Mode and Structure in The Merchant of Venice
Author(s): Thomas H. Fujimura
Source: PMLA , Dec., 1966, Vol. 81, No. 7 (Dec., 1966), pp. 499-511
Published by: Modern Language Association
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/461206
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MODE AND STRUCTURE IN THE MERCHANT OF VENICE
BY THOMAS H. FUJIMURA
A THOUGH The Merchant of Venice ranks with
speare's skillful interweaving of the main stories,
Hamlet in theatrical popularity, it ranks low
in critical esteem. A play that is difficult to
symmetrical structure. What is involved here is a
they have not recognized the play's complex yet
classify, it is variously labeled tragi-comedy or
question of critical method: the old-fashioned
romantic comedy;' but neither label embraces
preoccupation with character, the current con-
nor harmonizes the seemingly disparate plots.
cern with imagery and style," or even Brown's
Further, the plots are often condemned as pre-
stress on theme does not take us to the heart of
posterous and unrelated to life ;2 and a fairly
the chief merit of the play in its "flesh-and-blood
the play. What is central to drama is action, and
the mode (romantic, realistic, ironic) which determines the structure of that action. And a
study of the mode and structure of The Merchant
of Venice indicates that in its architectonics and
in its communicated meaning it ranks as one of
characters" who triumph over the shortcomings
Shakespeare's great comedies.
common view is that the play is a fairy tale:
"There is no more reality in Shylock's bond and
the Lord of Belmont's will than in Jack and the
Beanstalk."3 Critics adopting such a position find
of the story,4 with emphasis on Shylock, who is
There are three "worlds" presented in the
sometimes regarded as the protagonist.5 The
play, each in its own mode; and these can be
approach to Shylock has been diverse, ranging
summed up as the world of Bassanio-Portia, the
from Stoll's notion of hiin as a comic butt in
world of Antonio, and the world of Shylock. The
terms of Elizabethan conventions to the view
first is romantic in its mode and non-realistic, the
that he is a tragic figure.6 Readers have shown a
second is realistic, and the third is ironic; further,
preoccupation with Shylock the Jew as scape-
1 See E. K. Chambers, Shakespeare: A Survey (London,
goat, stereotype, victim, or Elizabethan usurer;
1925), p. 111, for the designation of the play as tragi-comedy.
For the romantic label, see Tyrone Guthrie, intro. to The
usually this interest has taken a realistic turn,
with concern over questions of anti-Semitism and
the legality of the trial.7
The Merchant of Venice seems to lack a center
Merchant of Venice, ed. G. B. Harrison (London, 1954), p. 16.
2 John Palmer, Comic Characters of Shakespeare (London,
1946), p. 64; Hazelton Spencer, The Art and Life of William
Shakespeare (New York, 1940), p. 239.
3 Harley Granville-Barker, Prefaces to Shakespeare (Princeton, 1946), i, 335; see also Palmer, p. 54.
4 Thomas Marc Parrott, Shakespearean Comedy (New
York, 1949), p. 143; Granville-Barker, i, 335, 349.
of gravity; and critics threaten to capsize it by
leaning too far toward the fairy-tale approach or
toward emphasis on Shylock. Not surprisingly,
there has been some disaffection with the play.
G. B. Harrison expresses a common opinion when
he says of the play, "It lacks the sincerity and
the depth of the greater comedies.... The play
is a good tale admirably told, but no more."8 The
artistry of the play is questioned by J. M. Murry:
"What he [Shakespeare] did not, could not, and,
so far as we can see or guess, would not do, was to
attempt to make it an intellectually coherent
whole."9 Perhaps the best counter-argument to
this is J. R. Brown's idea of a thematic unity:
"The Merchant of Venice presents in human and
dramatic terms Shakespeare's ideal of love's
wealth, its abundant and sometimes embarrassing riches; it shows how this wealth is gained and
possessed by giving freely and joyfully; it shows
also how destructive the opposing possessiveness
can become, and how it can cause those who
traffic in love to fight blindly for their existence."10
But more needs to be said about the structural
unity of the play in relation to its meaning.
Though critics have paid tribute to Shake-
6 Cf. Toby Lelyveld, Shylock on the Stage (London, 1961),
p. 3; Norman T. Carrington, Shakespeare: The Merchant of
Venice (London, 1945), p. 10; C. B. Purdom, What Happens
in Shakespeare (London, 1963), p. 95.
6 Elmer Edgar Stoll, "Shylock," Shakespeare Studies (New
York, 1927). Typical of the second view is the statement that
Shylock is "that haunting figure that has grown steadily more
tragic with the years"-Harold C. Goddard, The Meaning of
Shakespeare (Chicago, 1951), p. 115; for similar views, see n.
49.
7 Samuel A. Tannenbaum, Shakespeare's The Merchant of
Venice: A Concise Bibliography (New York, 1941)-see sections on "Law and The Merchant of Venice," pp. 49-54, and
"Jews and The Merchant," pp. 54-58. See also Gerald Friedlander, Shakespeare and the Jew (London, 1921); Hermann
Sinsheimer, Shylock: The History of a Character or the Myth of
the Jew (London, 1947).
8 G. B. Harrison, Shakespeare: The Complete Works (New
York, 1948), p. 582. For the severest strictures on the artistry,
characters, ethics of the play, see Tannenbaum, p. vii.
9 John Middleton Murry, Shakespeare (London, 1936),
p. 192.
10 John Russell Brown, Shakespeare and IIis Comedies
(London, 1957), p. 74.
11 Cf. L. C. Knights, "On Some Contemporary Trends in
Shakespeare Criticism and Other Preliminary Considerations," Some Shakespearean Themes (London, 1959).
499
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500 Mode and Structure in "The Merchant of Venice"
each mode has its relevant type of character,
language, and dramatic action. The architectonic
skill of Shakespeare appears in the interweaving
and contrasting of these modes of action to express his theme or "philosophy." There is no one
main action, and it seems a critical error to set up
the casket or the bond story as the central action.'2 Rather it is through the dramatic interaction and contrast among the modes of action that
the total meaning of the play emerges.'3 Each of
the three worlds is distinct and unique. To some
extent, the world of Bassanio-Portia and the
world of Shylock are insulated against each
other, even hostile, and hence impervious to the
dominant mood of the other. Though Shakespeare has provided links like Launcelot, Gratiano, and Jessica, it is chiefly through Antonio's
world that we pass from one extreme to the other.
The significance of these worlds is revealed to us
only through their dramatic action, but this action is symbolic and ritualistic; hence, at its most
meaningful moments, we participate in an enactment that transcends mere plot.
These distinctions can perhaps best be clarified
by speaking in terms of three kinds of presentation, or what Northrop Frye calls "fictional
modes." Of the five kinds of modes discussed in
his Anatomy of Criticism, three are relevant for
The Merchant of Venice. On the highest level is
the Bassanio-Portia story, involving the casket
and the ring episodes; this is on the level of
romance. "If superior in degree to other men and
to his environment, the hero is the typical hero of
romance, whose actions are marvellous but who is
himself identified as a human being.... Here we
have moved . . . into legend, folk tale, mdrchen
. . ." On the middle level is Antonio: "If superior neither to other men nor to his environment,
the hero is one of us: we respond to a sense of his
common humanity, and demand from the poet
the same canons of probability that we find in
our own experience. This gives us the hero of the
low mimetic mode, of most comedy and of realistic fiction." At the lowest level is Shylock: "If
inferior in power or intelligence to ourselves, so
that we have the sense of looking down on a
scene of bondage, frustration, or absurdity, the
hero belongs to the ironic mode."''4 The three
worlds (or modes) of The Merchant of Venice are
thus the romantic, the realistic, and the ironic.
These three worlds are represented symbolically in the play by the three caskets, gold, silver,
and lead. It would not be inaccurate to speak of
the golden world of Bassanio-Portia, the silver
world of Antonio, and the leaden world of Shylock. The metals stand for the respective values
of these worlds, and thus characterize everything
from the outer manners and speech of these persons to their moral being. But paradoxically, as
the caskets demonstrate, one needs to distinguish
between the truly golden and what is gilded as
well as the truly leaden and the apparently
leaden. The action in these three worlds, in
different modes, is also characterized by differences in the acuity of the protagonists: thus
Bassanio triumphs through his power of penetration, Antonio experiences a comic anagnorisis,
and Shylock is defeated because his vision remains leaden and dull.
The characters in these three worlds are all
engaged in their own mythic encounter, the kind
of action being determined by the mode which
dominates. The intent of the total dramatic action is to affirm certain values and to reject certain others. The values in the play are generally
familiar, and to the extent that they are acceptable to us, we assume their universality; where
they are unfamiliar, we are either unmoved or
perturbed. The dramatic affirmation of these
values is what we usually call the statement of
the theme. This theme is implicit rather than
explicit, and is expressed through action, character, and dialogue; and thus not much is gained by
too specific a summation of what the play
means."5 But if we examine the values affirmed in
12 "The main structural unit is the casket plot . . ."-H.
Spencer, p. 243. "The Bond story, not the tale of the caskets,
is the backbone of The Merchant of Venice. . ."-H. B.
Charlton, Shakespearian Comedy (London, 1938), p. 125.
13 J. R. Brown is most conscious of Shakespeare's use of
contrast as a structural principle: "Shakespeare was constantly experimenting in order to find a comic form which
would present several characters or groups of characters in
relation and contrast with each other and which would conclude in a scene which brought these various elements into
some stable relationship" (p. 43). But Brown emphasizes
theme; he is not concerned with the use of contrast in dramatic modes.
14 Northrop Frye, Anatomy of Criticism (Princeton, 1957),
pp. 33-34.
15 J. R. Brown sums up some of the familiar "interpretations" of The Merchant of Venice: the play is about the contrast between appearance and reality, the contrast between
love and usury, the conflict between love and hate, etc.-The
Merchant of Venice, ed. John Russell Brown (Arden Shakespeare) (London, 1955), pp. xlix-liii. It is an allegory "of Justice and Mercy, of the Old Law and the New"-Nevill Coghill, "The Governing Idea," Shakespeare Quarterly (London,
1948), i, 9-17. "The central theme of the play ... [is] that of
Grace, the daughter of universal harmony, challenged by the
blind letter of the Law. . ."-Henri Fluchere, Shakespeare
and the Elizabethans (New York, 1956), pp. 191-192. The
play "shows that friendship may have greater strength than
love; that true love must be forgiving"-Hardin Craig, An
Interpretation of Shakespeare (New York, 1948), p. 117. "The
Merchant of Venice . .. is 'about' judgment, redemption and
mercy . . ."-Frank Kermode, "The Mature Comedies," in
Early Shakespeare, Stratford-upon-Avon Studies 3 (New
York, 1961), p. 224.
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Thomas
H.
Fusjimura
501
the play, we find them to be aristocratic, Pla-
right casket, and thus affirms the values implicit
tonic, spiritual, Christian, in contrast to what is
"vulgar," commercial, materialistic, and non-
in his golden world. The full meaning of this ac-
Christian. The range of these values is greater
than in most of Shakespeare's comedies; and
basic to the meaning, and hence structure, of the
play are certain metaphysical assumptions.
There are roughly four levels of existence, according to the Renaissance way of belief. There
is the empyreal heaven, with its order of grace
mode; that is, by adopting a realistic approach to
and providence; then the Garden of Eden; next
tion is often obscured by failure to grasp the
the world of romance, and thus confusing modes.
This confusion of modes is demonstrated in those
who apply a realistic moral standard to Bassanio;
to such critics, he is simply "a predatory young
gentleman" in debt, who wants to borrow more
money to go off and hunt an heiress.'7 The historical-realistic approach is equally inadequate in its
the world of nature that man is born into,
estimate of Bassanio as a typical Elizabethan
touched by the fall of man; and finally the level
aristocrat who marries for money according to
of sin, death, and corruption.'6 This is the meta-
the custom of the times.'8 At the other extreme, it
physical background of The Merchant of Venice;
is not enough to see in Bassanio the conventional
each level has its implicit mode and hierarchical
hero of a fairy tale, involved in "the winning of a
characteristics. At the highest level is the super-
wife by means of an irrational test," and succeed-
lunary world, "the floor of heaven," that Lorenzo
ing on his third try because this is what one ex-
refers to (v.i.58-63), with its stars moving in
celestial harmony and making the music of the
spheres which only "immortal souls" can hear;
this higher world, with its order, harmony, and
perfect love, is suggested through the imagery of
celestial music; it provides the most meaningful
background to the action. Below it is the sublunary world where we are clothed in "this
muddy vesture of decay," and cannot hear the
celestial music; this world embraces the Garden
of Eden, represented in the play by Belmont (the
symbolic fair mount with its man-made music
and harmony), and the world of tainted nature,
represented by Venice, with its commerce and
law. Finally, there is the level of sin, death, and
corruption, symbolized by Shylock, with his
hatred, usury, and dislike of music. This division
corresponds roughly to Dante's divisions: Hell
(Shylock), Purgatory proper (Antonio), and the
Garden of Eden (Portia-Bassanio), and Paradise.
Central to the Commedia and to The Merchant of
Venice is the moving power of divine love
(mercy), which gives form and meaning to human conduct; in each of the several worlds de-
pects in a fairy tale.'9 Bassanio and Portia are
more than a pair of attractive young lovers,
whose "function is to charm the eyes of the
audience by their youth and beauty, its ears by
the exquisite music of their lines."20
Bassanio needs to be accepted on the play's
own terms, as the hero of a romance, whose action affirms the idealistic-aristocratic values implicit in his world. The dramatic action involves
a quest to liberate a princess, at the same time to
prove the hero's worth, and finally to defeat the
enemy of the golden world. This involves progress, or upward movement, from Venice (the
world of commerce and law) to Belmont (the
ideal world of romance). As befits the romantic
hero, Bassanio expresses himself in language and
imagery suggestive of the high world he inhabits.
In fact, as Caroline Spurgeon points out, "Bassanio uses the greatest number of images," and
along with Portia accounts for nearly half the
picted we find characters who have adopted a
certain posture toward this central principle and
who thus, in an Aristotelian sense, realize their
true nature, this realization (or actualization)
shaping the form of the dramatic action.
Which makes her seat of Belmont Colchos' strond,
And many Jasons come in quest of her.
The least controversial of the three worlds in
the play is that of Bassanio-Portia, involving the
casket story and the ring episode, with its characteristically romantic action of success and
triumph. In the casket story, the almost ritualistic presentation retains in its purest form the
symbolic meaning of Bassanio's encounter: after
two "inferior" figures (surrogates for Shylock
and Antonio) have failed, Bassanio picks the
images in the play.2' Speaking of Portia, he
exclaims:
her sunny locks
Hang on her temples like a golden fleece,
(i.i. 1 69-1 72)22
16 Northrop Frye, "New Directions from Old," Fables of
Identity (New York, 1963), p. 63.
17 The Merchant of Venice, ed. Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch and
John Dover Wilson (Cambridge, Eng., 1926), pp. xxiv-xxv.
18 Helen P. Pettigrew, "Bassanio, the Elizabethan Lover,"
PQ, xvi (1937), 305; Arthur Sewell, Character and Society in
Shakespeare (Oxford, 1951), p. 42.
19 H. Spencer, p. 243.
20 Guthrie, intro. to The Merchant of Venice, ed. Harrison,
p. 16.
21 Caroline F. E. Spurgeon, Shakespeare's Imagery and
What It Tdls Us (Boston, 1958), p. 281.
22 See also iii.ii.240-241. The edition used is The Merchant
of Venice, ed. John Russell Brown (Arden) (London, 1955).
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502 Mode and Structure in "The Merchant of Venice"
The imagery of gold dominates, and in some respects Bassanio is a seeker of gold; but the wealth
he pursues is spiritual and moral, embodied in a
fair heiress, and touched with the magic beauty
of love.23 In the casket scene, Portia depicts him
as a veritable Hercules:
Now he goes
With no less presence, but with much more love
Than young Alcides, when he did redeem
The virgin tribute, paid by howling Troy
To the sea-monster: ...
... go H-lercules!
Live thou, I live-with much much more dismay,
I view the fight, than thou that mak'st the fray.
(iii.ii.53-57, 60-62)
The language appropriately moves toward what
Renaissance rhetoricians would describe as the
high style, but falls short of it since the speakers
belong to the world of romantic comedy rather
than of tragedy or epic.
Bassanio needs to be accepted as the hero of a
romantic comedy. There is considerable truth to
the view of Bassanio as an ideal Renaissance
lover, moved to make the right choice because he
understands the Renaissance concept of ideal
love in Platonic terms.24 But Bassanio is something more and something less than an ideal
Renaissance lover. He is the hero of a romantic
comedy; that is, a young man of considerable
spiritual, moral, intellectual, and physical excellence, subject to a few human failings, yet within
reach of true love and the Garden of Eden because his failings are not irredeemable.25 If he has
a fault, it is his prodigality, which he honorably
confesses; but this prodigality springs from a
generosity of spirit that does not reckon up material considerations, and it is set off favorably
against the miserliness of Shylock.26 The qualities
of the romantic hero are clearly set forth in the
contrast established between Bassanio and the
other suitors in Acts i and ii.
Those who do not respond to the mode in
which Bassanio is presented forget that he plays
the role of the hero who embarks upon a hazardous and romantic quest. Belmont is no ordinary
place, for ruling over it is the spirit of Portia's
father, a kind of Prospero, who seems to possess
nagical powers. Nor are the hazards merely
imaginary: the penalty for failure is an oath to remain single all one's life. If Bassanio is not quite
Parsifal coming to the Siege Perilous, he is still
the hero who comes to face the test of his merit,
and also to free the imprisoned princess. The
effect of Bassanio's wise choice is to liberate
Portia from her father's iron-clad will, which,
however wise, restrains her freedom. So joy and
love and magnanimity are liberated. Bassanio is
not only the receiver but the giver of happiness.
Portia is the genie incarcerated in a casket: her
"little body is aweary of this great world" at the
beginning, but she is happy at the end. Her union
with Bassanio frees her spirit, and the caustic
Portia27 gives way to the teasing but merciful
wife, whose virtue is in forgiving. Without Bassanio, she would never achieve the magnanimity
of spirit which is finally hers, but would wither
away in spinsterhood, with all its connotations of
sterility, both physical and spiritual. She is hence
as much the debtor as Bassanio.
The casket scenes are the central episode of the
Bassanio-Portia story. Although they do not
have the dramatic tension and emotional urgency that realistic theatergoers demand, they
have a richly complex meaning and pattern
which are eminently satisfying for those who do
not demand merely realism in the theater.28 With
its roots in the medieval exemnplum and the
emblem, its almost allegorical simplicity, and its
Platonic basis, the casket episode retains the
ritualistic quality which we find in the Renaissance masque. Its significance for the Shylock and
Antonio stories I will leave for later comment. Its
meaning for Bassanio-Portia is explicit. Bassanio,
enlightened by true love and wisdom, sees the
symbolic quality of the metals, interprets the
mottoes rightly, and makes the fitting choice.
The right choice dramatically affirms the values
of the romantic world, in which the hero's character, parental wisdom, and providence are all
vindicated. Bassanio proves his worth; he also
demonstrates the rightness of the hierarchical
value system of which he is a part.
But another crucial test of the hero lies ahead
before he can fully achieve Belmont or the Garden of Eden. Like many another hero of romance
who has won his fair princess in a golden land,
Bassanio must return to the lower world to
23 J. R. Brown discusses the image of love as a kind of
wealth, in his chapter, "Love's Wealth and the Judgement of
The Merclhant of Venice," in Shakespeare and His Comedies.
24 Charles Read Baskervill, "Bassanio as an Ideal Lover,"
The Manly Anniversary Studies in Language and Literature
(Chicago, 1928), pp. 90-103.
26 Bassanio is more than "pure instinct"; cf. Donald A.
Stauffer, Shakespeare's World of Images (New York, 1949),
p. 61. It is also unsound to say of him, "Of anything practical
he is as innocent as a child. He is only full of the noblest im-
pulses .. ."-George Gordon, Shakespearian Comedy (Oxford,
1944), p. 29. See Bassanio's business-like preparations for departure, his advice to Gratiano (ii.ii.109-112, 171-180).
21 Cf. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, Book iv, Ch. i.
27 The satirical element in her is a modal link with Shylock's world, which is in the ironic mode.
28 Cf. the noh drama of Japan.
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Thomas
hazard all as final proof of his worth. This is the
point of the ring episode. Its symbolic meaning is
often overlooked.29 To understand the ring
episode, we need to re-read the inscription on the
lead casket: "Who chooseth me, must give and
hazard all he hath." Bassanio, with Antonio, is
the only person who has the dedication and wisdom to hazard all as a true lover must. But human love, as expressed in Dante or in the Renaissance, is not merely romantic love; it is an analogy of divine love; it is charity, mercy, and also
friendship. In the trial scene, Bassanio expresses
his willingness to hazard all for love:
H.
Fujimura
503
Portia. It is an act of gratitude and generosityand also sacrifice. It shows the genuineness of his
sentiments in the court scene (iv.i.278-283).
However much the action might pique a lesser
soul, Portia recognizes the worth of Bassanio.
The ring episode also re-enacts the pound of
flesh story; but with the charitable Portia rather
than a cruel usurer invoking the penalty, the resolution is a happy one. Bassanio has passed
every test, and proved to be true gold; he has
lived up to the motto that he chose. During the
course of the dramatic action, he has grown in
stature, till at the end he is indeed worthy of inhabiting Belmont or the Garden of Eden.
Antonio, I am married to a wife
Which is as dear to me as life itself,
But life itself, my wife, and all the world,
Are not with me esteem'd above thy life.
I would lose all, ay sacrifice them all
Here to this devil, to deliver you.
(Iv.i.278-283)
There is no resentment in the retort of Bellario
(Portia), for with her wisdom and insight, she
recognizes what is implicit in the offer of Bassanio, that it is the demonstration of the motto on
the leaden casket. When Lorenzo complimented
her earlier for her "god-like amity" in permitting
Bassanio to fly to his friend, she replied:
I never did repent for doing good,
Nor shall not now: for in companions
That do converse and waste the time together,
WVhose souls do bear an egall yoke of love,
There must be needs a like proportion
Of lineaments, of manners, and of spirit;
Which makes me think that this Antoniio
Being the bosom lover of my lord,
Must needs be like my lord.
(iII.iv. 10-18)
She appreciates the nature of friendship, as the
Renaissance understood it, and as it is set forth in
Books viii and ix of Aristotle's Nicomachean
Ethics: perfect friendship exists only between
virtuous men who are alike in quality; such
friendship is disinterested and reciprocal; and
where it exists, there is no need of justice (viii,
i-iii).30 She recognizes the kind of bond established by love, as distinguished from the kind of
bond demanded by Shylock; for she says to
Bassanio of Antonio:
You should in all sense be much bound to him,
For (as I hear) he was much bound for you.
(v.i. 136-137)
As Portia recognizes, the ring episode is a symbolic enactment of Bassanio's hazarding all for
love: to express his gratitude to Antonio's savior,
he relinquishes the ring; that is, he gives up
Bassanio and Portia, united in spirit, also
participate in another agon, or conflict, this time
with Shylock. This is dramatized in the trial
scene, in which the values of the romantic world
are pitted against their opposites. "The enemy is
associated with winter, darkness, confusion,
sterility, moribund life, and old age, and the hero
with spring, dawn, order, fertility, vigor, and
youth."'" Though it is Portia and not Bassanio
who actually encounters and defeats Shylock, the
meaning of the encounter is clear. The heroine
assumes a masculine disguise, and for the moment represents the hero in this familiar instance
of displacement. As two persons united in spirit,
Bassanio and Portia are interchangeable in their
relationship to Shylock, for theirs is the golden,
vital, youthful, and aristocratic world pitted
against the leaden, dead, withered, and "vulgar"
world of Shylock. In the triumph over Shylock
and also in Bassanio's achievements in the casket
scenes, his successful testing in the ring episode,
we have the dramatic (or ritualistic) affirmationthrough-enactment of certain values. These are
related to love, and hence to harmony, order, and
life, as contrasted with hatred, disorder, chaos,
and spiritual death. This affirmation, attested to
by the upward movement of the action, is not
merely "wish-fulfillment, a vision of goodness
dreamt in the reality of an increasingly acquisitive society";32 nor is it merely "wonderful improbabilities," a dream created as part of a
29 "We may overlook the ring plot at the close, since apar
from its joyous marital teasing, its sole wifely lesson to husbands might be the advice not to promise more than they can
perform"-Stauffer, p. 63. Cf. also Charlton, p. 159; J. R.
Brown, p. 69.
30 See Geoffrey Percival, Aristotle on Friendship (Cambridge, Eng., 1940); also St. Thomas Aquinas on Aristotle's
Love and Friendship, tr. Pierre Conway (Providence, R.I.,
1951).
31 Frye, Anatomy of Criticism, pp. 187-188.
3 Leo Kirschbaum, Character and Characterization in
Shakespeare (Detroit, 1962), p. 10.
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504 Mode and Structure in "The Merchant of Venice"
dramatic illusion.33 Our approach to the world
"accident"; his substance is his spiritual dead-
of romance and its values should not be so literal
ness or leadenness. Hence the endless discussions
and realistic, for the world of romance has its
of Shylock as a Jew are singularly fruitless; and
own validity. This ideal world, the attainable
in general the realistic approach implicit in this
Garden of Eden for those of right mind and
spirit, is not only man's dream but his actual
goal. As Jessica says aptly of Bassanio or any
other person of true merit:
it is very meet
The Lord Bassanio live an upright life
For having such a blessing in his lady,
He finds the joys of heaven here on earth,
And if on earth he do not merit it,
In reason he should never come to heaven!
(iii.v.67-72)
For the humanist-idealist like Shakespeare, the
Garden of Eden is of this world, if men demonstrate their merit, as Bassanio does, through
surviving the test of his intelligence and moral
worth. Belmont is not a dream or a vision; it is an
attainable reality.
Opposed to the romantic values of BassanioPortia is Shylock, who exists in a truly leaden
world. Whereas the action in which Bassanio is
involved turns upward, the action involving
Shylock turns downward, for it is in the ironic
mode. The ironic reversal in the trial scene brings
defeat to Shylock, as he is satirically exposed to
ridicule for the mean creature that he is. This
dramatic action is subject to misunderstanding
because the reader or theatergoer usually misses
the ironic mode. The actor over the years has
been as much to blame as anyone for this confusion of modes ;34 and at this late date, it is perhaps
impossible for most people to see Shylock clearly,
as he is characterized in the play through action
and dialogue.
The most serious obstacle to grasping the
ironic mode in which he is presented is to regard
Shylock primarily as a Jew. In adapting the bond
story, Shakespeare stressed his Jewish traits, no
doubt for the practical reason that the associations worked to communicate the theme with the
greatest economy on the Elizabethan stage. But
he is hateful not because he is a Jew but because
he is Shylock. When Jessica repudiates her
father, she says:
though I am a daughter to his blood
I am not to his manners:
(ii.iii. 18-19)
She is ashamed not of her father's Jewishness but
of his "manners," that is, his character. Shylock's
Jewishness is thus, in Aristotelian terms, an
stress on his Jewishness is unrewarding. The
study of anti-Semitism in Shakespeare's time
sheds some light,35 but it is not very illuminating
insofar as our understanding of the basic Shylock
is concerned. Also unilluminating is the realistic
and modern idea that Shylock is the product of
his environment, that he is a creature of hatred
because he has been warped by the hatred directed against his race.36 Again, discussion of the
Jewish practice of usury in the Elizabethan
period sheds some light,37 but is not crucial to our
understanding of Shylock. He merely happens to
be a usurer, and usuriousness like his Jewishness
is an "accident."
If Shylock is hateful, it is not primarily because he is a usurer or a Jew, but because he is the
malevolent creature that he is. His reiterated
assertion that Christians hate him because he is a
Jew is chiefly rationalization. His sanctimoniousness, like Tartuffe's, does not deceive us; and his
racial-religious hypocrisy is exposed, as when he
moans to Tubal about the diamonds taken by
Jessica: "The curse never fell upon our nation
till now, I never felt it till now" (III.i.77-79).
Though many qualities associated with Jews in
Elizabethan times are assigned to Shylock, we
can hardly regard him as a representative Jew;
for we have a likable figure in Jessica and a not
unsympathetic Jew in the wealthy Tubal. Further, with the major Shakespearean characters,
our response is chiefly to the moral nature of the
person rather than to his race, nationality, or
profession-and morally, the leaden-souled Shylock is reprehensible.
Our response to Shylock is complicated by the
fact that he is a complex symbol embodying a
great many negative qualities. Aside from his
Jewishness and his usury, he is a hater of music,
33 John Arthos, The Art of Shakespeare (New York, 1964),
pp. 91-92.
34 See Lelyveld on the transformation of Shylock on the
stage. Cf. John Russell Brown, "The Realization of Shylock:
A Theatrical Criticism," in Early Shakespeare, pp. 187-209.
35 For discussions of anti-Semitism, see Friedlander, p. 12;
Stoll, pp. 275, 279; Lelyveld, p. 6; Charlton, p. 127; Sinsheimer, p. 87; John Dover Wilson, Shakespeare's Happy
Comedies (London, 1962), pp. 112-113.
36 See Wilson, p. 114; Granville-Barker, p. 355; Palmer,
p. 74.
37 Warren D. Smith, "Shakespeare's Shylock," Shakespeare
Quarterly, xv (1964), 193-199. See also Kirschbaum, pp. 8-9;
Stoll, p. 289. Bernard Grebanier sees Shvlock as primarily the
usurer; see Ch. iii, The Truth About Shylock (New York,
1962).
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Thomas
and hence of harmony and concord, both social
and moral. As Lorenzo says:
naught so stockish, hard, and full of rage,
But music for the time doth change his nature,The man that hath no music in himself,
Nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds,
Is fit for treasons, strategems, and spoils,
The motions of his spirit are dull as night,
And his affections dark as Erebus:
Let no such man be trusted:
(v.i.81-88)
Earlier, Shylock has condemned masques and
"the vile squealing of the wry-neck'd fife" (ii.v.
28-30). In this hatred of music and in his stress
on thrift, he shows a Puritanic quality much like
Malvolio's. More conventionally, Shylock is the
miserly old man who stands in the way of true
love,38 and he is thus the familiar enemy of joy
and life. He is also the ogre:39 the pound of flesh
story is a mythic enactment of hatred transposed
into act; and Shylock shares with Ugolino a
hatred that expresses itself as a craving for human flesh. Finally, he is the fiend or devil incarnate, as indicated by many a comment in the
play (see lines 86-87 above). Jessica describes
their home as hell (ii.iii.2); and a number of
characters label him a devil (iii.i.t9-20; iI.ii.
23, 26). Shylock is a complex figure because he is
more than the sum of his explicit identities-a
Jew, usurer, and old father; he is also implicitly a
Puritan, ogre, and devil. He has his function as
antagonist to the world of romance; he also has
his function in the world of Antonio.
As for his own dramatic action, Shylock exists
on the level of the ironic mode. Consequently he
is treated satirically, without much sympathy,
and is allowed to entrap himself and bring about
his own ironic discomfiture. In this role, he shows
some traits of the eiron, in his blunt but doubletongued speeches. In pursuing this interpretation
of Shylock, I assume on Shakespeare's part a
capacity for what 0. J. Campbell calls "comicall
satyre."40 There is a fashionable notion that
Shakespearean comedy is essentially different
from Jonsonian comedy because Shakespeare was
sympathetic and romantic rather than intellectual or satiric in temperament like Jonson.41 But
the universality of Shakespeare embraces a
mastery of diverse modes, and ability to cope
with irony and satire as well as with romance.
Shylock is presented chiefly in the ironic mode;
and the action of which he is the protagonist involves an ironic reversal, with a consequent
satiric exposure.
The ironic treatment of Shylock is most evi-
H.
Fujimura
505
dent in the language and imagery associated with
him: his style is the plain style of Renaissance
rhetoric. It is factual, literal, prosaic, as befits a
materialistic creature; its rhythm is pedestrian
and devoid of music:
he hath an argosy bound to Tripolis, another to the
Indies, I understand moreover upon the Rialto, he
hath a third at Mexico, a fourth for England, and
other ventures he hath squand'red abroad,-but
ships are but boards, sailors but men, there be
land-rats, and water-rats, water-thieves, and
land-thieves, (I mean pirates), and then there is
the peril of waters, winds, and rocks: the man is
notwithstanding sufficient,-three thousand ducats,
-I think I may take his bond.
(i.iii. 15-24)
The syntax is based on enumeration, a piling up
of items, like a bookkeeper's adding up of sums.
The imagery rises no higher than land-rats and
water-rats, which the literal-minded Shylock
immediately translates into more prosaic terms,
as though his flight of fancy might exceed the
other's grasp. He is associated with animalsrats, curs, wolves-predatory creatures without
charity. Though Shylock accuses Antonio of
calling him "cut-throat dog" (i.iii.106), he
accepts the label:
Thou call'dst me dog before thou hadst a cause,
But since I am a dog, beware my fangs,-
(III.iii.6-7)
In the court scene, Gratiano suggests that the
Pythagorean view of reincarnation is true, and
that Shylock houses the soul of an animal:
thy currish spirit
Govern'd a wolf, who hang'd for human slaughterEven from the gallows did his fell soul fleet,
And whilst thou layest in thy unhallowed dam,
Infus'd itself in thee: for thy desires
Are wolvish, bloody, starv'd, and ravenous.
(iv.i. 133-138)
In his allusions Shylock turns naturally to low
images, chiefly bestial. Defending his irrational
desire for Antonio's flesh, he refers to "a gaping
pig," "a cat," and those who "Cannot contain
their urine" "when the bagpipe sings i'th'nose"
(iv.i.47-50); and supporting his claim to the
pound of flesh, he alludes to "a purchas'd slave"
38 Frye, Anatomy of Criticism, p. 176.
39 Ibid,. p. 148.
40 See Oscar James Campbell, Comicall Satyre and Shakespeare's Troilus and Cressida (San Marino, Calif., 1938);
Shakespeare's Satire (London, 1943).
41 Cf. Nevill Coghill, "The Basis of Shakespearian Comedy," Essays and Studies, 1950 (London, 1950), p. 1; Wilson,
p. 33; Palmer, p. xiv.
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506 Mode and Structure in "The Merchant of Venice"
and also asses, dogs, and mules (iv.i.90-91).
to be considered in the context of the play; and
Here speaks a "vulgar" mind, devoid of nobility,
in that context he is treated ironically.
as mean in its aspirations as in the language in
The scenes in which he appears are in the ironic
which its thoughts are clothed. This is the diction
mode, with its characteristic form of action and
and imagery of irony and satire.
presentation. In Act i, Scene iii, Shylock is
Much has been made of one speech of Shylock's in which he asserts his Jewishness:42
Jew, and a hypocrite who speaks with a forked
and what's his reason? I am a Jew. 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?-if you prick us do we not bleed? if you
tickle us do we not laugh? if you poison us do we
not die? and if you wrong us shall we not revenge?
(iii.i.52-60)
A sympathetic interpretation of this passage is
open to two main objections. First, we should
note the sophistry of Shylock, who is really
justifying revenge on the grounds that this is
what a Christian would do,43 and also rationalizing Antonio's contempt for him. But more seri-
ously, Shylock has not asserted his humanity, nor
his equality with people like Antonio and Bassanio. His list of items (hands, organs, dimensions,
senses, affections, passions) does not include
man's rational soul. Shylock is a creature of
passion, and hence irrational. For the Renaissance, there are four kinds of souls corresponding
to four levels of being. At the lowest level is plant
life, endowed with a nutritive soul. Above it are
animals, "which in addition to possessing a
nutritive soul or faculty, also possess a sensitive
soul or faculty; they can not only grow, they can
also feel, and hence they have the power of motion and, to some extent, the faculty of imagination. Above the animals comes man, who in addition to possessing a nutritive and sensitive soul,
possesses a rational soul. Above man come the
angels, who are pure intellect, and who are able
to apprehend universal truth without the
medium of the senses."44 Now, Shylock defines
himself in terms of the animal level, that is, the
sensitive soul. "With the sensible or irrational
part of the soul is joined a power of appetite
common to man and beast. Its operations receive different names: motions, affections, passions, perturbations."45 As Sir John Davies
points out in Nosce Teipsum (1599), there are
three sorts of men: some are like plants, others
are like beasts and follow sense; some are like
angels.46 Much is said about Shakespeare
humanizing Shylock;47 and indeed Shylock is a
human being, he is not a monster. But he needs
clearly identified as a low creature, a usurer, a
and ironic tongue:
Pray you tell me this,If he should break his day what should I gain
By the exaction of the forfeiture?
A pound of man's flesh taken from a man,
Is not so estimable, profitable neither
As flesh of muttons, beefs, or goats,-I say
To buy his favour, I extend this friendship,-
(i.iii. 158-164)
"I like not fair terms, and a villain's mind," says
Bassanio, to warn not only Antonio but the
audience. In Act ii, Scene v, Shylock is introduced with hWis low thoughtsthou shalt not gormandize
As thou hast done with me:-what Jessica!And sleep, and snore, and rend apparel out.
(ii.v.3-5)
"I'll go in hate, to feed upon / The prodigal
Christian," he says, suggesting the ogre. He refers to a "dream of money-bags," "the vile
squealing of the wry-neck'd fife." Act ii, Scene
viii, prepares for the appearance of Shylock by
describing his grotesque passion through Solanio:
I never heard a passion so confus'd,
So strange, outrageous, and so variable
As the dog Jew did utter in the streets,-
"My daughter! 0 my ducats! 0 my daughter!
Fled with a Christian! 0 my Christian ducats!
Justice, the law, my ducats, and my daughter!
(ii.viii. 12-17)
In Act iii, Scene i, when this "devil" and "old
carrion" appears, he utters his notorious "I am a
Jew" speech justifying revenge, and then dem-
onstrates the truth of Solanio's satiric description of his passion. In Act iII, Scene iii, Shylock
42 Shakespeare makes Shylock "a genuine man, at any rate,
of like passions with ourselves, so that we respond to every
word of his fierce protest . . ."-Quiller-Couch, ed. The Merchant of Venice, p. xxviii. See also Parrott, p. 143; Craig, pp.
118-119; Arthos, p. 88; Bertrand Evans, Shakespeare's Com-
edies (Oxford, 1Q60), p. 80.
4 Palmer, p. 79.
"4Theodore Spencer, Shakespeare and the Nature of Man
(Cambridge, Eng., 1943), p. 11.
46 Ruth Leila Anderson, Elizabethan Psychology and Shakespeare's Plays, Univ. of Iowa Humanistic Studies, Vol. iII,
No. 4 (Iowa City, 1927), p. 69.
'6 The Poems of Sir John Davies (New York, 1941), p. 53.
4 Cf. Palmer, p. 68.
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Thomas
renders himself contemptible by snarling his
hatred and intent to seek revenge: "But since I
am a dog, beware my fangs,-" (iii. iii. 7).
In Act iv, Scene i, he makes his last appearance, insisting upon justice, larding his speech
with the low references alluded to earlier ("gaping pig," "cat," "urine"). In the vein of invective
satire, Gratiano rails at him as "damn'd, inexorable dog," a wolf reincarnated (11. 128-138).48
The arrogant Shylock, confident of his revenge,
rebukes him:
Till thou canst rail the seal from off my bond,
Thou but offend'st thy lungs to speak so loud:
Repair thy wit good youth, or it will fall
To cureless ruin. I stand here for law.
(iv.i. 139-142)
Irony characterizes the most striking statements
of Shylock in the trial scene.
Duke. How shalt thou hope for mercy rend'ring none?
Shy. What judgment shall I dread doing no wrong?
(iv.i.88-89)
As Portia offers him a chance to be merciful,
Shylock exclaims with hypocritical sanctimoniousness:
H.
Fujimura
507
lock will not arouse a great deal of sympathy if
we are sensitive to the language, imagery, and
ironic devices.50
At the same time, we cannot dismiss Shylock
as simply a comic villain and the butt of ridicule
in the play. E. E. Stoll's conception of Shylock as
a thoroughly Elizabethan and comic villain overlooks the complexities.5' He is more than the butt
of ridicule in a comedy; he is the protagonist in
his own ironic action. Perhaps a figure closest to
him is someone like Volpone, who in his complexity and evil transcends the merely comic
evil-doer. The ironic-satiric treatment does not
allow for real sympathy, but it allows for passion,
both in the victim and in the audience. The
ironic mode is also at times closer in spirit to
tragedy than to the purely comic. Thus the victim may express hatred, venom, resentment, desire for revenge, avarice, lust, envy; and in reaction, the audience may feel anger, contempt,
hatred, loathing, disgust. Shylock is permitted to
express strong passions, though never with tragic
dignity or nobility.
Not only is Shylock the protagonist in his own
ironic action, but he is the antagonist in relation
An oath, an oath, I have an oath in heaven,Shall I lay perjury upon my soul?
(iv.i.224-225)
to Bassanio-Portia and also to Antonio. He
symbolizes the negation of all the values in the
play, in fact, of the whole social, ethical, and
metaphysical scheme of things.52 This role of
The devices of irony and satire-repetition and
exaggeration-are effectively employed against
"Gratiano's vulgar and repulsive Jew-baiting," says Guthrie,
intro. to The Merchant of Venice, ed. Harrison, p. 30.
Shylock. At the moment of seeming triumph, he
48 Gratiano's satiric function is usually misunderstood.
exclaims in praise of Portia, "A Daniel come to
49 The discussion of Shylock as a tragic figure is so voluminous that I shall cite only a few instances of this kind of inter-
the mean creature that he is. The whole treat-
(1961), 5.
ment is ironic and satiric. The low language of
Shylock, Gratiano's railing and mocking mimicry, the ironic reversal, the mean-spirited backing down of Shylock-all taken together clearly
indicate the ironic mode. In the court scene, Shy-
civilized and gracious world based on the proper use of
wealth, see C. L. Barber, Shakespeare's Festive Comedy
(Princeton, 1959), Ch. vii. For some of the best comments on
Shylock, see Charles Mitchell, "The Conscience of Venice:
Shakespeare's Merchant," JEGP, LXIII (1964), 214-225.
pretation. "This is a Shylock born of the old story, but transjudgment: yea a Daniel!" (l. 219). "Most rightformed, and here a theme of high tragedy, of the one seemful judge!" "Most learned judge!" he cries
ingly never-ending tragedy of the world"-Granville-Barker,
(11. 297, 300). And at that instant of comic hyp. 357. "There are ... good reasons, I think, why we ought
to regard Shylock as a tragic and not a comical figure . . ."bris, there is an ironic reversal; Portia declares
Wilson, p. 107. See also Palmer, p. xii; Lelyveld, p. 8; Sinsthat though Shylock may have his pound of
heimer, p. 144; Parrott, p. 140; Carrington, p. 9. For illumiflesh, he will pay with his lands and goods if he
nating commentary on the Jew-villain as a comic figure, see
sheds one drop of blood. Thereupon Gratiano
Edgar Rosenberg, From Shylock to Svengali (Stanford, Calif.,
mocks him with "O upright judge! ... 0 learned
1960), p. 35.
judge!" (11. 308-309), which he reiterates (11. 313, 50 Excessive sympathy for Shylock is common. "To uis, I
think, he emerges as a more admirable man than Gratiano,
319), and adds, "A second Daniel, a Daniel"
and possibly than Lorenzo and Bassanio"-Guthrie, intro. to
(l. 329). At this point a tragic villain would no
The Merchant of Venice, ed. Harrison, p. 17. "His fate is
doubt have insisted on his pound of flesh to feed
terrible . . . , and our hearts cannot help but be touched by
his suffering"-Carrington, p. 12. See also Wilson, p. 106.
his revenge whatever the consequences; but Shy61 E. E. Stoll, see chapter on "Shylock." His point of view
lock is not a tragic villain.49 Unlike Marlowe's
is restated in H. Spencer, pp. 245-246. "Shylock is villain and
Barabas, he lacks virtu. So he retreats, tries to
hero and clown . ."-John Hazel Smith, "Shylock: 'Devil
salvage what he can, and is further exposed for
Incarnation' or 'Poor Man ... Wronged'?" JEGP, LX
52 For Shylock as a killjoy figure, the comic antagonist to a
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508 Mode and Structure in "The Merchant of Venice"
Shylock's is worked out with considerable subtlety; and in this involvement he acquires more
dignity. As an instance of this complex working
out of his role, we might note that Morocco is a
surrogate for Shylock in the casket scene. There
is more than analogy in this. Morocco, like Shy-
lock, is an alien; like his symbolic equivalent, he
emphasizes his equality with other men, but in
purely physical terms (the redness of his blood).
Like Shylock's, his values are worldly and "vulgar"; and he chooses the gold casket, with its
motto, "Who chooseth me, shall gain what many
sour devil. Like Shylock, he exists on the level of
the senses and passions, and not of reason;
Launcelot loves to "gormandize,"56 and he deserts his master for someone who will feed him
better. In considering the question of deserting,
Launcelot comically presents a debate between
his conscience and the fiend, and he listens to the
fiend. Like his master, Launcelot also misorders
the father-child relationship. Though he may be
admitted to the service of Bassanio and find his
way to Belmont, he ends by getting a Moor with
ity. The values of Morocco and of Shylock are
much alike, and Shylock's ironic defeat is anticipated in the casket scene.
The role of Shylock as antagonist is also
dramatized through his involvement with two
minor figures, Jessica and Launcelot. Of these
two, Jessica is the more important; she has her
part as a romantic heroine, and thus echoes the
values of the Bassanio-Portia world. Lorenzo
says of her:
child,57 since he exists on the sensual level. With
his low style, as represented in his diction and
tone, Launcelot serves to drag down Shylock,
with whom he is associated in our minds. As a
"merry devil" on the side of disorder and passion,
Launcelot parodies the negative values represented by Shylock. Like Shylock, he voices some
mistaken notions that are refuted in the play, for
example, when he says to Jessica in a parody of
the Old Law, "The sins of the father are to be
laid upon the children" (iii.v.1-2). Launcelot
thus contributes to the complex treatment of
Shylock in the play.
Through his involvement with Launcelot and
Jessica as well as with Antonio, Bassanio, and
Portia, Shylock is clearly delineated. To the extent that he shares some degree of humanity with
them, mercy is extended to him. The ironic recoil of the demand for a pound of flesh brings the
possibility of grace and hence of redemption. He
is punished for his hatred, but the punishment is
not really severe. Of course he loses half his
fortune; but this is punishment only in the eyes
of those who, like Shylock, measure value in
And therefore like herself, wise, fair, and true,
Shall she be placed in my constant soul.
material terms. The enforced conversion opens
up the possibility of salvation,58 and there is an
men desire." When the lead casket asserts that
"Who chooseth me, must give and hazard all he
hath," Morocco expresses a materialistic view:
Must give,-for what? for lead, hazard for lead!
This casket threatens-men that hazard all
Do it in hope of fair advantages:
(ii.vii. 17-19)
So the materialistic creature is exposed for what
he is, and his reward is a skull rather than love.
He who is taken with false values and lacks the
wisdom to achieve the real world of love, mercy,
and magnanimity finds spiritual death and steril-
(ii.vi.56-57)
This parallels the qualities of Portia as well as
Bassanio's relationship to her."3 As the embodiment of values similar to Portia's, Jessica is the
one link between Shylock and the world of love
and joy; her flight represents the cutting of that
link. The onus is his, not hers; and her departure
can not be regarded as a primary motive for his
ironic recognition of his spiritual illness when he
says at the end of the trial scene, "I am not well"
63 See the reference to Bassanio as a "constant man" by
Portia (iii.ii.246).
54 Cf. Guthrie, p. 20; Quiller-Couch, p. xx; Parrott, p. 138;
Israel Gollancz, Allegory and Mysticism in Shakespeare (London, 1931), p. 31. Jessica has been both censured and defended for the theft from her father. But in the ironic treatment of Shylock, laughter rather than sympathy is aroused
passion for revenge.54
by his loss.
Just as he drives away his own daughter, so
Shylock drives away his servant Launcelot. A
common view is that Launcelot is merely a clown
who provides comic relief, and is unrelated to any
central idea in the play.55 Actually, he parodies
Shylock's behavior and values, and echoes some
of the major "themes" of the play. In Jessica's
words, Launcelot is "a merry devil" (ii.iii.2), as
distinguished perhaps from his master, who is a
36 Cf. Evans, p. 51; Samuel Asa Small, Shakespearean Character Interpretation: The Merchant of Venice (Gottingen,
1927), p. 116.
56 See ii.ii.101-103. Perhaps there is significance in the fact
that Shylock's name may derive from Shalack or Shelach,
meaning cormorant (a gluttonous person as well as bird).
67 There is a tenuous link here between Launcelot and
Morocco. See Mitchell, p. 223.
68 There is little point in arguing the morality of the forced
conversion, since the play assumes only a Christian meta-
physic.
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Thomas
(IV.i.392). For a creature of the leaden world, or
hell, death is the usual reward; but for Shylock
H.
Fujimura
509
who is his surrogate in the choice of the silver
casket. Antonio's spiritual career from hybris to
there is more than the skull that Morocco finds.
anagnorisis is also presented symbolically
Charity is extended even to him, and though he
through the account of his ships, from the picture
can never leave Venice for Belmont, he is not as
of the proud vessels at the beginning, through the
savagely punished as is Volpone. Shakespeare's
report of their loss at sea (death), to their final
comic world is far more humane than Jonson's.
restoration. The image of the voyaging ships
falls into the familiar pattern of the journey of
Finally, there is the silver world of Antonio,
with its action set in the realistic mode. Though
he does not hold the center of the stage, the
merchant of Venice is the central figure thematically. He is an aristocrat engaged in commercial
ventures; thus his existence impinges on the
world of Bassanio and the world of Shylock.
Antonio is silver-for the daily uses of this
world. As Everyman, he goes through a ritual of
death and rebirth, and experiences a comic anagnorisis, centered in the idea of mercy (charity,
love). In the beginning he is characterized by
hybris and lack of charity, demonstrated by his
conduct toward Shylock; his purgatorial experience of impending death and "justice" leads
to recognition and change, demonstrated by his
charity toward Shylock in the trial scene. At the
end, Antonio makes his symbolic journey to Belmont, the Garden of Eden, having freed himself
from sin. This dramatic action is comic in the
Dantean or medieval sense, in that it ends happily. As the protagonist in this "comic" action,
Antonio is not, as is sometimes said, a passive or
static character."9 Nor is he, as some critics describe him, the embodiment of perfect goodness.60
Those who adopt the first idea, that Antonio is
passive, are disturbed by what seems his "motiveless melancholy."'" Those who adopt the
second idea, that Antonio is a perfectly good
character, are disturbed by his harshness toward
Everyman's life, cast into the realistic mode. As
Gratiano says:
How like a younker or a prodigal
The scarfed bark puts from her native bayHugg'd and embraced by the strumpet wind!
How like the prodigal doth she return
With over-weather'd ribs and ragged sailsLean, rent, and beggar'd by the strumpet wind!
(ii.vi. 14-19)
Central to Antonio's "'comic" experience is his
growing acuity in relation to the basic principle
of love and charity and also his loss of hybris before the onslaughts of fortune.
At the beginning Antonio is melancholy, with
a malaise like that of Dante, lost in the woods in
the middle of his spiritual journey.
In sooth I know not why I am so sad,
It wearies me, you say it wearies you;
But how I caught it, found it, or came by it,
What stuff 'tis made of, whereof it is born,
I am to learn:
And such a want-wit sadness makes of me,
That I have much ado to know myself.
(ii. 1-7)
This malaise is the product of his spiritual condition, of his lack of charity and his ignorance of
self.64 But the tragic tone that some critics sense
in these lines is a mis-reading. The language of
Antonio is couched in the low middle style, with
Shylock in Act i, Scene iii.62 Actually, Antonio is simple diction and homely imagery, as befits the
involved as protagonist in an action that is
dramatic, and he undergoes a real change in the
process. The most serious obstacle to understanding his role is failure to grasp the dramatic mode
in which the action is cast. Thus, some critics see
Antonio's opening lines as the sign of a "tragic
quality" in the play, and find him alien to the
world of Shakespearean comedy.63 But Antonio
is the protagonist of a dramatic action cast in the
realistic mode, and his action follows the trajec-
tory of hybris, passion (or suffering), anagnorisis
or recognition, and a happy resolution.
A primary reason for failure to understand the
action involving Antonio is that his experience is
presented in a complex manner. He is of course
on the stage in propria persona to enact his own
drama. But he is represented, too, by Arragon,
realistic mode; it does not have the accent of
high tragedy. This is the spiritual condition of
Everyman, in a relatively low mimetic mode, ex-
pressed in ordinary language. The unsettled and
yet arrogant state of Antonio is suggested by the
Cf. Murry, p. 191; Granville-Barker, p. 351; QuillerCouch, p. xxiii; Cumberland Clark, A Study of The Merchant
of Venice (London, 1927), p. 122.
60 Cf. Evans, p. 57; Kirschbaum, p. 18.
61 The phrase is Murry's, p. 209.
62 Cf. Murry, p. 196; Chambers, p. 114; Wilson, p. 109;
Carrington, p. 17.
I" Wilson, pp. 50, 94-95; Chambers, p. 117; Parrott, p. 139.
64 The melancholy is usually explained as premonition of
impending disaster or simply as dramatic foreshadowing; see
Small, p. 71; Chambers, p. 106; Murry, p. 210; Stopford A.
Brooke, On Ten Plays of Shakespeare (London, 1905), p. 134.
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510 Mode and Structure in "The Merchant of Venice"
imagery of the ships that follows, in Salerio's
charity, which accompanies his hybris. When
words.
Shylock snarls at him, "You call'd me dog,"
Antonio retorts:
Your mind is tossing on the ocean,
I am as like to call thee so again,
To spet on thee again, to spurn thee too.
There where your argosies with portly sail
Like signiors and rich burghers on the flood,
Or as it were the pageants of the sea,
(i.iii. 125-126)
Do overpeer the petty traffickers
That cur'sy to them (do them reverence)
As they fly by them with their woven wings.
(i.i.8-14)
Salerio also conjures up images of disaster at sea,
the "wealthy Andrew dock'd in sand" (suggesting the wealthy Antonio)And in a word, but even now worth this,
And now worth nothing?
(i.i.35-36)
Antonio denies that his ventures make him sad;
and indeed he is right. But his calm faith in his
own ships reveals his hybris and a blindness to
the vagaries of fortune untypical of a wise Shake-
spearean character. At the same time Antonio,
like Arragon, is acute enough to penetrate appearances to some degree, and he declares:
I hold the world but as the world Gratiano,
This harshness of Antonio has bothered critics
who think of him as a perfectly good man. But
Antonio is clearly depicted at the beginning as a
man with a flaw. The redeeming quality is his
deep love for Bassanio; and on this pivots the
action in which Antonio makes his foolish mistake, goes through suffering (a kind of Purgatory
or ritual death), and finally experiences anagnorisis. In Antonio's story, Shylock assumes the role
of the fiend who nearly triumphs over him.
Though Antonio does not appear in Act ii, his
spiritual state is represented by the episode of
Arragon, who is analogous to Antonio in the first
act. Confronting the three caskets, Arragon
heeds the motto on the silver casket:
"Who chooseth me shall get as much as he deserves,"
And well said too; for who shall go about
To cozen Fortune, and be honourable
Without the stamp of merit?
(ii.ix.36-39)
A stage, where every man must play a part,
(i.i.77-78)
Antonio is aware of the mutability of life, its
transitory nature, and the mockery of makebelieve.65 Yet he is guilty of a strange over-confidence, based on his material possessions and the
respect of less affluent acquaintances. As Shylock says, with unintentional irony, "Antonio is a
good man.... my meaning in saying he is a
good man, is to have you understand me that he
is sufficient" (i.iii.11, 13-15). But if goodness is
only material sufficiency, it is hardly adequate to
weather the storms of life. With the blindness of
hybris, Antonio says blithely to the warier Bassanio when Shylock proposes his bond:
Why fear not man, I will not forfeit it,Within these two months, that's a month before
This bond expires, I do expect return
Of thrice three times the value of this bond.
(I.iii. 152-155)
Again, at the end of the act, he repeats with
supreme confidence:
in this there can be no dismay,
My ships come home a month before the day.
(i.iii. 176-177)
This reiteration is not accidental, but serves its
dramatic function of pointing up Antonio's overconfidence. At the same time, he reveals a lack of
Arragon, like Antonio, assumes desert; he finds a
fool's head,66 and the poem that lectures him:
Seven times tried that judgment is,
That did never choose amiss.
(ii.ix.64-65)
Immediately following, in Act iii, Scene i, we
hear that Antonio has also come to disaster:
"Antonio hath a ship of rich lading wrack'd on
the narrow seas; the Goodwins I think they call
the place, a very dangerous flat, and fatal, where
the carcases of many a tall ship lie buried"
(iii.i.2-6). Verbal echoes connect Antonio with
Arragon: Goodwin-Belmont; tall ship-noble
Prince; carcases of many. Disaster is piled on
disaster as all of Antonio's ships are reported
lost; the effect is to induce suffering and recognition. The humbled Antonio confesses in the trial
scene:
I am a tainted wether of the flock,
Meetest for death,-the weakest kind of fruit
Drops earliest to the ground, and so let me;
(iv.i. 1 14-116).
But there is a saving grace in confession. Mercy
65 He seems to anticipate the not-so-wise Jaques, and also
to echo the poet of the sonnets; cf. Knights, pp. 50-51.
16 Perhaps it is significant that Tony (Antonio) means fool,
and that Shylock calls Antonio a fool (In.iii.2).
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Thomas
is granted him, and he is "tested" in the courtroom. As Portia says,
The quality of mercy is not strain'd,
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath: it is twice blest,
It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes,
(iv.i.180-183).
When sentence is pronounced against Shylock,
the now wiser and more charitable Antonio intercedes for remission of half the fine against his
enemy. For such merciful conduct Antonio is rewarded; not only does he make the symbolic
journey to Belmont, but he is informed by Portia
that three of his argosies "Are richly come to
harbour suddenly" (v.i.276-277). The silver
world of Antonio, with its dramatic enactment of
hybris, suffering, and anagnorisis, remains on the
level of comedy. It does not sparkle with the
golden shimmer of the world of romance. But the
silver world, expressed through Antonio's experience and the language he habitually uses,
with its relatively simple diction, imagery, and
rhythm, is in the realistic mode, and is closest to
us, closer even than Shylock's world or Bassanio's.
The Merchant of Venice involves three actions,
each independent and yet intertwined and hence
interacting; the three actions are dominated by
three different characters-Bassanio-Portia, Shylock, and Antonio. Each works out his destiny in
his own mode-Bassanio-Portia in the romantic
mode, Shylock in the ironic, and Antonio in the
realistic. Each world is symbolized by one of the
caskets-gold, silver, and lead; its values, the
language characterizing its protagonist, the
action-all can be described in terms of these
metals. This is worked out with great subtlety
and complexity through the actions in the play.
H.
Fujimura
511
Our response is complicated by the fact that
some scenes, like the trial, call for reaction to
several modes at once, as Shylock, Portia-Bassanio, and Antonio all appear as protagonists in
their own individual actions. But the total effect
is one of unity and harmony, and also great
textural and thematic richness. Life is viewed on
several different levels, the complex vision of life
corresponding to the complex metaphysical assumptions of the play. Impressive testimony is
offered to the great architectonic skill of Shakespeare. He is more than a great poet, a great
creator of character, a master of the English
language. He is also a master dramatist concerned with dramatic action that will express his
sense of the order of the universe, of human
society, and of the individual. To appreciate The
Merchant of Venice, we need to recognize that
three actions in three modes are woven together
with great skill, to achieve a complex pattern and
meaning that are more than the sum of the
strands. A comedy almost contemporary with it,
A Midsummer Night's Dream, is more obvious in
its use of several modes-the serious romance of
Theseus-Hippolyta, the comic romance of the
pairs of lovers, and the low comedy and parody
of Bottom and his fellows; the various modes are
clearly different, more apparent, and less well integrated. In The Merchant of Venice, the modes
are more subtly presented and more complexly
integrated. What it says about life can hardly be
extracted, as though a clear theme could be
identified, running like a bright thread through
the play. The total meaning is expressed through
the three separate actions, the modes in which
they are cast, and through their harmonious interaction.
UNIVERSITY OF HAWAII
Honolulu
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