful. However, I just want to mention that Duke's motivation is somewhat selfish for it seems like he wants to project himself as being better than Shylock, whom he claims is "an inhuman wretch, [u]ncapable of pity, void, and empty [f]rom any dram of mercy" (IV.i.4-5). However, there as mentioned earlier, this motivation does not have malicious intent and therefore I believe it is merciful.
I believe that the "mercy" bestowed by Portia is however not pure mercy, but in fact is a form of malicious revenge.
In the beginning, Portia comes off as being a fair judge for she confirms Shylock’s name, which makes her seem respectable and different from the overtly biased anti-Semitic audience who refuse to acknowledge Shylock’s name due to his lowly status [Portia: “Is your name Shylock?” (IV.i.172)]. Therefore, I thought she was going to be just and fair to Shylock. Yet, after reading it, I also believe that Portia was toying with Shylock like poetic justice stated because she seems to provide this elaborate speech filled with opportunities and reasons for Shylock to provide mercy. She seems to only provide these opportunities to seem like a fair judge who gave Shylock a fair trial. However, it should be duly noted that Portia did not want her husband to be eternally despondent, and thus her motive from the beginning was to somehow get Antonio out of the bond. For why else would she come to Venice from Belmont? Why not allow a true judge to impart judgment on the situation if she truly wanted a just and lawful judgment to be given? Like I stated earlier, it is because she wanted to save Antonio, and thus keep her spouse Bassanio happy and free from torment. The only way she could accomplish this was to either get Shylock to do it himself, or have Shylock go down. Since Shylock did not want to relieve Antonio of his judgment, she had to make Shylock fail. Portia is able to do this by the law by stating that the bond did not specify flesh and blood, and therefore Shylock was not able to take Antonio’s flesh. But Portia provides a counter sentence to Shylock in which she claims that Shylock is subject to die because he attempted to kill a citizen of Venice (even though Shylock was just lawfully abiding by the legal bond). This is where I believe Portia steps into the bounds of malice. Portia should have just stopped at letting Shylock go without the money and the flesh, but then she dishes out a new judgment that I believe is filled with malicious intent. She orders Shylock to be murdered. Hmm…after many minutes of pondering I came to the conclusion that the Duke’s claim that “thou shalt see the difference in our spirit” (IV.i.364) was complete bogus in regards to the difference between Portia and Shylock. We know that the premise of this court scene was about Antonio’s sentence to die. Now, Portia is sentencing Shylock to death. What truly is the difference between these two characters for I really see none? Both Portia and Shylock should have released their respective debtors from the sentence of death, but they didn’t. It could be argued that Portia is different from Shylock because she turns it over the Duke to handle (who does grant Shylock mercy). But, then the Duke turns it over to Antonio. So, Portia misses her opportunity to pardon Shylock from his judgment when she was in charge of the case because she was the one who imposed his death sentence! I’ve addressed the Duke’s stance, and so now lastly I’ll address Antonio’s.
Antonio I think has more malicious intent than Portia for he was Shylock’s target. Therefore, what may first seem as like a merciful pardon of Shylock’s life is quite the opposite for it is loaded with malevolence. Have you ever heard about a situation in which the victim desired to die than the live the lifestyle he or she was forced into? Well, if so, such a scenario fits quite nicely with what Shylock has to go through after Antonio imparts his judgment on Shylock. Antonio states that Shylock would have to become a Christian and to give all of his possessions to his daughter and her husband. By doing this, Antonio is shredding Shylock’s image even further for now Shylock has to in a sense pay the man who took his daughter away from (Ah, Antonio’s malicious intent of berating Shylock is revealed). Also, Antonio is making a devout Jew convert into a religion that he despised (Christians showed him no mercy when he walked on the streets. Antonio berated him and spat on him, etc. And now he has to be one of them. He has to change his lifestyle in terms of his diet and clothes. However, even by becoming a Christian, he will not be accepted due to his Jewish roots). Not only that, but by becoming a Christian, Shylock will not be able to use the practice of usury (charging interest on money-lending) to make a living! And it should be noted that Antonio hated Shylock’s practice of usury, and so he is taking revenge of Shylock for practicing usury (Ah, the malicious intent of revenge is revealed!). All in all, it seems that this judgment is quite harsh even in comparison to a death sentence. Shylock even makes this point for he states that “[y]ou take my house, when you do take the prop [t]hat doth sustain my house: you take my life [w]hen you do take the means whereby I live” (IV.i.371-373). Meaning, since Antonio takes away the means by which Shylock lives like his income source or his lifestyle, Antonio is essentially taking away Shylock’s life. Thus, the option of death is equal to the option Antonio is providing. Therefore, it doesn’t matter which Shylock chooses because either will lead to his demise. So, I definitely do not believe Antonio’s judgment is merciful at all because he is just providing him with another option of death. Therefore, the difference between Antonio and Shylock is not evident as well because both seek to cause each other some form of death whether it be literal or figurative.
In conclusion, after uncovering the visage of mercy, we see that the characters are not so different after all. Shylock sticks to his malicious intentions and make them very obvious to the audience. Others like Portia and Antonio cunningly use the guise of mercy to deliver malice and injustice to their opponents. Hence, I believe mercy and justice are concepts appropriate to the time period. During Shakespeare’s time, the Christian audience members would probably argue that pure mercy and justice were delivered to Shylock due to their societal and cultural beliefs (they were highly anti-Semitic and so they probably believed that Shylock got what he deserved). However, in a modern society, it is difficult for me to share their beliefs and therefore my interpretation is quite different than theirs. I believe that mercy was flawed, and thus that malice was more prevalent in the play. Yet, once again, it all depends on perspective and interpretation.
SORRY FOR THE LONG RANT! Hope that helped!
In your last paragraph you finally got to the knub of the problem with this play, that is how did Shakespeare intend us to feel towards Shylock. Should we pity him as a human being or revile him as a Jew. To do the latter would be more in tune with the society for which he wrote, but Shakespeare has created a Jew with feelings and thoughts that remind us he is a man, not merely a caricature. ( Compare him with Marlow's Jew of Malta)
This is remarkable considering the predjudices of the day. The play was written at a time when there were very few Jews in England, they were all expelled from the Kingdom in 1290. However stories of their "unholy" practises were rife. ( It was widely believed they slaughtered and ate Christian children)
Also there had recently been a scandal concerning the Queens physician,( Dr Rodrigues Lopez) who was discovered to be a Jew and was then accused and convicted of trying to poisen her.
So the Jews were the bogeymen of the age, and it makes Shylock a truely remarkable creation of shakespear,s.
I agree that justice and mercy and malice are all knotted up here. Portia speaks so eloquently about the quality of mercy, but she doesn't follow her own advice. When Shylock says okay, just give me the original 3000 ducats, she could stop there, but she takes it all the way to the full measure of the bond and then uses that bond to take Shylock down. Mercy? I think not. For all their talk of mercy, the Christians are hardly merciful. Portia also does not treat her husband very well with the whole ring scheme.
One thing to remember is that forcing Shylock to become Christian was considered a favor in Shakespeare's time. We would never consider such a thing today, but times are different now.