Category Archives: Images and Figures

True or False?

Sir Henry Percy, also known as Hotspur, is a major character in Shakespeare’s Henry IV Part 1. However, he was also a man in real life. Many scholars have debated how much of the events and characters in Shakespeare’s plays are accurate depictions of history, and how much is theatrical embellishment. I now apply this question to Sir Henry Percy.

How much of Shakespeare’s depiction of Sir Henry Percy, or Hotspur, is fact and how much is fiction? Continue reading

Portia: Exposed

Portia and Shylock, from Shakespeare’s “The Merchant of Venice.” Edward Alcock. ca. 1778. ARTstor [online]. Yale Center for British Art. [cited 14 July 2015]. http://library.artstor.org/library/secure/ViewImages?id=8CladTYuJCxdLS04eTh8QHsoWg%3D%3D&userId=hzZCcjIm&zoomparams=

Portia and Shylock, from Shakespeare’s “The Merchant of Venice.” Edward Alcock. ca. 1778. ARTstor [online]. Yale Center for British Art. [cited 14 July 2015]. http://library.artstor.org/library/secure/ViewImages?id=8CladTYuJCxdLS04eTh8QHsoWg%3D%3D&userId=hzZCcjIm&zoomparams=

Portia and Shylock lead such vastly different lives that their stories can easily be divided into two completely separate plays altogether. The two stories do intertwine and the characters do eventually come face to face, but only in an obviously disadvantageous circumstance for Shylock. Certainly, the antagonized character is never seen under a positive light. He is commonly – if not always – referred to as “The Jew” and evidently in a significantly lower social tier than Portia or any of her counterparts. Even so, the fact that Shylock is a self-governing Jewish male provides him with greater agency than Portia, whose choice has been taken away by none other than her dead, Christian father. I guess you could say that Portia’s father is the ultimate “Dead White Guy,” but I digress. Continue reading

Hath not a Jew banks?

The Rothschild family has been recently highlighted in the media due to the very recent nuptials of young James Rothschild to Nicky Hilton, “hotel heiress” daughter to the famous Hilton family, and sister to the infamous reality star and socialite Paris Hilton. The two were married this past weekend on July 10th. Although Hilton is likely a more familiar name to many Americans (or at least associated with more notoriety), the Rothschild family has a history much longer and a fortune much grander than the Hiltons’.

In fact, the Rothschild family is one of the oldest and largest banking families in the world. They also happen to be Jewish. Continue reading

Fortuna & The Wheel of Fortune

In The Merchant of Venice, Portia, an affluent and quick-witted heiress from Belmont, aids in rescuing Antonio from his legal plight with Shylock. The fates of people around Portia shift constantly, while her situation generally improves without problem. Portia’s actions through the play embody Fortuna’s whimsical interest in humanity.  Continue reading

The Merchant of Venice: Stereotyping Shylock

Art is a reflection of reality, and so it must also be true that art is a mode for the production of reality’s darker features of racism, intolerance and prejudice. “The Merchant of Venice” and the characterization of Shylock reminds us all of the darker truths of the Elizabethan era, praised for its contributions to the arts that were built upon the foundations of lingering social conflicts and hierarchical supremacies. That Shakespeare constructed a villain in a very specific religious and racial group stands alone as a evidence to the existing social divides in Elizabethan England. That he did so after knowing few, if any, Jewish people at all is telling of a darker and more striking truth about the basis of prejudice that has remained present in the play throughout history. Continue reading

Shakespeare Making “Shylock”

On Tuesday September 16, 2014 Vice President Joe Biden referred to people who make loans toshylock members of the military and take advantage of them while they are over seas, as “shylocks“. Today, Time Magazine says,  “shylock” is considered an antisemitic slur. In Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice, Shylock is a jewish merchant and money lender, who is
portrayed as an antagonistic figure. Even some images of this character, as seen here, portray him as an antagonistic moneylender and loan shark.

But how did  this prejudice meaning of the term “shylock” come to be? Continue reading

Diana: Antagonist or Quiet Hero?

Shakespeare juxtaposes loving desire and chaste austerity through the two deities Cupid and Diana. Cupid is “said to be a child” (I.1.238), “blind[ly]” (I.1.235) slinging fiery shafts at maidens to implant tenacious and sometimes self-destructive “fancies.” In contrast, Diana, the “reputedly hostile to men” [1] “virgin goddess of the moon” (MSND, 6), is presented as the antithesis to this amorous frenzy. Continue reading