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A Character Sketch of Shylock

Shylock is a fictional character in William Shakespeare's play The Merchant of

Venice. Because of the character's notable request of a "pound of flesh" for security
interest, individuals considered to charge excessive interest on loans are sometimes
called "Shylock." The creation of Shylock is one of the triumphs of Shakespeares art
of characterization. He is highly complex nature, and hence most varied and
contradictory estimates of his character have been given. Shakespeare has shown
the Jew as cruel, savage, relentless, vindictive and greedy, with all the atrocity
traditionally associated with the Jewish character; and yet he has succeeded in
enlisting our sympathies for him.

His Passion For Money

Passion for revenge and passion for money are the two leading traits of his
character. He is a miser who hoards, and for him even to spend a single penny is a
torture. He lives for money; money is his life and soul. Money is the standard by
which he judges others. His greed has destroyed in him even his affection for his
daughter, since his solicitude at his daughters loss is as nothing compared with his
rage at the loss of his money:

My daughter!O my ducats!O my daughter!

Fled with a Christian!O my Christian ducats.

His Vindictiveness

Perhaps even stronger than his love of money is his hatred of Antonio as one
of the Christians who had persecuted his tribe so cruelly. And one cannot help feeling
a natural sympathy with the Jew, a sympathy which Shakespeare evidently felt
himself and presumably intended his audience to share. How pathetic these lines of
Shylock are:

Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, sense, 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?
If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble you in that also.

Here Shylock is not speaking in his own person, but as the representative of
an oppressed people. He feels for the suffering of his race. He is both a type and an
individual.

Passion For Revenge

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Shylock insists that his debt be paid; he wants revenge on Antonio, as the
latter loans money without charging interest (thus making Shylock lose business). He
had spat on Shylock, verbally and physically abused him, turned his friends against
him, and inflamed his enemies toward him.

If I can catch him once upon the hip,

I will feed fat the ancient grudge I bear him
He hates our sacred nation

His Essential Humanity And Patriotism

Shylock has often been represented on the stage as a perfectly unnatural

monster, with no passions save those of hate and avarice, and, indeed, there is some
cause for such a view. Despite all these unattractive characteristics we cannot say
that there are no elements of grandeur about this Jew. He always speaks with a true
patriotic fervor about his sacred nation. He has the true Jewish exclusiveness. There
is one passage where even he seems to exhibit a trace of affection and essentially
human feelings. When the Tubal has been giving him an account of Jessicas
extravagance in Genoa, that among other things she has exchanged his ring for a
monkey, he cries:

Out upon her; thou torturest me; Tubal; it

Was my turquoise: I had it of Leah when
I was bachelor: I would not have given it for
A wilderness of monkeys.

Nevertheless, it must be confessed that, as far as the play goes, we do not

hear much of the human side of his nature.