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英美文学范文:Appreciation of "the Merchant of Venice"

时间:2021-08-15 来源:未知 编辑:梦想论文 阅读:
Abstract:Shakespeare's "the Merchant of Venice" is a famous comedy in the second stage of his artistic career?it was written in 1596 to 1597 and was one of the of six comedies during this creation period. In this comedy, Shakespeare utilized the humanism as an ideological weapon to show the contradictions between the new commercial capital and the feudal usurious capital in that period. The general uses of the poetry and vivid language, multiform and splendid tropes, tensing and labyrinthian scenes and comedic ideal end make the readers never forget and a recollect again and again.
Key words:the Merchant of Venice; Comedy;Novel
 
Shakespeare's "the Merchant of Venice" is a famous comedy in the second stage of his artistic career?it was written in 1596 to 1597 and was one of the of six comedies during this creation period. It just located the British heyday when Britain's Queen Elizabeth was ruling the Britain and the Britain was showing a thriving prosperity vision. In this period, the ideas of the humanism emerged like the shooting bamboos. Shakespeare accepted the ascendant humanism ideas and integrated the humanism ideas into his comedies. Moreover, on this basis, he expressed his insightful thoughts and opinions, which made his comedies is not only full of optimism colors but also some banters with a touch of melancholy sarcasm. In this comedy, Shakespeare utilized the humanism ideas as an ideological weapon to show the contradictions between the new commercial capital and the feudal usurious capital in that period. The general uses of the poetry and vivid language, multiform and splendid tropes, tensing and labyrinthian scenes, and the comedic ideal end leave the readers a profound impression. 
 
 
Writing Background 
William Shakespeare is renowned as the English playwright and poet whose body of works is considered the greatest in history of English literature. He was born in 1564 to a successful middle-class glove-maker in Stratford-upon-Avon, England. Shakespeare attended grammar school, but his formal education proceeded no further. In 1582 he married an older woman, Anne Hathaway, and had three children with her. Around 1590 he left his family behind and traveled to London to work as an actor and playwright. Public and critical success quickly followed, and Shakespeare eventually became the most popular playwright in England and part-owner of the Globe Theater. His career bridged the reigns of Elizabeth I (ruled 1558–1603) and James I (ruled 1603–1625), and he was a favorite of both monarchs. Indeed, James granted Shakespeare’s company the greatest possible compliment by bestowing upon its members the title of King’s Men. Wealthy and renowned, Shakespeare retired to Stratford and died in 1616 at the age of fifty-two. Shakespeare's works are often divided into four periods beginning with what is referred to as an experimental period starting around 1591 and ending around 1593 which includes Titus Andronicus, Love's Labour's Lost, The Two Gentlemen of Verona, The Comedy of Errors and The Taming of the Shrew. The second period ending around 1601, marks the establishment of Shakespeare and the Merchant of Venice was written in this period. At the same time, he wrote the tragedy Romeo and Juliet, the comedies A Midsummer-Night's Dream, Much Ado about Nothing, The Merry Wives of Windsor and the history plays, Henry IV, Parts I and II, Henry V, Richard II, King John and Julius Caesar?Weiss?1971?Tillyard?1965?Sinsheimer,1947.
 
  Shakespeare's comedies reflect the British anti-feudal struggle process of the bourgeoisie during the 16th century and early 17th century, they incarnate the demands of the emerging bourgeoisie. Shakespeare's work "the Merchant of Venice" just located the British heyday when Britain's Queen Elizabeth was ruling the Britain and the Britain was showing a thriving prosperity vision. The emerging bourgeoisie won a series of anti-feudal struggle. In the end, the emerging bourgeoisie with an unstoppable trend mounted on the stage of the history. In this period, the humanism ideas emerged like the shooting bamboos. Then, the humanism ideas developed to all the places of the Britain. They advocated human rights, freedom, individuality and they were against feudal separatism and religious rules. At this time, Shakespeare's profound thoughts have been maturing, rather than those unrealistic and mysterious thoughts and the neglect of the politics in the juvenile. In his works, he had shown more deep thoughts, witty language, exquisite writing techniques, and a variety of expression method, he has reached the top of his creation summit. He accepted the ascendant ideas of the humanism ideas and integrated the humanism ideas into his comedies. Moreover, on this basis, he expressed his insightful thoughts and opinions, which made his comedies is not only full of optimism colors but also some banters with a touch of melancholy sarcasm. 
 
Ideological weapon of the humanism
 
The Merchant of Venice reflected the contradictions between the new commercial capital and the feudal usurious capital in that period (Shenyu,2002). 
The comedy described the intelligent cunning and speaking gab of Bassanio who was the representative of the emerging commercial capital and profoundly revealed the ruthless greed and selfishness of Shylock who was the representative of the feudal usurer(Auden,1965; Walley,1967?Widers?1969; Lelyveld,1961; Grebanier,1962;) Charlton,1938).This comedy praised the humanism of friendship, Love of freedom and individual liberation and gave the ugly faces of the ruthless greed and selfishness of the feudal class the merciless lash. The theme of this comedy is praising the caring, friendship and the love, at the same time, the comedy are penetrated the unique perspectives of the author to the issues of the money, law and religious in the bourgeois society. The whole scenes of the comedy shine with the radiance of the humanism ideas, Shakespeare's humorous witty language and the interesting plots filled with optimism(GuoYuanbo,2006) 
In the comedy of the Merchant of Venice, Shakespeare depicted the Belmont where the ideal shape of Bassanio lived as an ideal world and compared the ideal Belmont with the real world of Venice where was full of money and evil, which shows that Shakespeare has a profound understanding of the dark reality(Holland,1964). He has seen through the far distance between the ideal and the reality. The whole scenes implied the author's cannot help and criticism(XiaofuCong,2003).
In the period of the European Renaissance, the emerging bourgeois as a revolutionary class was locating the growth period. Although the feudal forces have come to the end of the rope, but they still tried to do their death throes. The infiltration of the old culture and the feudal ideas could be seen everywhere. At that time, the society strongly required the emergence of a spokesman who was the representative of the emerging bourgeois and the spokesman could use a sharp pen point to struggle cleverly and skillfully with the feudal remnant forces and the religion dark forces. The spokesman could guide the majority of the people to accept the bourgeois ideology and culture. At that time, William Shakespeare just conformed to this trend. In his drama, from the theme to the characterization of the figures in detail, all this shone the strong anti-feudal, anti-religious ideology of the humanist. He effectively used the ideological weapon of the humanism to criticize the merciless world of the feudal usurer and expose the hypocrisy nature of the religion. The humanistic thinking of the emerging bourgeoisie was blazoned forth. Moreover, he paved the way for the smooth development of the emerging bourgeoisie, which accorded with the trend of social development and greatly promoted the historical development.
Super writing skills and methods 
Shakespeare inherited and carried forward the fine traditions of the British folk drama of the ancient Greek and Roman theater, he ignored the "three and one" regulation of the monastery and broke the boundaries of comedy and tragedy. He did a creative innovation to the dramas from the contents to the forms. His dramas usually have two or more staggered clues in the stories, the clues set off each other and syncretized together in the end. The Merchant of Venice is more one of the representatives, the drama interwove with the three parallel clues in the story on the limited stage and a limited time frame to the readers, a broad social picture were shown to the eyes of the readers. Moreover, each distinct character was clearly shown by using the individualized language. A three-dimensional vision with full flesh was shown.
The language in Shakespeare’s comedy was refined and vivid. He not only used the interleaving written and oral languages but also widely used the folk proverbs and slang. The most important is that he also endowed by the nature of creating the new language term, when the existing vocabularies could not vividly express the strong storyline, Shakespeare will start his flexible thought and created the new language term with innovative and fresh force to be added to his comedy. His language was broad and rich, flexible and effective. The different characters could be shown with different and according personality, identity, status of the characters. The Merchant of Venice was mainly used the body of no rhyme, it was not only full of the rhythm beauty but also good at using analogies to describe the vivid and distinct characters, and the enthusiastic bold fantasies. The writing skills and methods can analyzed from the fowling five aspects:
First, the good use of individualized language to show the people's personality, which makes the readers easily apperceive the figural characters under the individualized language. This is the most important writing method and skill in Shakespeare’s dramas.
For example, in the scene of the "court trial" of the comedy, Shakespeare gave each personality a unique language color: After Shylock went to the stage, in order to conceal the unmerciful as the fair and reasonable behaves, he calmly quoted the classical language and attributed his behaves to the religion and the law in face of everybody's face and the satirical voices, the languages were very shallow and  extremely arrogant to everything, they were filled with businessmen spoken tones like "mouse." "The pig opened her mouth." "Was forced to urinate" and so on. While after Shylock was sentenced, the plaintive lament of Shylock always did not deviate from the language of the "money", which fully showed that the cruel, vulgar and philistine character and Shylock's money worship thinking. Bassanio’s languages were the perfect combination of poetry and philosophy, although they were simple and neat, but careful, precise and logical, gradually tempt Shylock to go to her planed trap, which not only well demonstrated Bassanio’s intelligent and erudite character but also reflected the light of the humanism ideas; The languages of Antonio, Basaniao and Gelaixiannuo reflected the characters of the humanists that they pay attention to the friendship and can do everything for their friends. In this way, every characters in the Merchant of Venice vividly shown to the readers by using the distinct and individualized languages ,which gave the readers an indelible impression. 
Second, Shakespeare was good at using many novel appropriate analogies, which can make the readers profoundly feel the characters and the development of the story. This is another important writing method and skill in the Merchant of Venice.
  Shakespeare's rich imagination, creative thinking and broad vision to life opened the door of the theatrical language hole and reached a vast open space, which makes the readers or the viewers at the same time refreshed when they went to understand the plot development(JinyunJIang,2003). Unique and innovative analogies can make the eyes of the readers or the views subsequently appeared in a series of vivid images. For example, Antonio said, " I pray you, think you question with the Jew: You may as well go stand upon the beach And bid the main flood bate his usual height; You may as well use question with the wolf Why he hath made the ewe bleat for the lamb; You may as well forbid the mountain pines To wag their high tops and to make no noise, When they are fretten with the gusts of heaven; You may as well do anything most hard, As seek to soften that–than which what's harder?”  The three analogies make the or the views can not help thinking of the Shylock as violent as the indignant billows, as inhuman as the beasts, as merciless as he pine trees, which makes the readers can feel the evil business practices of Shylock.
In addition, there are many vivid analogies in the comedy. For example, Antonio said, "I am a tainted wether of the flock, Meetest for death: the weakest kind of fruit Drops earliest to the ground; and so let me You cannot better be employ'd. Shylock anwered the Basaniao and hoped that he will give up the penalty, he said "what? Willing you to be bitten twice by a snake? "This fully displayed the cruel of Shylock Shakespeare's analogies not only distinctly showed the figures of the characters but also enhanced the interests of the readers , which makes the readers more like this comedy.
Third, the beautiful words like poetry and were promethean. Moreover, all kinds of rhetorical methods were neatly used.  All the above made the language beautiful moving and meaning. Readers can enjoy the beautiful expressions, the dramatic rhythm like a poem and taste the wonderful melodies, and a strong sense of the beauty and elegance of the comedy. 
Shakespeare's profound knowledge and extensive experience enabled him to master the English language and rhetoric neatly, In order to make the language become more attractive and unique, he reorganized the English vocabularies, which made the comedy more attract the eyes of the readers. The Rhetoric and interleaving uses of analogy, expansivenesses, and comparison enhanced readability and appeal force of the comedy to the readers. He is the "magician" and "bold and innovative man" of the English language. He eagerly extracted all kinds of the new vocabularies from the mouths of the talkers. In the Merchant of Venice, it is difficulty for the readers to leave for the neatly use of the rhetoric. The nice phrase sounds like flourishing fruits of the trees with the numerous achievements, which make the readers easily happy. The readers can easily enter into the scenes of the drama and do not want to leave. 
Moreover, as a great master of language in that period, Shakespeare was also good at using vivid language to move the readers. In the comedy, we can see not only the perfect combination of the bright and colorful witty languages and down-to-earth common plain spoken words but also can feel the narrative like a flow poem and vivid expression with a strong force. The satirical and vivid terms with humor make the readers enjoy the beauty sense of the words and the sprits of the characters.
Fourth, Shakespeare’s theatrical skill of the "thieves stolen" neatly expressed the people’s resentments to the feudal usury and showed the forever of the justice.
In the Merchant of Venice, the theatrical skill of the "thieves stolen" is more of an organization method and it becomes the key writing skill. The greedy businessmen Shylock underhand proposed a contract that Antonio would be cut off a full pound of white meat as the punishment if the Antonio did not pay off until the contract expired. Antonio signed the contract for the friends and because his merchant quickly returned. It was unfortunate for the Antonio that the contract was expired and his merchant did not return on the time. Shylock immediately wanted to fulfill the punishment. Antonio’s friend was willing to doubly repay the debts, but Shylock always wanted to sabotage the Antonio and stubbornly insisted Antonio should be punished while the law was not only just a piece of paper of the Venice. Under the outrage and the sigh of the public voice on that Antonio had no alternative, the wife of Antonio’s friend came in time and disguised to get the chief umpire of the case. At the start of the case, she emphasized again and again that "according to the law, Shylock demanded the right to cut off a pound of Antonio’s flesh.” While when Shylock had his moment to praise the judge was a fair and honest judge and could not wait to parade woman, She shouted to the Shylock and solemnly said: "There is only “ a pound of meat” written in the contract, he does not allow you to cut off a drop of blood. So according to the law, all of your property will be confiscated if a drop of blood in his own flesh drops when you cut off the meat.” At that time, Shylock was stunned and quickly decided that he would accept the compensation rather than his meat, the judge further emphasized: "According the law, you should not accept any other form of compensation except the cutting off his meat, and the meat is just a full pound and   there is no any difference to an inch. Otherwise, you will be a life for a life! "In the end, those attempted to harm the others harms themselves.
Fifth, Shakespeare skillfully set drama suspensions and made the risk raised step by step. The readers with a strong interest read to the end of the comedy following the scenes of the story and gradually reach the high tide. 
In the Merchant of Venice, the better skill was in the language style. The story did not use the straightforward depiction but set the cleverest suspensions, insert another story at the crucial moments. Three parallel story clues were inserted the comedy and staggered forward, which made the story strenuous and labyrinthian till to the climax. Moreover, the comedy was full of very strange and romantic colors. All the above can make the readers anxiously want to see the end of the Comedy.
Summarization 
In short, the Merchant of Venice fully showed Shakespeare's super writing skills and methods. In this comedy, Shakespeare expressed his insightful thoughts and opinions, which made his comedies is not only full of optimism colors but also some banters with a touch of melancholy sarcasm. He fully utilized the humanism ideas as an ideological weapon to show the contradictions between the new commercial capital and the feudal usurious capital in that period. The general uses of the poetry and vivid language, multiform and splendid tropes, tensing and labyrinthian scenes, and the comedic ideal end leave the readers a profound impression. 
References
Auden, W. H. 1965"Love and Usury in The Merchant of Venice." In Four Centuries of Shakespeare Criticism, ed. by Frank Kermode. New York: Avon.
Charlton, H. B. Shakespearean Comedy. New York: Methuen, 1938. A sympathetic view of Shylock. 
Danson, Lawrence. 1978. The Harmonies of The Merchant of Venice. New Haven: Yale University Press, 
Grebanier, Bernard. 1962.The Truth About Shylock. New York: Random House. 
Holland, Norman. 1964. The Shakespearean Imagination. New York: Macmillan. 
Lelyveld, Toby. ,1961.Shylock on the Stage. London: Routledge. 
Sinsheimer, Hermann. Shylock. New York: Benjamin Blom, 1947. Includes much historical background on usury and Jews in medieval and Renaissance literature. 
Tillyard, E. M. W. 1965.Shakespeare's Early Comedies. New York: Barnes & Noble.
Van Doren, Mark. Shakespeare. 1939.New York: Henry Holt, 
Walley, Harold. 1967. "Shakespeare's Portrayal of Shylock." The Parrott Presentation Volume, ed. Hardin Craig. New York: Russell & Russell
Weiss, Theodore. 1971.The Breath of Clowns and Kings: Shakespeare's Early Comedies and Histories. New York: Atheneum.
Wilders, John, ed. 1969.  The Merchant of Venice: A Selection of Critical Essays. London: Macmillan, Criticism from 1709 to 1963, including many of the more important essays on the play. 
XiaofuCong,2003. Shakespeare's "Merchant of Venice" figures. Vol.5.pp:92-93 
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