Merchant of Venice (The Merchant of Venice - William Shakespeare)

Name: mmblah

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Product:	The Merchant of Venice - William Shakespeare
Date:	31/05/08 (28 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: great characters, interesting plot, a story that invites your interpretation

Disadvantages: none, although one may struggle with language initially

It's customary for students to hate the books forced upon them but, whether it be me, this book or something else entirely, it is simply not so with the Merchant of Venice. I had never read Shakespeare prior to this book, except a quick, heavily simplified teaching of The Tempest at the beginning of secondary school; and yet, even so, I was captured from the first page: "In sooth, I know not why I am so sad". There's so many glorious quotes throughout and following this one that I am having to fully restrain myself not to blurt them out haphazardly.

The pulling feature of this book is, of course, Shylock. He's a character of pure duality and this is perhaps why we, as a modern society, have been able to twist and turn him into a character of sympathy rather than the comic villain that was arguably intended by Shakespeare. We simply cannot look past the character of Shylock and the ferocious prejudice exhibited by the Christian characters of the play - each time a new production is released, the issue once more arises. I don't really believe it matters whether or not the play was written as anti-Semitic or whether it was a play against anti-Semitism as we, as the reader (or viewer), are the ones to ultimately decide on the issue. Such has always been the case.

Indeed, the same is true for any of the other characters of the play, as all are worthy of your ponderings. I cannot compare this play to others written by Shakespeare, but even so I heartily recommend it. Perhaps those more experienced with his works will contradict me, but I see it also as a great introduction to his other plays. I, at least, have decide to delve into all his other works simply because of this one play. Regardless of original intentions or the newspaper's view of things, Shakespeare has created characters that are so essentially 'real' that there's evidence for any sort of interpretation.

Summary: Very interesting and with a definite re-read value.