The Merchant of Venice: Language and Writing

Description

Arden Student Skills: Language and Writing volumes offer a new type of study aid that combines lively critical insight with practical guidance on the writing skills you need to develop in order to engage fully with Shakespeare’s texts. The books’ core focus is on language: both understanding and enjoying Shakespeare’s complex dramatic language, and expanding your own critical vocabulary, as you respond to his plays. Each guide in the series will empower you to read and write about Shakespeare with increased confidence and enthusiasm. A notoriously disturbing play, The Merchant of Venice explores how the discourses of racial and religious prejudice and of business intertwine and shape how characters understand themselves and their relationships with one another. The intersections between religious, racial and economic language in The Merchant of Venice can be challenging to grasp, but in this guide Douglas Lanier showcases a range of approaches to understanding its language, all based on close reading and attention to Shakespeare’s style. The volume will equip you to analyze Shakespeare’s troubling portrayal of anti-Semitism for yourself and to articulate your views on The Merchant of Venice with greater insight and confidence. Cover Contents Series Editor’s Preface A Note on Editions Introduction 1 Shakespeare’s Stylistic Resources Historicizing Shakespeare’s language Rhetorical patterning Metre Imagery Wordplay Writing matters – writing criticism 2 Language in Print I: Texts from Texts Sources Allusions Shylock and the Bible Christians and classical myth Writing matters – using sources 3 Language in Print II: Two Shylocks, Two Portias The two Shylocks The two Portias Writing matters – form, sequencing, proportion 4 Language in Print III: Bonds Resonance Bond as commercial contract Bond as connection, constriction, covenant and seal Bonds of hate and love Words as bonds Writing matters – abstraction and nuance 5 Language in Dramatic Context The casket scene (MV 3.2) The trial scene (MV 4.1) Writing matters – context 6 The Language of Racial and Ethnic Humour Portia Lancelet Giobbe Shylock Writing matters – asking analytic questions 7 The Language of Comedy Rings Music Writing matters – conclusions 8 Language through Time: Adaptations and Performance Print editions Performance Adaptations Notes Further Reading, Listening and Viewing