But that, I would say, is the point. Having Shylock mention Leah is of a
piece with his making Shylock a sympathetic character and his making
Antonio and company so unsympathetic. Suddenly, the audience sees that the
senex-figure, the guy everyone is primed to boo both because of his
religion and his position as the obstruction to young love, may be much
more complex than they had previously realized. Along these lines, it is no
accident that Shakespeare also makes Jessica a much more venal character
(e.g., making sure that she steals her father's cash before absconding).
Compare her behavior to, say, that of Hermia and Demetrius in MND, who take
off with nothing other than the togas on their backs.
Peter C. Herman
At 08:55 AM 4/4/2005, you wrote:
>Thank you. I meant uncharacteristic (of Shakespeare) only in the more
>limited sense that so many of his protagonists refer to deceased wives,
>generally as their daughers' mothers, but not generally by name. It's a
>rather stock moment, but one startlingly different in Merchant.
>
>
>David Lee Miller
>Department of English
>University of South Carolina
>Columbia, SC 29208
>
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>
>
> >>> [log in to unmask] 4/4/2005 12:43:40 PM >>>
> >Yes--but doesn't the contrast say a lot? There's no Paulina hounding
> >Shylock, no sense in the text that he should be haunted by her ghost,
> >not even much to activate the latent sense of Leah as second-best
>sister
> >(fit for a second-best bed). It seems to me a truly striking moment
>of
> >pathos because it's equally uncharacteristic of Shakespeare and of
> >Shylock. At the risk of sounding naive, I think it's a stroke of
>genius
> >in the play.
>
>This seems to me quite right. It's a moment comparable to Hamlet's
>suddenly discovering to us, and himself, the scene of himself riding
>around on Yorick's back, kissing his lips, watching his father and
>mother roaring with laughter at their grown-up dinner-party, which he
>has been allowed to join for once. Gaping gulfs of backstory that
>both characters have almost visibly to choke back. Quite gratuitous
>and all the more astonishing for it. I'm not sure it's
>uncharacteristic, but certainly worth risking naivety for.
>
>T
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