The Alien Statute and the Sentence on Shylock

Three. It applies only to aliens. Shylock has lived in Venice, traded on the Rialto, and paid for the privilege of being spat upon there. The law he is destroyed by could never have been used against Antonio, whatever Antonio had done. A student writing on antisemitism in the play should use this: the final blow is a rule that exists to treat one class of person differently.

Four. If it was available all along, the whole crisis was unnecessary. The Duke spent the scene saying he could not deny the course of law. The statute was in the laws of Venice the entire time. Either nobody in the ducal court knew the law of their own city, or the statute is produced only when it is needed to reach a result the court has already decided on.

The sentence, step by step

The Duke pardons the life. Before Shylock can ask, and with a line that tells you exactly what the pardon is for: "That thou shalt see the difference of our spirit, I pardon thee thy life before thou ask it." The mercy is a demonstration, aimed at an audience.

The property. Half to Antonio, half to the state, though the Duke says humbleness may reduce the state's half to a fine. Portia corrects even that: the fine is for the state, not for Antonio.

Shylock's reply. Four lines that many readers find the most painful in the play, and which a candidate should know.

Nay, take my life and all, pardon not that.

You take my house when you do take the prop

That doth sustain my house; you take my life

When you do take the means whereby I live.

Antonio's conditions. He asks the court to quit the fine on the state's half, and to let him have the other half in use, that is, to hold as trustee, rendering it on Shylock's death to Lorenzo. He then adds two conditions "provided more".

1. That Shylock "presently become a Christian".
2. That he record a deed of gift, there in the court, of everything he dies possessed of, to Lorenzo and Jessica.

The Duke says he shall do this or the pardon is recanted, which means the conditions are not an offer but a price for his life.

Shylock's last words. "I am content." Then a request to be allowed to go, because he is not well, and to have the deed sent after him for signature. He never speaks again in the play.

Is Antonio's treatment of Shylock merciful?

This is a set essay question in every form. Argue it properly.

The case that it is merciful. He gives up outright ownership of the half awarded to him, taking only the use of it. He asks the state to drop its claim. He leaves Shylock alive and with the income of half his estate for life. Measured against Gratiano, who wants him hanged, this is restraint.

The case that it is not. The property still ends with Lorenzo, the man who took his daughter and his money. Shylock's daughter, having robbed him, inherits everything. He is required to change his religion, which for a man who swore "by our holy Sabbath" is the destruction of the thing he is. And the alternative offered is death, so his consent means nothing.

The strongest way to put it. Antonio takes from Shylock exactly what Shylock's Christian neighbours have been taking all along, and gives it the form of a favour. That is a defensible thesis and it is supported by the whole play, not just by this scene.

What the forced conversion is doing in the play

Two readings, and you may argue either.

The charitable reading. In the world of the play, a Christian believes conversion saves a soul. Antonio, on this view, gives Shylock the one thing he thinks is worth having and cannot lose. Some of the audience Shakespeare wrote for would have heard it that way.

The reading most readers now take. It is annihilation. Shylock's religion is the whole of his identity in the play, the thing that has been used against him in every scene. Taking his money leaves him poor; taking his faith leaves him nobody. And the three words with which he accepts, "I am content", are the flattest thing in a play full of rhetoric, from a man who has been the most articulate person on stage all evening.

What beginners get wrong

They stop at the blood. The blood argument only defeats the claim. It leaves Shylock poorer by the debt. The statute takes his estate, his profession and his religion.

They think Shylock is punished for cruelty. He is punished under a statute that applies to aliens who seek the life of citizens, and the only act relied on is his lawsuit.

They call the ending merciful without examining it. Read the conditions before you use the word.

They forget the deed of gift is used again. In Act V, Nerissa hands it to Lorenzo and Jessica, and Lorenzo says the ladies drop manna in the way of starved people. The play does not treat Shylock's ruin as unfinished business; it treats it as a gift to the lovers.

A worked answer

Question. "Was Shylock treated justly by the court?"

A weak answer. No, because he was a Jew and everybody hated him.

Why it is weak. It gives a reason outside the record and none inside it.

A strong answer, in four steps. First, the conduct relied on to convict him was the bringing of this very suit, on a bond the same court had held valid minutes earlier. Second, no charge was laid, no evidence was called and no opportunity to answer was given; the judge announced the statute after judgment, on the words "it appears by manifest proceeding". Third, the statute applies only to aliens, so the identical conduct by Antonio could not have attracted it. Fourth, the sentence went beyond the statute: the Duke pardoned the life, and Antonio then required conversion to Christianity and a deed of gift to Lorenzo and Jessica as the price of that pardon.

The closing sentence. A court may reach a right result by a wrong route, and a candidate who says so, and then shows the route, is doing what "critically examine" asks for.

Quick revision

The statute: an alien who by direct or indirect attempts seeks the life of a citizen forfeits half his goods to the intended victim, half to the state, and his life to the Duke's mercy.

The act relied on is the lawsuit itself, and the statute is produced by the judge after judgment, with no charge and no defence.

The Duke pardons the life before it is asked for, to show "the difference of our spirit".

Antonio's terms: quit the state's fine, hold the other half in use for Lorenzo, become a Christian, record a deed of gift to Lorenzo and Jessica.

Shylock: "You take my life when you do take the means whereby I live", and then "I am content".

Test yourself

1. State the alien statute in your own words. If it is proved that an alien has sought the life of a citizen of Venice, whether by direct or indirect attempts, the intended victim takes half his goods, the state takes the other half, and his life is at the mercy of the Duke alone.

2. What conduct of Shylock's is said to satisfy it? His pursuit of the bond in this very suit. Portia says it appears by manifest proceeding that he has contrived, indirectly and directly too, against the life of the defendant.

3. Give two objections to the way the statute is applied. That the only act relied on is a lawsuit on a bond the court had just held valid, and that the charge is made by the judge after judgment without any accusation, evidence or opportunity to answer. That it applies only to aliens, and that its sudden appearance contradicts the Duke's earlier statement that the law could not be denied, are two more.

4. List Antonio's conditions in order. That the state's fine on one half be quitted; that he himself hold the other half in use and render it on Shylock's death to Lorenzo; that Shylock presently become a Christian; and that he record in court a deed of gift of all he dies possessed of to Lorenzo and Jessica.

5. Why do Shylock's last three words matter? Because "I am content" is the shortest answer he gives anybody in the play, from the character who has spoken the longest and best speeches in it. The flatness is the point, and a reader is left to decide whether it is submission, exhaustion or something the play refuses to name.