Death in Venice

In this book Rabkin looks at several Shakespeare plays including The Merchant of Venice, Henry V, and The Tempest as well as many others. Rabkin uses these to support his argument that the plays do mean something more than can be conveyed by description alone. He shows that there are many complex paradoxical elements present in Shakespeare’s work. The first chapter is entitled “Meaning and The Merchant of Venice”. In this chapter Rabkin begins by explaining his perception of the changing…

Shylock shows the intriguing conflict between the Christians and the Jews in Venice. Shylock immediately shows his hatred for Antonio, as he says in an aside, “I hate him for he is a Christian; But more, for that in low simplicity He lends out money gratis”. This shows his loathing for Antonio based on that fact that he dislikes Christians and highlighting the conflict between Christians and Jews in Venice, furthermore, Antonio is seen as a rival in his business, this further emphasizes the…

It would be unfair to claim the all the rulers and people of the middle ages and renaissance, where all biased and unfair. There were kings, popes, barons, clergy, and simpletons, who defended the Jews, and attempted to provide equality and justice for all of their subjects (Roth, Foa, Wein). King James I of Aragon, is paradigmatic of such a ruler. There were many atrocities committed against the Jews during the King Jamie’s reign, and many forced disputations between Jewish and Christian clergy…

The Diary of Anne Frank by Francis Goodrich and Albert Hackett includes dramatic license which is unjustified because of Anne Frank: The biography by Melissa Müller because the people are shown with different personalities, some events were not present, and the people in the annex were given inaccurate emotions. The change made to Mr. Van Daan’s personality causes the reader to believe that he is a horrible person. He has been shown as this rude, selfish person because He was shown…

When working on Portia my instinct was initially fire and I’m happy to say that my instinct was right. Portia’s journey in Julius Caesar led me to believe that she was in fact fire. In an intense proclamation of love for her husband, Brutus, Portia stabs herself in the leg. Act 2 Scene 1, “I have made strong proof of my constancy, Giving myself a voluntary wound Here, in the thigh: can I bear it with patience, And not my husband’s secrets?” In this case Portia chooses action into order to prove…

It is common to pontificate about matters of love and money, and how one comes to effect the other. At best, the true connection of love and money is undefined, and at worst, it is unknowable. In Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice, love and money are core themes which dictate not only the relationships of characters but the motivations of characters as well. Love and money become so interlaced in this play, that the independent existence of one without the other becomes an impossibility. Through…

One piece of literature that would convey Atwood’s views on finances, and fairness, and how it works in society is Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice. This piece allows you to view how finances worked in a different time period, compared to how it was described in Payback. The merchant of Venice is Antonio whom is close friends with Bassanio. In the piece of literature Bassanio quickly depleted his funds in pursuit of a wealthy women, Portia. To continue to court, and…

lose all he worked hard for, be abandoned by loved ones, and be forced to give up his identity after being oppressed by other civilians with strong religious beliefs, would this individual remain as villainous as intended to be? In The Merchant of Venice, a play written by William Shakespeare, a dramatic plot was set in an era where the judgement and persecution of Jewish people was acceptable. Respectively, Shakespeare chose to characterize the villain of the play to be a Jewish moneylender…

This is a critique of the production of The Last Night of Ballyhoo. The Last Night of Ballyhoo is Alfred Uhry’s glance back into Southern Jewish nostalgia based on his life’s experiences. The Last Night of Ballyhoo won the 1997 Tony Award for Best Play. Ballyhoo is established only a couple of months after Hitler’s military occupied Poland. However, as a amount of Ballyhoo characters propose, Hitler and Europe are too distant to be of life-threatening alarm This play was written by Alfred Uhry,…

William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice is one of his most disputable plays for an assortment of reasons. Written in sixteenth-century England, where against Semitism was normal and the nearness of Jews was not, the play suggests numerous conversation starters concerning racial, religious and human distinction. The play is particularly precarious to inspect in the present society, as its hostile to Semitic subjects and dialect can be awkward to look in a world post-Holocaust. Also, the…