Victims Essay Research Paper The plot of

Victims Essay, Research Paper

The plot of the play is that Bassanio wants to borrow money so he goes with Antonio to Shylock who is a wealthy Jewish business man, even though they call him a dog and mock his Jewish ways Shylock offers him a bond, Shylock says that if he doesn´t pay he will take a pound of Antonio´s flesh, he says this and Antonio and Bassanio believe he is only joking, Even though Antonio is racist towards him he still lends him the money. The play is a mixture of love greed and revenge. I would define a “victim” as someone who is on the receiving end of abuse; this could be physical or verbal. The victim may or may not contribute to there victimisation for example someone could be victimised for their physical appearance which they have no control over and have not contributed to, or someone could be victimised because of their actions which they have control over and have contributed to. In Shakespeare´s time it would have been classed as the norm to be racist towards the Jews and the people watching the Merchant of Venice would have cheered when shylock was treated badly for example in act 3 scene 1 Solanio says “lest the devil cross my prayer, for here he comes now in the likeness of a Jew” this is aimed at shylock and they are calling him the devil, the crowd would most probably laughed at this in Shakespeare´s time and would have found it very amusing, they will not have seen shylock as a victim but as a villain who hated all Christians. Christians would use excuses like the Jews killed Jesus as a reason to hate them but really most Christians hate Jews because they where envious of them because they where usually very religious and where allowed to practice usury in their religion whereas Christians where not and therefore Christians usually owed them money, also the Jewish are usually very well educated this is a few reasons why Christians sometimes hated them.

Nowadays we would see this play as very racist towards the Jewish people because times have changed and people think differently, people are more aware of people as individuals and not just as a member of a group even though racism still exists today. There is a long history of the persecution of the Jews for example the holocaust where Hitler carried out ethnic cleansing against the Jews and many other religions and groups of people, he killed some 6 million Jews just because they where different. Another example is what happened in Britain 700 years ago where the Jews where killed and expelled from Britain.

We only know a bit about shylocks past history, but we do know that there was a woman in his life, this could have been his wife as it seems he was very close to her but she died, we know this because his most prized possession was a ring that he gave to her in Frankfurt but this was stolen by his daughter and traded for a monkey.

He is Jewish so all his life he would have suffered racial abuse so this could have made him very vengeful towards Antonio as he is a Christian, when Shylock finds out that Antonio is going bankrupt and he says “I thank God I thank God” and he decides

to kick him when he is down and take revenge for all the times Antonio has wronged him, Shylock says “ He hath disgraced me and hindered me half a million” meaning Antonio has gone out of his way so that Shylock lost half a million ducats. Shylock is showing a very nasty side to himself in this scene and he is on a roller coaster of emotions, first he is unhappy about his daughter then he finds out about Antonio and he cheers up.

We don´t really know much about Antonio´s past history but we do know he is a wealthy merchant in the city of Venice. Antonio is portrayed by Shakespeare as an outcast and does not get involved in the social atmosphere that is thriving in Venice.

We think he has never been married or has ever wanted to, in act 1 scene 1 when solanio says “Why then you are in love” Antonio replies with “Fie, Fie” meaning nonsense.

Shylock must not have had a very good relationship with his daughter for her to run off with all his money. It is understandable for his daughter to run away from shylock because she is in love with a Christian, but for her to run away with all his money shylock must not have had a very good relationship with her, she swapped his most cherished possession, a ring that Shylock gave to Jessica´s mother in Frankfurt for a monkey. This is very nasty and deliberate and just shows she wanted to hurt Shylock. From reading the text we can see that shylock was keeping Jessica as a prisoner in her own house, by not letting her out and not letting her hear the Christian music around her he says to her “Lock up my doors; and when you hear the drum. But stop my house’s ears-I mean casements. Let not the sound of shallow fopp’ry enter my sober house.” Jessica hates the way Shylock treats her and calls Shylock Satan. Shylock does not love his daughter enough and he even complains when he has to pay someone to find her so he can get his money back.

Antonio does not seem to have much family but he treats Bassanio like he is part of his family as far as we see in the play he is the closest thing to a family for Antonio and Antonio seems like a very lonely businessman.

Shylock does not seem to have any friends as he treats everyone as if he was superior to them, he has pushed all