I'm honestly not sure which I cringe at more, fiedler:

Your seemingly-simplistic and classroom-parroted reading of Shakespeare...

Or your simplistic take on morality to such an extent as to see that neither Aaron nor Shylock are truly good or evil...but, as the Great Mustachioed German would say:

BEYOND Good and Evil, in that grey, ambiguous area of morality that actual adults have to deal with, where not everyone is perfectly-good by their actions or perfectly-evil or, even more troubling, when they're in some sense BOTH at the same time.

You are assuming that the audience would sympathize with a Jew. Unlikely. In today's world we would see the misfortunes that befell Shylock as the result of intolerance and antisemitism. That is likely not the way people would see it in Shakespearean England where Jews were still expelled from the country. Sympathy is reserved for those that deserve it, English society, and most likely Shakespeare had little sympathy for Jews. The misfortune that befell Shylock could just as easily be seen as retribution for his jewishness. you make much of his daughter having positive traits despite being Jewish, but she converts and marries a christian, showing that she was truly good all along. Shylock, the wicked one bent on revenge is the last to hold onto his Jewish identity. Good thing this is a COMEDY and Shylock's forced conversion is a happy ending.

What you have is an uppity jew, who no one in the play sympathizes with, losing the court case, and almost his property and his life until the truly generous Christians let him live (but not as a Jew) in contrast to his insatiable desire for revenge.

And it would make sense you see it as sympathetic. According to the Internet, starting in the late nineteenth century, Shylock, who used to be played on stage as a clown, started to be played as a sympathetic character. All the plays you have seen play him as sympathetic, all your teachers have been taught to read him as sympathetic, but that does not mean he was meant to be sympathetic in 16th century England.

I think the most damning evidence to Obi's view is that this is a Comedy, not a Tragedy. If what happened to Shylock at the en of the play constitutes a happy ending, I dont know how you could claim that, as a Jew, he is supposed to be sympathetic.

when did I say Titus/the Romans were 'better' than aaron? You introduced the subject of titus.

But since you do insist, you say:
"But Aaron, killing because--hey!--it sucks to be a slave and he has no other means of power or freedom, HE doesn't meet that bar of morality set by Titus?"

You seem to forget, professor, Aarons conversation with lucius before he is executed:

AARON
Tut, Lucius, this was but a deed of charity
To that which thou shalt hear of me anon.
'Twas her two sons that murder'd Bassianus;
They cut thy sister's tongue and ravish'd her
And cut her hands and trimm'd her as thou saw'st.

LUCIUS
O detestable villain! call'st thou that trimming?

AARON
Why, she was wash'd and cut and trimm'd, and 'twas
Trim sport for them that had the doing of it.

LUCIUS
O barbarous, beastly villains, like thyself!

AARON
Indeed, I was their tutor to instruct them:
That codding spirit had they from their mother,
As sure a card as ever won the set;
That bloody mind, I think, they learn'd of me,
As true a dog as ever fought at head.
Well, let my deeds be witness of my worth.
I train'd thy brethren to that guileful hole
Where the dead corpse of Bassianus lay:
I wrote the letter that thy father found
And hid the gold within the letter mention'd,
Confederate with the queen and her two sons:
And what not done, that thou hast cause to rue,
Wherein I had no stroke of mischief in it?
I play'd the cheater for thy father's hand,
And, when I had it, drew myself apart
And almost broke my heart with extreme laughter:
I pry'd me through the crevice of a wall
When, for his hand, he had his two sons' heads;
Beheld his tears, and laugh'd so heartily,
That both mine eyes were rainy like to his :
And when I told the empress of this sport,
She swooned almost at my pleasing tale,
And for my tidings gave me twenty kisses.

First Goth
What, canst thou say all this, and never blush?

AARON
Ay, like a black dog, as the saying is.

LUCIUS
Art thou not sorry for these heinous deeds?

AARON
Ay, that I had not done a thousand more.
Even now I curse the day--and yet, I think,
Few come within the compass of my curse,--
Wherein I did not some notorious ill,
As kill a man, or else devise his death,
Ravish a maid, or plot the way to do it,
Accuse some innocent and forswear myself,
Set deadly enmity between two friends,
Make poor men's cattle break their necks;
Set fire on barns and hay-stacks in the night,
And bid the owners quench them with their tears.
Oft have I digg'd up dead men from their graves,
And set them upright at their dear friends' doors,
Even when their sorrows almost were forgot;
And on their skins, as on the bark of trees,
Have with my knife carved in Roman letters,
'Let not your sorrow die, though I am dead.'
Tut, I have done a thousand dreadful things
As willingly as one would kill a fly,
And nothing grieves me heartily indeed
But that I cannot do ten thousand more.

LUCIUS
Bring down the devil; for he must not die
So sweet a death as hanging presently.


I'm pretty sure Shakespear is presenting Aaron as the black devil here, no?

care to comment, professor?

"If Aaron was a Jew at Auschwitz and Titus an SS Commander, and Saturninus Hitler..."

Sorry obi, i appear to have broken your brain.
Oops.

"You are assuming that the audience would sympathize with a Jew."

Actually, not at all--

You quite rightly point out the Anti-Semetism in Shakespeare's day.

However, again--

Who Shakespeare the AUTHOR gives his best lines to are generally who he sympathizes with...

Is there any doubt that the "Hath not a Jew eyes?" speech is not only the best of the play, easily the most memorable, but one of the supreme speeches in all of Shakespeare's canon?

It's my belief, my interpretation, that this is by far Shakespeare's most morally complex of his "problem plays," and because of that, I think we have two layers to it--

The surfacey layer that panders to the Anti-Semetism of his day...

And then the actual, deeper layer that speaks far more strongly towards a sort of tolerance and even a hypocrisy in religion (itself not outside the realm of possibility for showing in Shakespeare's day, as it'd be Italy, and thus the Catholic Church being mocked, which would've been volatile, yes, for Shakesepeare's day, but not at all unheard of, and in fact, Shakesepare pokes fun at the Catholics--as well as the Puritans--in other plays as well, so certainly, I think, we can permit Shakespeare, of all authors, more than one layer to his work, and in this case, a layer meant for his day, and, perhaps, a layer meant for the intelligentsia of the day alone and, perhaps, the future as well?

I don't claim this is a certainty, at all, just an interpretation with some facts from the text, other texts of his, and his time to back it up...)

"I think the most damning evidence to Obi's view is that this is a Comedy, not a Tragedy. If what happened to Shylock at the en of the play constitutes a happy ending, I dont know how you could claim that, as a Jew, he is supposed to be sympathetic."

I'm skipping a bit here, SC, sorry, but I think I addressed the rest of your first post in my first response.

Now then.

HERE we have a piece of evidence that cuts both ways, because...

It's not styled as a comedy in the original, full title.

That's a classification that authors following Shakespeare gave it; if you'll notice, I've referred to it as one of his "problem plays," which is the MODERN term for it in the scholastic world, or at least, the more popularly-recognized term for it now, as, indeed, it is a problematic piece in placing it as a Tragedy/History/Comedy like most of his others...

Like "Troilus and Cressida," which has a tinge of almost-modern marital strife in there and isn't quite in keeping with his general fare as a tragedy, the structure of this play and it's tone is not AT ALL in keeping with the comedies--

For one thing, right off the bat--

There is more reference to religion (rather understandably) in this play than any others by the Bard, AND BY FAR...

There is more serious treatment of the subject of religious persecution, again, BY FAR...

If we're going to go English major on it, Shylock, easily the most memorable character, is done after Act IV, and Act V follows as part anti-climax, part added-on extra, it almost feels like an epilogue just to tie up loose ends, really, than a whole other act (compare the Acts V in something like "Hamlet" or "Macbeth" or, to use another "comedy," "A Midsummer Night's Dream" with the Act V here, TMOV doesn't NEARLY have the same level of emphasis on Act V as usual for a Shakespeare play...it's rather clear, when Shylock's story ends, the play truly ends, and Act V is really just a short epilogue to tie up the B plot.)

Shylock has more of a focus and more emphasis on his lines than the supposed-heroes of the play, with the exception of Portia, who herself is a figure for feminism in the play...

So, I reiterate:

Shakespeare's focusing on a Jew and a Woman in this work, and splitting his sympathies between them from a STRUCTURAL point of view.

Now, TONALLY, obviously, they're on opposite sides of the argument, can't take both, and as the Jews are unpopular, that makes Shakespeare's decision easy which to choose as the winner.

But again--when Shylock's story ends, there's far more a feeling of resolution than when Act V ends...

And what is the TONE at the end of Act IV?

Shylock is left an utterly broken man, everyone who just forcibly converted him is still jabbing at him a bit, and happy.

SO.

What's the TONE at the "real" end of the play, ie, after Shylock's defeat in Act IV?

In Shakespeare's day, it's one of happiness, hence the "comedy" title at the time...

Since then--it's one of grim solemnity...

And I don't think that's just a mistake, or a reinterpretation--

Shakespeare HAS the sympathy for Shylock built in...

But knew those in his time wouldn't sympathize with a Jew, so he sides with Portia.

NOW that we have our Anti-Semetism stripped away...we see the sympathy built into the play, it's no accident, it's not as if we're adding extra lines or misconstruing the words or even giving new meaning to the words.

"Hath not a Jew eyes?" and Shylock's grief in the end have ALWAYS been there...

So Shakespeare's textual message is constant.

WE have just only now reached the point in the last 150+ years where we can see that now, and aren't laughing like racist idiots.

Shylock? He should be more outgoing or something. tsk

lol

You, again, are imposing grim solemnity upon it. Now we would see Shylock's downfall as grim, a man losing his identity. Yet if you view it from a sixteenth century english point of view, Shylock keeps most of his worldly wealth, he gets back his daughter in a sense now that he is christian, and, finally, he wins eternal salvation, albeit unwillingly. Both Shylock wins and the Christians (whose celebrations are the actual last scenes of the play) win themselves while pushing Shylock to salvation. Everyone wins, its a comedy, as the folio colater understood merely 30 years later.

Fully agree wif you santa.

As a play, i think it's so-so, but it is full of quotables, which is great if you want to be pretentious whilst sipping your pinot gris.

"I'm pretty sure Shakespear is presenting Aaron as the black devil here, no?

care to comment, professor?"

As a professor, never, I've not the patience...

But yes, OF COURSE, if it's Shakespeare, I ALWAYS would care to comment...

Especially as I still think you're wrong, or, to be more precise, making the same mistake I think SC made with his take on TMOV, but this time, a bit more egregiously, since SC at least had historical evidence on his side...

You are simply taking the text for the black and white on the page, and not allowing for anything but the most literal, shallow, and surface-level interpretations.

:)

Let's take a look at that selection again...

"AARON
Tut, Lucius, this was but a deed of charity
To that which thou shalt hear of me anon.
'Twas her two sons that murder'd Bassianus;
They cut thy sister's tongue and ravish'd her
And cut her hands and trimm'd her as thou saw'st.

LUCIUS
O detestable villain! call'st thou that trimming?

AARON
Why, she was wash'd and cut and trimm'd, and 'twas
Trim sport for them that had the doing of it.

LUCIUS
O barbarous, beastly villains, like thyself!"

OK, so, first question--why is the speech here?

Obvious answer--to give Lucius the information the audience already has so we can get on with things...pretty simple...

Notice it's Lucius, of the white, Roman, Andronicii family, and thus the voice of the white Romans here, calling Aaron a villain.

Important English major note:

Character voice is NOT always authorial voice...in fact, often times, it's different, especially in great, complex works.

Does Shakespeare cast Aaron as the villain?
Sure?
Is he has cut and dry a villain as Lucius is making him out to be?
I say no--and given how much attention Shakespeare gives him, that seems to hold up.
Why, then, does Lucius treat Aaron as a cruder, simpler, more basic villain than the Bard?
Two reasons: 1. He's grief-stricken and not exactly articulate right now and is rather crude with his words (and you can tell this stylistically and structurally again, note how Aaron's words are calm and his thoughts come across as put together, whereas Lucius is just overwrought with grief and almost flailing with his words, trying to put a label and a description to this indescribable horror) and 2. Because Lucius is a Roman and, thus, views Aaron in a cruder, basic, and more bestial state than does the author himself.'

Continuing on from your selection...

"AARON
Indeed, I was their tutor to instruct them:
That codding spirit had they from their mother,
As sure a card as ever won the set;
That bloody mind, I think, they learn'd of me,
As true a dog as ever fought at head.
Well, let my deeds be witness of my worth.
I train'd thy brethren to that guileful hole
Where the dead corpse of Bassianus lay:
I wrote the letter that thy father found
And hid the gold within the letter mention'd,
Confederate with the queen and her two sons:
And what not done, that thou hast cause to rue,
Wherein I had no stroke of mischief in it?
I play'd the cheater for thy father's hand,
And, when I had it, drew myself apart
And almost broke my heart with extreme laughter:
I pry'd me through the crevice of a wall
When, for his hand, he had his two sons' heads;
Beheld his tears, and laugh'd so heartily,
That both mine eyes were rainy like to his :
And when I told the empress of this sport,
She swooned almost at my pleasing tale,
And for my tidings gave me twenty kisses.

First Goth
What, canst thou say all this, and never blush?

AARON
Ay, like a black dog, as the saying is."

Again, more explanation as to his deed, but not how he has a sense of pride and, as the text says, laughter about him when he does this...

He is coming across not as a mere villain, but a strong, proud villain, someone who is immensely proud to have taken down this elite group who were his slavers...

The reference to a "black dog" is obviously directed at his skin color, and I'll answer the inevitable "Don't you think THAT'S a bit racist, obi?" with--

Sure...but the character's rather racist, too, viewing the Romans as he does, and even if he weren't...

I'd point out that since people DO say racist things in life...well, if you're going to be an author, and you're gong to write and try and have it come across as somewhat realistic, these people and their feelings, and you bring up the subject of race, chances are, you're going to have some character say some racist things...because that's what people DO in real life.

No one accuses Harper Lee of being racist, and there's plenty of racist parts of character speeches (FAR worse than "black dog," by the way) in TKAM.

The Bard himself wrote "On swallow does not a summer make."

A few racist comments--especially by the antagonist/morally-questionable person--does not a racist play Shakespeare make.

"LUCIUS
Art thou not sorry for these heinous deeds?

AARON
Ay, that I had not done a thousand more.
Even now I curse the day--and yet, I think,
Few come within the compass of my curse,--
Wherein I did not some notorious ill,
As kill a man, or else devise his death,
Ravish a maid, or plot the way to do it,
Accuse some innocent and forswear myself,
Set deadly enmity between two friends,
Make poor men's cattle break their necks;
Set fire on barns and hay-stacks in the night,
And bid the owners quench them with their tears.
Oft have I digg'd up dead men from their graves,
And set them upright at their dear friends' doors,
Even when their sorrows almost were forgot;
And on their skins, as on the bark of trees,
Have with my knife carved in Roman letters,
'Let not your sorrow die, though I am dead.'
Tut, I have done a thousand dreadful things
As willingly as one would kill a fly,
And nothing grieves me heartily indeed
But that I cannot do ten thousand more.

LUCIUS
Bring down the devil; for he must not die
So sweet a death as hanging presently."

So the slave isn't sorry he did these terrible things to the slave masters?

And in fact, he only wishes he could hurt the people who hurt him so much even more?

And the white Roman who is acting the role of the master to Aaron's slave at this point refers to him as a devil after he just lost his whole family to Aaron through one device or another?

...Yes, I can see how that's TOTALLY just Shakespeare calling Aaron a devil flat-out, I'm sure that Shakespeare, an author noted for deep characters with many facets, wouldn't have more depth to his character than that, and that this isn't just the views of the character in grief and from HIS point of view, no, it's far more likely that Lucius, who is given comparatively little and bland attention, is FAR more important than Aaron and his speeches...

After all, Shakespeare just gave Aaron the best speeches, and as I've said before, Shakespeare ALWAYS gives his best lines to those he sees as dynamic, complex, and NOT jsut two-dimensional...

Oh.

Yes.

I can see where your two-dimensional reading might have a problem with that.

"You, again, are imposing grim solemnity upon it."

...Do you think it's imposing to say "Gee, the 'Hath not a Jew eyes?' speech is rather grim?'"

And beyond that...

"Nay, take my life and all; pardon not that:
You take my house when you do take the prop
That doth sustain my house; you take my life
When you do take the means whereby I live."

Do you think that was ever textually--not how it was ACTED, how it reads TEXTUALLY--a happy moment?

No.

Again--

Most people in Shakespeare's time were ILLITERATE.

So...

Shakespeare writes a play with the Jew as the anti-hero, or, at least, a sympathetic and complex villain...

And he PERFORMS it as a comedy, knowing that's how it will be accepted by the public.

BUT...

The actual TEXT is still sympathetic, so, again--

Shakespeare the AUTHOR is sympathetic in the TEXT, if not in the acted PORTRAYAL (prior to about 1850) of Shylock.



Layers to the author with some of the most layered characters?

To believe that ISN'T the case, SC, seems the greater stretch to me. :)

...Do you think it's imposing to say "Gee, the 'Hath not a Jew eyes?' speech is rather grim?'"

That wasn't at the end of the play it was smack in the middle

"Nay, take my life and all; pardon not that:
You take my house when you do take the prop
That doth sustain my house; you take my life
When you do take the means whereby I live."

And uppity jew groveling and the christian he tormented showing him the mercy the jew was unwilling to give, what makes it an unhappy moment?

When a Bond villain falls into the trap he himself set and dies a slow death from sharks with nuclear teeth is that a sad moment?

Please Santa, any interpretation that Obi does not like is 'two-dimensional'.

We are simply not smart enough to understand what Shakespear REALLY MEANT.

Fortunately we have obiwanobiwan. Truly a visionary.
lolz.

"That wasn't at the end of the play it was smack in the middle"

I'm aware, I'm making the case for there being sympathy for Shylock throughout (come on, now, SC, I KNOW which part of the play it's from.) :)

Again, though--

Audience reaction vs. Textual structuring.

An Elizabethan audience reacts in the Bond-villain-yay-dead way...
A modern audience responds in a more somber way...

But the actual TEXT...which reading does THAT support, is my point?

If you think those 4 lines, in the text ITSELF, devoid of audience reaction--and if anything keeping in mind how much more tragic Shylock comes across at this stage than the Jew of Malta counterpart he has in Marlowe, again, Shakespeare making the character IN THE TEXT ITSELF more complex and tragic--speaks to the Elizabethan reading...

Give me a reason.

But if you think those 4 lines, by themselves, taking out of consideration whatever clownish antics Shakespeare's actors would've done to appeal to the audience...JUST on the basis of what's said in the text, right there...

If you'd read those 4 lines, and not known what play it was from:

Would you have been more likely to feel it was meant as a sympathetic/tragic/somber moment, or a comedic, wa-wa-waaaaaaaaaa, villain-gets-comeuppance moment?

one of obi's gifts is to be able to take any piece of the play out of context, and then build an argument around it. Mad skillzs.

Out of curiosity, fielder...

True, his name was spelled varying ways, including that way, for centuries...

But as it's generally now written "Shakespeare," why are you leaving off the final "e," are you trying to harken back to those spellings, you prefer the alternative...you forgot to put it in...

Also--

No.

not every interpretation I dislike is two-dimensional.

I dislike those who say Hamlet is mad from the start of the play...

But you can still make a case for it, intelligently, and by taking the text at more than face value.

That's what you're doing, and all you're doing--

Taking the text as literal and at face value...

Irony, sarcasm...you seem to love them, and yet, they seem to soar over your head when each and every interpretation you give so far is little more than base plot summary and what is stated literally.

You seem to be confusing Shakespeare, one of the most famously-nuanced authors ever, for Hollywood's black-and-white, good-or-evil view of things in cheap action movies where corporations are always evil, the black guy and at least one cute girl always seem to die in the survival films, and anything made with Ben Stiller makes one want to find the nearest trashcan and retch from the sheer putrid stench of the recycled horseshit they've just seen.

(Also, that Al Pacino is the epitome of awesome.) ;)

As a person who has inherited enlightenment ideals that were not shared at that time and a belief in tolerance that was 100 years away from being conceived in England, I do read it as sympathetic. As a historian, who knows that Shakespeare's benefactor had hanged a Jew 4 years prior for allegedly trying to kill her as the public mocked and laughed the guy as he swung from the gallows, I am not so sure Shakespeare had any secret message.

Well as you say obi, the audience was largely illiterate, so which interpretation do you think is more likely, the obvious and plain one, or this incredibly nuanced interpretation that only makes socio-political sense centuries later!? And what a coincidence, it fits exactly with what you want to believe about shakepearE!

I know the plays well an I think it's obvious the bard held quite generally racist views, as was the style of the time. Doesn't mean I appreciate the plays any less.

"so which interpretation do you think is more likely, the obvious and plain one, or this incredibly nuanced interpretation that only makes socio-political sense centuries later!?"

...

Well, as Shakespeare is neither an obvious nor plain author, by and large, and I think most would say he was socially and stylistically ahead of his time...

The latter, for the reasons I've said--

Easy to perform and pander to the illiterate crowd, but the textual, social message is preserved and interpreted later?

I must ask--

What is your major, fielder, or your occupation? Are you always so very much in favor of the "obvious and plain?"

Even when faced with a figure in literature who is as complex as Shakespeare?

And I couldn't disagree more--

You've yet to even TOUCH my Othello counterexample...
You've challenged the Aaron one, but at best we can say EVERYONE in that play is morally bankrupt, besides Lavinia (and possibly Bassianus and Lucius to some extent) so really, Aaron, if he is a wrong-doer, is a black kettle amongst black pots...no pun intended...

And then this play.

You've yet to answer my charge, which I've laid time and again--

WHY go through the trouble of adding portions that seem overwhelmingly in favor of making Shylock more complex and sympathetic (if you refuse to believe sympathetic right now, at the very least, complex) when he stole the plot of Marlowe's "The Jew of Malta," why not just keep Shylock a simple, mustache-twirling evil bad buy of a villain, why give him depth if he didn't feel the issue had depth?

(And again, I hasten to remind you once more--BY FAR this is Shakespeare's most religious play, with the most religious references and certainly the most debate had between two religions competing with one another, so I'm sorry, the "it was just a simple comedy" excuse doesn't fly, unless you want to try and make the case that simple illiterate groundlings would've found passages upon passages of references to old religious wars and debates and conflicts in a Scripture they can't even READ just hysterical...sorry, this isn't just a comedy...)

One does not simply debate Shakespeare in webdip.

Why did he make shylock somewhat sympathetic? Because it pushes peoples buttons and is more DRAMATIC. I think most of your interpretations are actually your willful imagination. I don't know how to argue with that. And I'm a little tired of your personal attacks. I'm quite happy to disagree with you.

I like how you get my sarcasm tho. Glad it's not wasted :)

You shall not pass!

-Gandalf, to Shakespeare.

i was forced to read midsummer nights dream. that had all the comedic excellence of a polly shore movie. if he really is making fun of shylock in the passage, then it's one of those pathetic attempts at humor that weren't funny back then and aren't funny now. reminds me of how greek lawyers used to use puns to win cases. ancient people really failed at humor.

.

Wasn't everyone anti-semitic at the time? Excluding the Jews, of course.