The Merchant of Venice was written sometime between 1596 and 1598. Its genre has come under fire because while it sort of meets all the requirements to be a comedy, it is a ‘problem play’, a play that raises more questions than it answers (Truxler Coleman, 1992). Some also have trouble calling it a comedy because of its inherent anti-Semitism. The Merchant of Venice is set in in the cultural melting pot of Venice as well as in Belmont. The role of Venice as a setting is interesting because it was supposedly more religiously and racially tolerant place (Chambers, 1970) and Jewish people were allowed to live in Venice during Shakespearean times , unlike in England.
In 1290, after centuries of persecution of the Jews in England, Edward I declared an Edict of Expulsion, banishing all Jews from England. Jews were completely expelled until 1657 (Shapiro, 1996). This means that, unlike Catholicism in Othello, the convergence of England to a Jewish state was not a fear in English eyes. However, because there were no Jews in England it is unlikely that most people in England during the time in which Shakespeare wrote Merchant of Venice had even met a Jewish person, Shakespeare included, so all most knew about the Jews came from stereotypes of the time. The misconception that Jewish people had killed Christ, the myth of Jewish ritual murder and blood libel, and other ‘anti-Semitic canards’, defined as “unfounded rumours” in relation to Jewish people (Merriam Webster online), were in circulation during this time (Shapiro, 1996). This is evident in the play, as Shylock demands a blood libel from Antonio for his debt. It is especially evil because Shylock evidently does not care about getting the money; he just really wants to gruesomely murd...
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... Guide to Reading Plays. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2002. Print.
"Moor" Encyclopedia Britannica Online. Encyclopedia Britannica. Web.
"Mortality play" Encyclopedia Britannica Online. Encyclopedia Britannica. Web.
Orkin, Martin. "Othello and the 'Plain Face' of Racism." Shakespeare Quarterly Summer 1987: 166-88. Web.
"Othello" Encyclopedia Britannica Online. Encyclopedia Britannica. Web.
Shakespeare, William, Stanley Wells, and Gary Taylor. "The Merchant of Venice." The Oxford Shakespeare: The Complete Works. 2nd ed. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1998. Print.
Shakespeare, William, Stanley Wells, and Gary Taylor. "Othello." The Oxford Shakespeare: The Complete Works. 2nd ed. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1998. Print.
Shapiro, James. Shakespeare and the Jews. New York: Columbia UP, 1996. Print.
West, Robert Hunter. The Christianness of Othello. N.p.: Shakespeare Association of America, 1964. Print.
Shakespeare, William. The Tragedy of Othello: The Moor of Venice. Ed. Barbara A. Mowat and Paul Werstine. New York; Washington Square Press, 1993.
Kernan, Alvin. “Othello: and Introduction.” Shakespeare: The Tragedies. Ed. Alfred Harbage. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall Inc., 1964.
Races were viewed differently during the past, specifically the Elizabethan era. It was unexpected for the readers when they discovered the race of Othello. The protagonist, or the “good guy”, was usually portrayed as a light-skinned character in literature works. However, the main character in the play Othello was a black army general who is powerful and well respected by other characters. The critic G.K. Hunter looked further into the race of Othello and discovered the difference of races during the Elizabethans, “Hunter reviews the notions Elizabethans held about foreigners in general and blacks in particular, finding that there existed a widespread association of blacks with sin, wickednes...
Shakespeare, William. “The Tragedy of Othello the Moor of Venice.” The Norton Anthology of World Masterpieces.
Clark, W. G. and Wright, W. Aldis , ed. The Complete Works of William Shakespeare. Vol. 1. New York: Nelson-Doubleday
Shakespeare, William. Othello. Ed. Barbara A. Mowat and Paul Werstine. New York: Simon & Schuster Paperbacks, 2009. Print
Shakespeare, William. Othello. Ed. Barbara A. Mowat and Paul Werstine. New York: Simon & Schuster Paperbacks, 2009. Print
Shakespeare, William. The Tempest. The Riverside Shakespeare. Ed. G. Blakemore Evans, et. al. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1974.
Orkin, Martin. “Othello and the “plain face” Of Racism.” 2nd ed. Vol. 38. N.p.: n.p., n.d. 166-88. Shakespeare Quarterly. Folger Shakespeare Library in Association with George Washington University, Summer 1987. Web. 12 Mar. 2014. .
Shakespeare, William. The Norton Shakespear. Othello. Dir. Grenblatt, Cohen, Howard, and Eisaman Maus. (second ed.) New York. 2008.
In the Sixteenth century, as we see clearly from Othello and other works of both Shakespeare and Cinthio's original version of Othello, race was a topic of great debate and discussion. Today, in the twenty-first century the debate retains its controversy and passion. However, attitudes towards race have taken a dramatic turn during the last century. In the developed world people are now living in an increasingly cosmopolitan society would undoubtedly be more tolerant and would reject or even be offended by racial discrimination to any person or sections of the community. Openly 'racist' people today are seen as outcasts. Taking this into account, the way a modern audience would react to race and racism in Othello is dependent upon the way in which that modern audience would interpret 'Othello'. This prompts the questions of what sort of message Shakespeare wanted to send to his audience and was Othello the moor portrayed as a tragic hero or did his character eventually come to resemble the prejudices of which he was a victim. Shakespeare also discusses the issue of race with other characters such as the hateful Iago and the prejudices hidden deep in Barbantio.
Shakespeare, William. The Tempest. The Norton Shakespeare. Ed. Greenblatt, Stephen. New York: W.W. Norton & Co. Inc., 1997.
Shakespeare, William. "The Tragedy of Othello: The Moor of Venice." The Signet Classic Shakespeare. Ed. Alvin Kernan. New York: Penguin Putnam, 1998.
In "The Merchant Of Venice." English Literary Renaissance 34.3 (2004): 286-305. Shakespeare, William, Barbara A. Mowat, and Paul Werstine. The Merchant of Venice. New York: Washington Square, 1992.