The Merchant of Venice
William Shakespeare
Characters
Understanding the ways in which characters are presented in
Shakespeare’s plays is crucial if we want to understand the meanings that
are being communicated. As readers we rely on what characters say and
how they interact in order to construct pictures of them in our mind and
to make sense of what the playwright is trying to say.
Although it may sound obvious, The Merchant of Venice is a drama, and
was written to be performed. Studying a play requires a different focus
from studying a novel. The interpretations of director and actors and the
way the play is staged in terms of set, lighting and costume will have a
bearing on the messages and ideas that are communicated to us.
It is interesting that the presentation of Shylock has changed greatly
over the years. The Jew as a stereotypically evil character has been
replaced by a man bearing the weight of centuries of persecution on his
shoulders and the vicious taunts of Gratiano in Act 4, Scene 1 make us
squirm uncomfortably when we remember the Holocaust.
One of the most important aspects of dealing with characters in a play is
to come to some sort of conclusions about their dramatic function.
Shakespeare tells us a fascinating and lively story but he has important
themes or ideas to communicate as well.
Shylock
Despite the title of the play suggesting that Antonio is the central
character, Shylock is the main interest, a man who both fascinates and
repels us. His behaviour in the play is sickeningly vengeful yet somehow
sympathy for his situation is created. It is, however, too simplistic to
think of the play as either being merely anti-Semitic or of consciously
subverting the anti-Jewish prejudice of Shakespeare’s own time (see
background).
Shylock is a Jewish moneylender who lives in the Jewish ghetto in Venice
with his only daughter Jessica. He has no other family that we know of,
his wife is dead and we only see him with one other person from his
community, Tubal who functions simply to give Shylock information on his
runaway daughter. It seems that Shakespeare was not interested in
showing anything of the Jewish community although we see much of the
Christians.
It is difficult to make sense of him without understanding something of
the common beliefs in England at the time Shakespeare wrote this play.
Shylock is a moneylender and although this seems to be an unpleasant line
of work, study of the period in which the play was written reveals the
plight and suffering of the Jews in Europe. Most trades were barred to
Jews and Shylock is merely following one of the few professions open to
him. In Shakespeare’s time Shylock was portrayed as a villain and a clown
and it was not until the nineteenth century that the actor Edmund Keen
played him as a victim of unjust laws and prejudice.
Shakespeare is following in a long tradition of including in his play a villain
who is Jewish. The stereotype of the grasping, murderous Jew was
common in Elizabethan theatre and a few years before The Merchant of
Venice Christopher Marlowe’s play The Jew of Malta was hugely popular
and probably influenced Shakespeare in his creation of Shylock. In
Marlowe’s work, the Jew Barrabas is vicious and without redeeming
features.
As a study in hatred and revenge, Shylock goes beyond the traditional
stereotypes, however. He is presented initially as grasping and filled with
desire for vengeance and Shakespeare intended his audience to
sympathise entirely with Antonio when his life is placed at risk within the
terms of the bond of flesh. If Antonio cannot repay the money borrowed
for Bassanio to pursue Portia within the allotted time of three months,
Shylock is entitled to take a pound of flesh from Antonio’s body.
Despite the monstrous nature of the bond of the pound of flesh, our
sympathies for Shylock are engaged. For the modern audience, the
rampant anti-Semitism of the Christian characters is difficult to watch
and listen to and we hear good reasons why Shylock hates Antonio, who
has particularly targeted him, spat upon him and abused him in the
street:
‘You that did void your rheum upon my beard,
And foot me as you spurn a stranger cur
Over your threshold’ (1.iii.112-14)
It is ironic that this same man, with his friend Bassanio, has approached
Shylock for a loan and the temptation to place him in an impossible
position is too much. Shylock cleverly pretends to be friendly towards
Antonio:
‘I would be friends with you, and have your love,
Forget the shames that you have stained me with,’ (1.iii.133-4)
Of course, one of the contradictions in the play is that Shylock could not
possibly know that Antonio’s ships would be lost but the audience is
willing to suspend its disbelief in order to enjoy the excitement of the
unfolding of the plot.
It is a measure of Antonio’s hatred for Shylock that he remarks:
‘I am as like to call thee so again,
To spet on thee again, to spurn thee too.’ (1.iii.125-6)
Our sympathies (but not those of Shakespeare’s contemporary audience)
are further engaged when we witness Jessica’s treatment of her father:
‘Though I am a daughter to his blood,
I am not to his manners.’ (2.iii.18-19)
Her elopement and the theft of her father’s jewels and money seem like
a betrayal of both her family and her culture and Shylock’s sadness when
he discovers Jessica has exchanged her mother’s ring for a monkey is
understandable.
Even Shylock’s servant Lancelet Gobbo deserts him and goes to work for
Bassanio. Shylock is completely isolated.
One of the key speeches Shylock makes in the play is in Act 3, Scene 1
when Shylock responds to Salerio and Solanio’s gloating taunts over the
flight of Jessica:
‘Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses,
affections, passions?…..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?……The villainy you teach me I will execute, and it
shall go hard but I will better the instruction.’ (3.i.52-66)
His words transcend the anti-Semitic times in which Shakespeare was
writing and to the modern audience seem to be a call for tolerance in a
cruelly intolerant world. But the characterisation of Shylock is more
complex than that. We can be appalled at his behaviour, yet understand
his motives and feel moved by his words. He promises to exceed the
wrongs done to him and certainly his attempt on Antonio’s life does that.
The court scene is a clever and intriguing one. The terrible act of the
cutting of Antonio’s flesh that we believe we are about to witness
ensures that we feel Shylock’s desire for revenge is unspeakable and our
sympathies veer away from him. The scene has some stage directions,
unusual for Shakespeare, requiring the actor playing Shylock to whet the
blade of his knife in readiness. At this point in the play, Shakespeare had
a chance to show Shylock to be morally superior to the Christians.
Showing mercy towards Antonio despite the prejudice of the Christians
would have provided an exciting ending. This would have been unthinkable
to the Elizabethan audience, however, and for them, Shylock has to be
demonised throughout the play.
Instead, Shylock exults in Portia’s apparent support for him:
‘O wise and upright judge!’ (4.i.248)
When the court turns upon him and he discovers the law is against him,
not for him, he says little. It is up to the actor playing the part to
express the range of emotions we sense he must be feeling, with few
words to speak:
‘I am content.’ (4.i.393)
It is easy to imagine Shylock standing with a quiet dignity as his rights
and goods are stripped away. Our sympathies tend to shift back to him
because of the harsh treatment he receives at the hands of his Christian
tormentors who preach mercy but do not show it to non-Christians.
Contemporary productions bring out this aspect of the play, a different
situation from Shakespeare’s own time where the confounding and
punishment of the Jewish moneylender would give rise to much mirth.
Shylock is not a straightforward character and simple explanations do
not do the play justice. He acts without mercy in a time that offered him
no justice or real protection within the law. Perhaps that is why the
character and the play continue to fascinate audiences with every new
production.
Portia
Portia is the witty and spirited heroine of The Merchant of Venice.
Shakespeare often made his heroines more intelligent and lively than the
heroes and Portia is perhaps one of the best examples. She is an heiress
and before we even meet her we hear of her great beauty and eligibility.
‘In Belmont is a lady richly left,
And she is fair, and, fairer than that word,
Of wondrous virtues.’ (1.i.161-3)
However the terms of her father’s will mean that she must marry the
man who correctly identifies the one casket of three containing her
portrait. Although she is only bound by a promise, it is Portia’s sense of
the importance of family bonds that mean she keeps her word and she is
intelligent enough to realise that the casket test of flesh and 3 caskets
may find a husband more suited to her, who is able to look beyond mere
surface features. Our first encounter with Portia is in Act 1, Scene 2
when she wittily dismisses the suitors waiting to try the test, providing
great amusement for the audience.
Portia and Bassanio are ideally suited. She is of equal status to him and
she has plenty of money, something he needs. They fall in love instantly
and although critics over the years have been charmed by their pretty,
courtly speeches in Act 3, Scene 2 her references to him as her ‘Lord’
and the speed with which she surrenders all her possessions to him do
not seem to fit neatly with her earlier spirited humour or her actions
later.
‘You see me here, Lord Bassanio, where I stand,
Such as I am. Though for myself alone
I would not be ambitious in my wish
To wish myself much better, yet for you
I would be trebled twenty times myself ’
and
‘That, only to stand as high in your account,’ (3.ii.149-53 and 156)
When she discovers that her husband’s best friend is in danger she
immediately (and secretly) hatches a plan to save him by dressing as a
lawyer and going to the court where Antonio faces trial. Her courageous
actions in Act 4 are entirely in keeping with the woman of Act 1, Scene 2
and place the theme of appearance and reality central to the action.
In the court, Portia demonstrates intelligence and good judgement. She
is obviously aware, from the beginning, of the loophole in the law that
means the pound of flesh must be exact and that no drop of Christian
blood may be spilt in the process, and yet she allows Shylock a chance to
show mercy several times before she turns the tables on him.
‘Be merciful:
Take thrice the money. Bid me tear the bond.’ (4.i.231)
Her speeches in Act 4 (4.i.182-200) are beautifully measured and elegant
as well as philosophically balanced and are worth careful study. She is
able to construct an argument better than any man in the play and in this
area too she and Bassanio seem ill matched.
Her wit and good humour are apparent even in the highly intense
moments in the court when she pleads for mercy. She is unable to resist
making a remark when Bassanio offers to give up his wife if only Antonio
could be saved:
‘Your wife would give you little thanks for that.’ (4.i.286)
She does have some negative aspects to her character. She is racist as
her treatment of The Prince of Morocco shows and is cruel in her
relentless persecution of Shylock. Her idea of the ring trick is unkind as
well: Bassanio is entirely beholden to the young lawyer Balthazar (Portia
in disguise) and has to give her the ring when Antonio asks him to. It is
important to remember that Shakespeare needed to return the play to
the conventions of comedy — its dramatic climax is the trial scene and
our sympathies for, or hatred of, Shylock might overshadow the
lightness of the ending.
Antonio
Antonio is the middle-aged merchant of the title of the play. Like
Shylock, he is wealthy. Despite this he shows little of the keen business
sense that has allowed him to become a successful merchant and it is
astonishing that he has placed all his wealth into his ships at once, thus
exposing himself to possible ruin. He is of high status and is well
respected, and is thus placed in opposition to the Jewish moneylender.
At the beginning of the play Antonio comments that he is unhappy but
does not know the reason:
‘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:’ (1.i.1)
This opening speech strikes the keynote for Antonio. He is melancholy
despite his advantages and this sadness only lifts when his close friend
Bassanio is present. Their friendship is one of the central threads of the
play.
He has a premonition of disaster in Act 1, Scene 1, suggesting a brooding,
fatalistic nature. He comments to Gratiano:
‘I hold the world but as the world, Gratiano:
A stage, where every man must play a part,
And mine a sad one.’ (1.i.77-9)
His love for Bassanio is extraordinary:
‘My purse, my person, my extremest means,
Lie all unlocked to your occasions.’ (1.i.138-9)
And as Solanio comments in Act 2, Scene 8:
‘he only loves the world for him.’ (2.viii.50)
Antonio has acted as a benefactor to Bassanio, lending him money and
supporting his youthful excesses. He is even prepared to borrow money
from his greatest enemy Shylock in order to fund Bassanio’s trip to
Belmont to woo Portia and agrees to a horrific bond, a pound of his flesh
to be cut out by Shylock if he fails to repay the loan.
When his ships are lost and he cannot repay the money, his melancholy
fatalism means that he accepts the forfeit and pleads with the Duke:
‘Let me have judgement, and the Jew his will.’ (4.i.83)
He is a vehement anti-Semite and his treatment of Shylock has been
abusive and violent, as we hear in Act 1, Scene 3:
‘In the Rialto you have rated me’
and
‘You called me misbeliever, cut-throat, dog,
And spet upon my Jewish gaberdine.’ (1.iii.102)
Antonio has no regrets about his behaviour because he is aware of the
law and even promises Shylock ‘to spet on thee again’, if he is given the
opportunity. It seems little wonder that Shylock desires revenge.
Although many Christian characters in the play exhibit anti-Semitism
Antonio’s hatred seems extreme. It has been argued that his melancholy
and solitary nature required some sort of emotional outlet and that this
was achieved in his hatred of Shylock.
Some recent productions suggest Antonio’s feelings for Bassanio are not
entirely platonic. This is explained by his unmarried status, his offer to
lay down his life for Bassanio and his uncomfortable encounter with
Portia in Act 5, Scene 1, despite the fact that she has willingly offered
more than enough money to pay off the bond.
At the end of the trial scene it is Antonio who pushes for a full
punishment of Shylock (see theme of law and justice). He is quick to
seize his opportunity for revenge when the tables are turned on his
enemy.
Antonio is a very complex character. His love for Bassanio contrasts
sharply with his cruel treatment of Shylock and he seems displaced at
the end of the play when the married couples are reunited.
Bassanio
Bassanio is a straightforward character, the hero and the lover of Portia.
He does not change or develop as the play progresses and his decision to
give up the carefree life of a bachelor and marry has been made before
the play begins. His wooing of Portia should not be taken as a sign of
fortune-hunting tendencies despite his description of her as ‘richly
left’(1.i.161): Shakespeare’s original audience would have greatly approved
of this as an indication of maturity.
He is presented as the epitome of Elizabethan manhood, noble, educated,
handsome and much admired, yet heavily in debt. His attitude to life is
summed up in his opening line in Act 1, Scene 1: ‘Good signiors both, when
shall we laugh’(1.i.66). We gain a positive impression of him from his
friends. Antonio ‘only loves the world for him’(2.viii.50), and Portia whose
judgement we are intended to admire, falls in love with him. Nerissa feels
he is ‘the best deserving a fair lady’(1.ii.110), and his friends always
address him as ‘My Lord Bassanio’(1.i.69), and ‘Signior Bassanio’(2.ii.164).
Even Lancelet the fool wants to work for him.
He is honest. He freely admits he already has debts and plans to borrow
more in order to pay them all off. In Act 3, Scene 2 he tells Portia he has
no fortune:
‘When I did first impart my love to you,
I freely told you all the wealth I had
Ran in my veins: I was a gentleman.’ (3.ii.253-5)
In other words, true nobility and breeding count for as much as wealth.
In addition, when Portia confronts him over the whereabouts of the ring
she gave him he tells the truth.
To the modern audience, Bassanio appears headstrong. He spends money
recklessly, falls in love hastily and rashly offers his own life for his
friend Antonio in Act 4, Scene 1. He attempts to win Shylock over, yet
calls him devil. However, although he exhibits the same anti-Semitic
views as Antonio he is much more restrained in his abuse of Shylock.
It is difficult to feel interested in Bassanio as an individual. He lacks any
depth to his character and functions mainly as a foil for both Portia and
Antonio. His relationship with Antonio helps us to consider the nature of
the bond of friendship whilst the bond of romantic love is explored in the
scenes with Portia. However, the most interesting aspect to consider
here is the way the two relationships collide: the ring test, where
Bassanio is persuaded by Antonio to give up his love token places these
key relationships in opposition. Antonio’s behaviour in the final scene also
suggests that the two bonds might not be compatible.
Lorenzo
Lorenzo is a serious-minded Christian Venetian who falls in love with
Jessica and elopes with her. He does not seem to have planned beyond
this initial flight, however, and according to Tubal in Act 3, Scene 1 they
then roam around Italy spending money recklessly, probably on gambling.
He agrees to go to Portia’s house after meeting Salerio and does not
seem to have thought beyond that. The conversation he has with Jessica
about doomed lovers in Act 5, Scene 1 suggests that they may live to
regret their actions. The play is a comedy, however, and the punishment
meted out to Shylock means that Lorenzo and Jessica inherit a fortune,
suggesting a happy ending.
Lorenzo’s zealous conversion of Jessica highlights for us the plight of
the Jewish community in Venice. He shows no qualms in helping Jessica to
deceive her father nor at the theft which accompanied it.
Jessica
Jessica is the daughter of the moneylender Shylock and her character is
difficult to evaluate. Some modern audiences would disapprove of her
behaviour and thus feel sympathy for Shylock, others would understand
the desire of an unhappy teenager to leave her stifling home. The
Elizabethan audience would have wholeheartedly approved of Jessica’s
conversion to Christianity. She appears to be of a fickle, pleasure-loving
nature and is thus diametrically opposed to her father. Only once does
she show any remorse at her actions (2.iii.16) even though she is his only
kin.
Although she has converted she is not fully accepted by the Christian
nobility, represented by Portia. Her decision to marry Lorenzo was made
in haste: they have had little opportunity to meet and the conversation
they have about doomed lovers in Act 5, Scene 1 suggests that they
might live to regret it. Shakespeare once again questions the vows of
marriage.
Nerissa
Nerissa is Portia’s waiting woman at Belmont but she has a role far more
important than that of a servant. Her confidence and wit suggest she is
of nearly equal social status to Portia but lacks her wealth. She is Portia’s
confidante and shares her thoughts, for example, in Act 1, Scene 2 when
they laugh together about the inadequate suitors. She is prepared to
make Portia count her blessings, however in Act 1, Scene 2, lines 3-4. She
herself is headstrong, and, like Lorenzo and Jessica, she makes a hasty
marriage that she may live to regret. She does not appear to have
absorbed the message of the caskets that what appears on the surface
is not always the truth (see appearance and reality), despite being a
witness to the unsuccessful candidates.
She is a match for Portia in terms of humour but her jokes tend to be
cruder. She is a follower, she seems to model herself on Portia and
willingly goes along with the plan to dress up as men. She is the first to
start a quarrel when they return.
Gratiano
Gratiano is a high-spirited character, an acquaintance of Antonio and a
friend to Bassanio and does not seem to be particularly liked even by his
friends. In Act 1, Scene 1 we learn that his noisy aggression has got him
into trouble and others are often embarrassed by his behaviour. He
functions as a kind of fool and makes it his job to make others laugh. He
is described as ‘too wild, too rude, and bold of voice’(2.ii.169), and
Bassanio dryly comments:
‘Gratiano speaks an infinite deal of nothing, more than any man in all
Venice. His reasons are as two grains of wheat hid in two bushels of
chaff: you shall seek all day ere you find them, and when you have they
are not worth the search.’ (1.i.114)
He insists on accompanying Bassanio to Belmont despite the fact that his
friend has grave misgiving that he might not behave well. He does in the
end behave himself but rushes into things and falls in love with Nerissa in
the time it takes Bassanio to choose the right casket, drawing our
attention to the questions surrounding the vows of marriage.
He can be witty and in Act 1, Scene 1 in an attempt to cheer him up he
urges Antonio to, ‘Let me play the fool’(1.i.79). However there is a dark
and unpleasant side to his character, shown in Act 4, Scene 1. He
interrupts the court proceedings and does nothing to help matters. He
abuses Shylock openly and even though he probably only voices the views
of other characters, he speaks inappropriately, calling Shylock
‘inexecrable dog’(4.i.128), and thus earns Shylock’s telling rebuke,
‘Repair thy wit, good youth, or it will fall
To cureless ruin.’ (4.i.141-2)
He is delighted when Portia outwits Shylock and crows delightedly,
‘O Jew, an upright judge, a learnèd judge.’ (4.i.321)
The modern audience has little time for Gratiano’s nonsense and his
attacks only serve to increase our sympathy for Shylock.
Minor Characters
The Prince of Morocco
Together with the Prince of Arragon, the Prince of Morocco serves as an
example of an unsuitable suitor. We have already heard Portia’s scornful
dismissal of the others in Act 1, Scene 2 and because Morocco is unable
to choose the right casket he provides us with a contrast to the
eminently suitable Bassanio.
His choice of the gold casket is based entirely on surface value, alerting
us to the theme of appearance and reality — the most precious exterior
does not necessarily contain a centre of the greatest worth. He gains
‘what many men desire’(2.vii.5), gold, but it is of no real value. As the
writing on the scroll in the casket says, if Morocco had been as wise as
bold he would have seen past the surface and made a better choice.
In showing this, Shakespeare is asking us to consider human values.
Morocco is boastful and shallow and lacks the moral judgement needed to
make the correct choice. He is brave, strong and handsome, with many
sexual conquests but we are not meant to consider him to be as worthy as
Bassanio.
For the modern reader or audience there is a difficult issue surrounding
Morocco. He is black and, although she is polite to his face, Portia makes
no secret of her loathing for him:
‘Let all of his complexion choose me so.’ (2.vii.79)
Black skin was considered ugly in Shakespeare’s time — Bassanio talks of
veils hiding ‘Indian beauty’ (3.ii.99) in very negative terms. This racist
view is one that does not sit comfortably with our modern understanding
of the importance of tolerance and valuing difference. We do need to
look at the play within its own context, however. These views would be
considered commonplace then and a white actor would have played
Morocco in dark make-up. Although sometimes in Shakespeare’s
comedies, unsuited characters do fall in love, the requirement for a
happy ending means that by the end of the play the appropriate matches
are made in terms of social status. Morocco is presented as unsuitable
because he is black and it was unthinkable for a black man to marry a
white woman. In Shakespeare’s great tragedy Othello, the hero is black
and marries a white Venetian. Convention dictates that it must all end
tragically and he kills her, thus ensuring that the ‘unsuitable’ marriage is
ended.
A modern company can create some interesting moments with his
character: we do not particularly admire him but we feel the sting of
racism when he is dismissed by Portia.
The Prince of Arragon
As there are three caskets, the patterning of the folk tale dictates that
there need to be three suitors, two of whom should be unsuccessful.
Arragon is the second unsuccessful candidate and increases our sense of
dramatic tension as we observe him making his choice.
Arragon chooses the silver casket, believing it to be no more than he
deserves. Even his name suggests the word ‘arrogant’ and indeed his
overblown sense of self-importance means he wins only a picture of a
‘blinking idiot’(2.ix.54) or fool. Shakespeare is inviting us to laugh at him,
more so than for Morocco. It is important to note that Arragon was a
Spanish kingdom and the Spanish were bitter enemies to England. By
showing Arragon to be full of self-importance and conceit Shakespeare
was having fun at the expense of a popular enemy.
Tubal
Tubal is a friend of Shylock’s and Shakespeare is careful to show their
relationship as business-like. They do not talk of friendship or ideas but
instead Shylock receives the gossip on his daughter’s behaviour.
Sometimes Tubal is interpreted as malicious in his intentions, sometimes
as a good friend to Shylock.
The Duke
The Duke does not appear until the trial scene, Act 4, Scene 1, but is
mentioned before in the context of Jessica’s disappearance. As ruler of
the state of Venice he is the most powerful and wealthy man in the city
and has the final judgement in major disputes. He represents the law in
Venice. He could be viewed as weak because he is not prepared to rule
against Shylock in order to see justice prevail. It is only the intervention
of Portia, in disguise as Balthazar the lawyer, which saves Antonio.
To the modern audience it is somewhat disturbing that he has clearly
taken the side of the prisoner before the trial begins:
‘I am sorry for thee; thou art come to answer
A stony adversary, an inhuman wretch,’ (4.i.3-4)
This only serves to underline the second-class status of Jews.
Salerio and Solanio
These two Venetians are introduced in Act 1, Scene 1 as a means of
showing the extent of Antonio’s popularity and thus provide a contrast
with the isolated Shylock. Their friendship with Antonio is one-sided
however — they view him as a means to better themselves socially and
are often portrayed on stage as jealous of the attention Antonio gives to
Bassanio. They usually appear together and are not distinguished from
one another in terms of character. They also add a sense of laddishness
to the elopement scene (Act 2, Scene 6) by noisily (and possibly
drunkenly) supporting Lorenzo.
Their comments about and to Shylock are unpleasantly ant-Semitic and in
this they serve to remind us of the general anti-Jewish prejudice in
Venice.
Their most important function is as a kind of chorus, or narrators. They
give the audience and the major characters updates on the action and on
events supposedly taking place off stage, for example, in Act 2, Scene 8
and in Act 3, Scene 1, events that would have taken too long to show
onstage. Thus they act as devices for sustaining dramatic tension.
Lancelet Gobbo and Old Gobbo
Lancelet is a character who changes in the play. He begins as a comic
figure who represents the lower-class people of Venice but by the end
has become more of a professional stage fool successfully teasing
Jessica and irritating Lorenzo.
He is not interested in the affairs of the higher-status characters like
Antonio and Bassanio unless they affect him. His move to Bassanio’s
household seems to be based on boredom and on casual anti-Semitism —
he calls Shylock ‘the devil’(2.ii.24-5) without apparent ill-feeling. Shylock
describes him as greedy and is pleased that Bassanio will now have to pay
for his food.
His humour is in the form of clownish capering and he constantly and
unconsciously makes verbal mistakes, mixing up his words and making
quite different meanings. He teases his blind father and pretends to be
someone else. He seems genuinely fond of Jessica, however, and part of
his function is to aid her escape by relaying messages. In addition he
lightens the atmosphere of the play, particularly after dramatically
intense moments. For example, after the tension of the bond scene, Act
1, Scene 3, and the high formality of the first casket scene, Act 2, Scene
1, his silly capering serves as light relief for the audience, an important
aspect of comedy
His comic struggle with his conscience in Act 2, Scene 2 is intended to
remind the audience of morality plays.
Balthazar, Stephano and Leonardo
These three characters are all servants of Portia and Bassanio. Their
presence ensures we understand the high status of their employers.