Contract, Friendship, and Love inThe Merchant of Venice

Shakespeare shows how enforceable contract not only undergirds the city of Venice, which makes a multicultural society possible, but its corrosive effects on non-contractual relationships like friendship, love, and marriage. This is evident in the decisions, actions, and relationships of Antonio, Bassanio, Portia, and Jessica. Although Shakespeare concludes the play on a happy note, the conclusion one can reach is that, despite its advantages, regimes based on commerce and contract fail to create the conditions for friendship, love, and marriage to flourish. Keywords: commercecontractShakespeareThe Merchant of Venice NotesI thank referees Richard Avramenko, Brianne Walsh, and the University of Wisconsin Political Theory workshop for their criticism of this article. Most critics have focused on the themes of justice and mercy as, respectively, represented by the character Shylock and the city Venice and Portia and Belmont. E. K. Chambers, Shakespeare: A Survey (London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1925), 106–17; J. W. Lever, "Shylock, Portia and the Values of Shakespearian Comedy," Shakespeare Quarterly 3 (1952): 383–86; John Russell Brown, The Merchant of Venice (London: Methuen, 1955); C. L. Barber, Shakespeare's Festive Comedy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1959), 163–91; W. H. Auden, "Brothers and Others," in The Dryer's Hand and Other Essays (London: Faber & Faber, 1963), 218–37; Nevill Coghill, "The Theme of The Merchant of Venice," in Twentieth Century Interpretations of "The Merchant of Venice," ed. Sylvan Barnet (Englewood Cliffs: NJ: Prentice Hall, 1970), 108–13; Albert Wertheim, "The Treatment of Shylock and Thematic Integrity in The Merchant of Venice," Shakespeare Studies 6 (1970): 75–87; Raymond B. Waddington, "Blind Gods: Fortune, Justice, and Cupid in The Merchant of Venice," English Literary History 44 (1977): 458–77. For other themes in the play, refer to Barbara K. Lewalski, "Biblical Allusion and Allegory in The Merchant of Venice," Shakespeare Quarterly 13 (1962): 327–43; Thomas H. Fujumura, "Mode and Structure in The Merchant of Venice," PMLA 81 (1966): 449–511; Peter G. Phialas, Shakespeare's Romantic Comedies (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1966); Danson Lawrence, The Harmonies of The Merchant of Venice (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1978); Isabella Wheater, "Aristotelian Wealth and the Sea of Love: Shakespeare's Synthesis of Greek Philosophy and Roman Poetry in The Merchant of Venice," The Review of English Studies, New Series 44 (1993): 16–36. Scholars also have looked at the role of women in the play. Camille Slights, "In Defense of Jessica: The Runaway Daughter in The Merchant of Venice," Shakespeare Quarterly 31 (1980): 357–68; Karen Newman, "Portia's Ring: Unruly Women and Structures of Exchanges in The Merchant of Venice," Shakespeare Quarterly 38 (1987): 19–33; Lynda Boose, "The Comic Contract and Portia's Golden Ring," Shakespeare Studies 20 (1988): 241–54; Carol Leventen, "Patrimony and Patriarchy in The Merchant of Venice," in The Matter of Difference: Materialist Feminist Criticism of Shakespeare, ed. Valerie Wayne (Ithaca: Cornell UP, 1991), 57–79; Olvia Delgado de Torres, "Reflections on Patriarchy and the Rebellion of Daughters in Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice and Othello," Interpretations 21 (1994): 333–51. Finally, there are commentators who believe there is no coherent plot or theme in the play. Leo Salinger, Shakespeare and the Tradition of Comedy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1974), 298–317; Norman Rabkin, "Meaning and The Merchant of Venice," in Shakespeare and the Problem of Meaning (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981), 1–32; David N. Beauregard, "Sidney, Aristotle, and The Merchant of Venice: Shakespeare's Triadic Image of Liberty and Justice," Shakespeare Studies 20 (1988): 33–48; Derek Cohen, Shakespeare's Motives (London: Macmillan, 1988); John Lyon, The Merchant of Venice (Boston: Twayne, 1988).For critics who see Shylock as the pivotal figure in the play, refer to John W. Draper, "Usury in The Merchant of Venice," Modern Philology 33 (1935): 37–47; E. C. Pettet, "The Merchant of Venice and the Problem of Usury," Essays and Studies 31 (1945): 19–33; C. L. Barber, Shakespeare's Festive Comedy, 163–91; Frank Kermode, "The Mature Comedies," in Early Shakespeare, eds. John Russell Brown and Bernard Harris (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1961), 220–24; Allan Bloom, "On Christian and Jew," in Allan Bloom with Harry V. Jaffa, Shakespeare's Politics (New York: Basic Books, 1964), 13–33; Paul N. Siegel, "Shylock, the Elizabethan Puritan, and Our Own World," in Shakespeare in His Time and Ours (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1968), 337–38; John R. Cooper, "Shylock's Humanity," Shakespeare Quarterly 21 (1970): 117–24; Lawrence Danson, The Harmonies of The Merchant of Venice, 1–18; Marc Shell, "The Wether and the Ewe: Verbal Usury in The Merchant of Venice," Kenyon Review 1 (1979): 65–92; René Girard, "'To Entrap the Wisest': A Reading of The Merchant of Venice," in Literature and Society, ed. Edward W. Said (Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1980), 100–19; Burton Hatlen, "Feudal and Bourgeois Concepts of Value in The Merchant of Venice," in Shakespeare: Contemporary Critical Approaches, ed. Harry R. Garvin (Lewisburg: Bucknell University Press, 1980), 91–105; John Barton, "Exploring a Character: Playing Shylock," in Playing Shakespeare (London: Methuen, 1984), 169–80; Richard Arneson, "Shakespeare and the Jewish Question," Political Theory 13 (1985): 85–111; Derek Cohen, "Shylock and the Idea of the Jew," in Shakespearean Motives (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1988), 104–18; Samuel Ajzenstat, "Contract in The Merchant of Venice," Philosophy and Literature 21 (1997): 262–78; Martin D. Yaffe, Shylock and the Jewish Question (Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1997); Jay Michaelson, "In Praise of the Pound of Flesh: Legalism, Multiculturalism, and the Problem of the Soul," Journal of Law 98 (2005): 1–31; Susannah Heschel, "From Jesus to Shylock: Christian Supersessionism and "The Merchant of Venice," Harvard Theological Review 99 (2006): 407–31; Gorman Beauchamp, "Shylock's Conversion," Humanitas XXIV (2012): 55–92.Citations of the play are from G. Blackemore Evans et al., eds., The Riverside Shakespeare (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1974), 254–85.Both Bloom and Torres make this point explicitly. Allan Bloom, "On Christian and Jew," 14–16; Olvia Delgado de Torres, "Reflections on Patriarchy and the Rebellion of Daughters," 339. For more about the sources that influenced Shakespeare's understanding of Venice, refer to Bloom's first footnote as well as endnotes 8, 9, 17, 29, and 30 of this article.For interpretations of the court scene as a conflict between law and equity or justice and mercy, refer to endnote 1 as well as Maxine MacKay, "The Merchant of Venice: A Reflection of the Early Conflict Between Courts of Law and Courts of Equity," Shakespeare Quarterly 15 (1964): 371–75; Andrews Mark E. Law versus Equity in The Merchant of Venice (Boulder: Colorado University Press, 1965); George W. Keeton, Shakespeare's Legal and Political Background (London: Pitman, 1967), 132–50; Ruth M. Levitsky, "Shylock's as Unregenerate Man," Shakespeare Quarterly 28 (1977): 243–63.A recent production that emphasizes commerce in the play was Daniel Sullivan's New York production in Central Park in 2010. Ben Brantley, "Theater Review: The Merchant of Venice, "Railing at a Money-Mad World," June 30, 2010, http://theater2.nytimes.com/2010/07/01/theater/reviews/01merchant.html?n=Top/Reference/Times Topics/Subjects/T/Theater&_r=0moc.semityn.2retaeht&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1348624665-6C3Joxzn81A7UMTrD+CmkA; Stephen Greenblatt, "Shakespeare & Shylock," The New York Review of Books, September 30, 2010, http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2010/sep/30/shakespeare-shylock/?pagination=false.Sigurd Burckhardt, "The Merchant of Venice: The Gentle Bond," English Literary History 29 (1962): 239–62; MacKay, "The Merchant of Venice: A Reflection of the Early Conflict between Courts of Law and Courts of Equity"; Robert Hapgood, "Portia and the Merchant of Venice: The Gentle Bond," Modern Language Quarterly 28 (1967): 19–32; John P. Sisk, "Bondage and Release in The Merchant of Venice," Shakespeare Quarterly 20 (1969): 217–23; E. F. J. Tucker, "The Letter of the Law in The Merchant of Venice," Shakespeare Survey 29 (1976): 93–101; Jan Lawson Hinely, "Bond Priorities in The Merchant of Venice," Studies in English Literature 20 (1980): 217–39; William Chester Jordan, "Approaches to the Court Scene in the Bond Story: Equity and Mercy or Reason and Nature," Shakespeare Quarterly 33 (1982): 49–59; Lars Engle, "'Thrift is Blessing'": Exchange and Explanation in The Merchant of Venice," Shakespeare Quarterly 37 (1986): 20–37; Charles Spinosa, "Shylock and Debt and Contract in The Merchant of Venice," Cardozo Studies in Law and Literature 5 (1993): 65–85; "The Transformation of Intentionality: Debt and Contract in The Merchant of Venice," English Literary Renaissance 24 (1994): 370–409; Frederick Turner, Shakespeare's Twenty-First-Century Economics. The Morality of Love and Money (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999).C. L. Barber, "The Merchants and the Jew of Venice: Wealth's Communion and an Intruder," in Twentieth Century Interpretations of The Merchant of Venice, ed. Sylvan Barnet (Englewood Cliffs: NJ: Prentice Hall, 1970), 11–32; Shell, "The Wether and the Ewe"; William Chester Jordan, "Approaches to the Court Scene in The Bond Story: Equity and Mercy or Reason and Nature," Shakespeare Quarterly 33 (1982): 45–59; Donna M. Kish-Goodling, "Using 'The Merchant of Venice' in Teaching Monetary Economics," The Journal of Economic Education 29, no. 4 (1998): 330–39; Suzanne Penuel, "Castrating the Creditor in "The Merchant of Venice," Studies in English Literature 44 (2004): 255–75. For the methodology of understanding the play in a historical context, refer to Walter Cohen, "The Merchant of Venice and the Possibilities of Historical Criticism," English Literary History 49 (1982): 765–89.For those who argue that the practice of humans being used as collateral was a common one during Shakespeare's time, refer to Theodore B. Leinwand, Theater, Finance and Society in Early Modern England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999); Linda Woodbridge, ed., Money and the Age of Shakespeare: Essays in New Economic Criticism (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003); Valerie Forman, Tragicomic Redemptions: Global Economics and the Early Modern English Stage (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2008); Natasha Korda, "Dame Usury: Gender, Credit, and (Ac)counting in the Sonnets and The Merchant of Venice," Shakespeare Quarterly 60 (2009): 129–53; Amanda Bailey, "Shylock and the Slaves: Owning and Owning in The Merchant of Venice," Shakespeare Quarterly 62 (2011): 1–24.Harp makes a comparison of risk taking in business and love, but he does not explore the origins or how these parallel activities are related in the play, whereas Sharp believes that gift giving rather than contractual consent is the dominant relationship among the characters, thereby severing the connection between non-contractual and contractual relations. Shirley and Kerrigan look at the use of promises and swearing in Shakespeare's play, which is similar to contracts but lack their binding force. Frances Shirley, Swearing and Perjury in Shakespeare's Plays (London: Allen & Unwin, 1979); Ronald A. Sharp, "Gift Exchange and the Economies of Spirit in 'The Merchant of Venice,'" Modern Philology 83 (1986): 250–65; William Kerrigan Shakespeare's Promises (Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1999); Richard Harp, "Love and Money in The Merchant of Venice," Modern Age (Winter 2010): 37–44.For those who attribute the cause of Antonio's sadness to religious or philosophical reasons, refer to Lawrence W. Hyman and Thomas H. Fujmura, "Antonio in The Merchant of Venice," PMLA 82 (1967): 649–50; Allan Holaday, "Antonio and the Allegory of Salvation," Shakespeare Studies 4 (1968): 109–18; R. Chris Hassel Jr., "Antonio and the Ironic Festivity of The Merchant of Venice," Shakespeare Studies 6 (1970): 67–74; J. A. Bryant Jr., "'The Merchant of Venice' and the Common Flaw (For C.T.H.)," The Sewanee Review 81 (1973): 606–22; Monica J. Hamill, "Poetry, Law, and the Pursuit of Perfection: Portia's Role in The Merchant of Venice," Studies in English Literature 18 (1978): 229–43; David Lowenthal, Shakespeare and the Good Life (New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 1997), 147–72; Henry S. Turner, "The Problem of More-than-One: Friendship, Calculation, and Political Association in The Merchant of Venice," Shakespeare Quarterly 57 (2006): 413–42. Other critics have argued that Antonio's condition is due to the conflict between friendship and marriage. John D. Hurrell, "Love and Friendship in The Merchant of Venice," Texas Studies in Literature and Language 3 (1961): 328–41; Lawrence W. Hyman, "The Rival Lovers in The Merchant of Venice," Shakespeare Quarterly 21 (1970): 109–16; Walter F. Eggers Jr., "Love and Likeness in The Merchant of Venice," Shakespeare Quarterly 28 (1977): 327–33; Alice N. Benston, "Portia, the Law, and the Tripartite Structure of The Merchant of Venice," Shakespeare Quarterly 30 (1979): 384–85; Cynthia Lewis, "Antonio and Alienation in 'The Merchant of Venice,'" South Atlantic Review 48 (1983): 19–31; Richard Rorty, Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), 3–22; Michael Zuckert, "The New Medea: On Portia's Comic Triumph in The Merchant of Venice," in Shakespeare's Political Pageant: Essays in Literature and Politics, eds. Joseph Alulis and Vickie Sullivan (New York: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 1996), 3–36. For explanations of Antonio's sadness as suppressed homosexual feelings, refer to Graham Midgley, "The Merchant of Venice: A Reconsideration," Essays in Criticism 10 (1960): 119–33; W. H. Auden, "Brothers and Others," in The Dryer's Hand and Other Essays (London: Faber & Faber, 1963), 218–37; Steven Patterson, "The Bankruptcy of Homoerotic Amity in Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice," Shakespeare Quarterly 50 (1999): 9–32. Finally, there are those who believe that Antonio's melancholy is motiveless. Janet Spens, An Essay on Shakespeare's Relation to Tradition (Oxford: B. H. Blackwell, 1916), 45; John Middleton Murray, Shakespeare (New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1936), 155; Bernard Grebarnier, The Truth about Shylock (New York: Random House, 1962), 215–19.It is not unreasonable to assume that some ethical presuppositions that informed the late Elizabethan period had roots in classical Greek and Roman philosophies. It is well known that Aristotle's Ethics and Cicero's On Duties were part of the intellectual and educational culture of the period; and these specific works were cited by the widest range of writers on the most diverse questions. The Ethics appeared in both public and private inventories two or three times more often than the Politics; and On Duties was ubiquitous in English grammar-school classrooms throughout the sixteenth centuries for instruction in Latin. Neal Wood, "Cicero and Political Thought of the Early English Renaissance," Modern Language Quarterly 51 (1990): 185–207; David Harris Sacks, "The Greed of Judas: Avarice, Monopoly, and the Moral Economy in England, ca. 1350-ca.1600,"Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies 28 (1998): 263–307; Howard Jones, Master Tully: Cicero in Tudor England (Nieuwkoop: De Graaf, 1998), 120–42; Henry Turner, The English Renaissance Stage: Geometry, Poetics, and the Practical Spatial Arts 1580-1630 (Oxford: Oxford UP, 2006), 47–50, 62–63, 65. Also refer to Isabella Wheater, "Aristotelian Wealth and the Sea of Love: Shakespeare's Synthesis of Greek Philosophy and Roman Poetry in The Merchant of Venice."Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, trans. H Rackham, Loeb Classical Library (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1990), 1156b8–19. Subsequent citations are in text. For the other types of Aristotelian friendships, utility and pleasure, refer to 1156a6–30. For more about Aristotle's account of friendship, refer to Stephen Salkever, "Taking Friendship Seriously: Aristotle on the Place(s) of Philia in Human Life," in Friendship and Politics: Essays in Political Thought, eds. John von Heyking and Richard Avarmenko (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 2008), 53–83; John von Heyking, "'Sunaisthetic' Friendship and the Foundations of Political Anthropology," International Political Anthropology 1 (2008): 179–93.Bassanio does not seem to operate entirely out of self-interest, because the next lines in his description about Portia indicate that he does recognize virtue "And she is fair and, fairer that word, / Of wondrous virtues" (I.i.161–63). However, this conflict between self-interest and virtue manifests itself again when Bassanio decides to value his friendship with Antonio over his marriage to Portia, when Bassanio gives his wedding ring, albeit reluctantly, to Balthazar (IV.i.452–54).This is the consensus among critics. John D. Hurrell, "Love and Friendship in The Merchant of Venice"; Lawrence W. Hyman, "The Rival Lovers in The Merchant of Venice"; Walter F. Eggers Jr., "Love and Likeness in The Merchant of Venice"; Alice N. Benston, "Portia, the Law, and the Tripartite Structure of The Merchant of Venice"; Cynthia Lewis, "Antonio and Alienation in 'The Merchant of Venice'"; Michael Zuckert, "The New Medea: On Portia's Comic Triumph in The Merchant of Venice."Both Lowenthal and Holmer argue that Antonio does achieve a type of self-knowledge at the end of the play: Lowenthal sees Antonio as representative of classical philosophical knowledge in contrast to revelation, whereas Holmer interprets Antonio as being bound in a more perfect love with Bassanio and Portia. Although Antonio is now part of the community formed by Bassanio's and Portia's marriage, it is not evident in the play that Antonio has learned what friendship truly is. Lowenthal, Shakespeare and the Good Life, 147–48, 170–72; Joan Ozark Holmer, "The Education of The Merchant of Venice," Studies in English Literature 25 (1985): 307–35.It is important to note, particularly for the next section of this article, that by Shakespeare's time, the notion that a woman could be owned by her father or husband was being challenged. While fathers and potential husbands did have a claim to a woman's legal persona, they had no rights to her actual person. Furthermore, married women were not considered property, and a woman's interest in property could not be entirely denied. Probate evidence of the period indicates that women had control over property, particularly over land, than what the law had admitted. This was particularly true for women of higher social status or who possessed greater wealth than their husbands. Finally, sealed bonds that dictated a daughter's marital choice would have been unusual during Shakespeare's period, because daughters had some say in their choice of a husband. David Seipp, "The Concept of Property in Early Common Law," Law and History Review 12 (1994): 29–91; Amy Louise Erickson, Women and Property in Early Modern England (London: Routledge, 1993); B. J. Sokol and Mary Sokol. Shakespeare, Law, and Marriage (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003).For critics who disagree with this similarity between Belmont and Venice, refer to endnote 1.It is surprising that critics have failed to see the contractual and commercial language and thinking of Portia. For other interpretations of her role, refer to Robert Hapgood, "Portia and the Merchant of Venice: The Gentle Bond"; Herbert S. Donow, "Shakespeare's Caskets: Unity in The Merchant of Venice," Shakespeare Studies 4 (1968): 86–93; Monica J. Hamill, "Poetry, Law, and the Pursuit of Perfection: Portia's Role in The Merchant of Venice"; Joan Ozark Holmer, "Loving Wisely and the Casket Test: Symbolic and Structural Unity in The Merchant of Venice," Shakespeare Studies 11 (1978): 53–76; Alice N. Benston, "Portia, the Law, and the Tripartite Structure of The Merchant of Venice"; Harry Berger Jr., "Marriage and Mercifixion in The Merchant of Venice: The Casket Scene Revisited," Shakespeare Quarterly 32 (1981): 155–62; Karen Newman, "Portia's Ring: Unruly Women and Structures of Exchanges in The Merchant of Venice"; Lynda Boose, "The Comic Contract and Portia's Golden Ring"; Michael Zuckert, "The New Medea: On Portia's Comic Triumph in The Merchant of Venice"; Barbara Tovey, "The Golden Casket: An Interpretation of The Merchant of Venice," in Shakespeare as Political Thinker, eds. John E. Alvis and Thomas G. West (Wilmington, DE: ISI Books, 2000), 261–87.Tovey points out that Portia's song contains several words that rhyme with as and Barbara Tovey, "The Golden Casket: An Interpretation of The Merchant of Venice"; also see Michael Zuckert, "The New Medea: On Portia's Comic Triumph in The Merchant of more about a of the play, refer to the critics in endnotes and Bassanio his as part of his marital contract with Portia can be in and more about the relationship between fathers and daughters in the play, refer to Leo of The Merchant of Venice," English Literary History (1973): Camille Slights, "In Defense of Jessica: The Runaway Daughter in The Merchant of Venice"; Karen Newman, "Portia's Ring: Unruly Women and Structures of Exchanges in The Merchant of Venice"; Lynda Boose, "The Comic Contract and Portia's Golden Ring"; Carol Leventen, "Patrimony and Patriarchy in The Merchant of Venice"; Olvia Delgado de Torres, "Reflections on Patriarchy and the Rebellion of Daughters in Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice and is one of the not Shakespeare characters, who at the end of the play does not with her father and is is the is often the of a or A between and these other two is her to whereas both and Christian throughout their in her husband and to her an as to her be be by he / a Christian more about who the contract in the play, refer to René E. and the of Allegory in The Merchant of Venice," Studies in English Literature is to that the melancholy of Antonio at the of the play the melancholy of and at the of the scene of the are but they not C. The Meaning of Shakespeare (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, Burckhardt, "The Merchant of Venice: The Gentle Bond," most critics as For the interpretations on its refer to endnote more about in refer to J. G. A. The Political Thought and the Atlantic Tradition Princeton University Press, and the in History & Essays in of eds. Valerie and (London: 1981), shows how among Elizabethan Classical and in English Political Thought, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, also refer to Political Thought in The Cambridge History of Political Thought, ed. J. H. with Mark (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), David the English and Politics, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, Poetry and Politics in the English Renaissance (Oxford: Oxford University Press, For in Shakespeare's refer to "Shakespeare and History and Shakespeare and (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, Shakespeare and Political (Chicago: University of Chicago Press

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