The Merchant of Venice is filled with antisemitic characters. Shylock reports that Antonio kicked, spat at, and insulted him: “You call me misbeliever, cut-throat dog, / And spit upon my Jewish gaberdine.” When Shylock seeks to do Antonio harm, the Christian Antonio indicates that nothing is harder than “His Jewish heart.”
Launcelot decides to leave his master Shylock because “the Jew is the very devil.” He uses the term “Jew” as an insult multiple times: “My master's a very Jew” and “for I am a Jew, if I serve the Jew any longer.” Launcelot also seems to believe that Jewish people cannot be kind, telling Jessica that his father must have been Christian because she is so sweet. He later says that she is damned because her father is Jewish.
Lorenzo calls Shylock “faithless,” as if Judaism isn’t a faith. Solanio refers to Shylock as “the villain Jew” and “the dog Jew.” Nearly everyone knows Shylock as the “Jew,” a word that sets him apart and gives a negative connotation due to the society’s antisemitism. Because of his religion and ethnicity, Shylock is considered an alien in his own home.
Characters mock and abuse Shylock, tying his cruelty, duplicity, and greed to his Jewishness. However, it is difficult to watch or read the play without thinking that Shylock’s severe flaws have developed in order to cope in a bigoted society.
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