If you are writing a revision, consider the following: – Make sure you understand the play’s main plot points and themes; I suggest consulting a Shakespeare guide and synopsis. – Cut excessive plot summaries. Only choose moments which illustrate a point you are trying to make – Write an introduction before any quotation you use, then follow it up with an interpretation and analysis. – Develop a clear thesis. What are you actually trying to argue? – Use clear, simple, sentences and avoid overly flowery language which make it difficult to follow what you are trying to communicate.
Tianyang Shen
BUS 3920
Paper 2
4/24/2020
The Wife of Bath and the Prioress
Portia’s wittiness grips the readers in how she wins the heart of Bassanio into her wealth. Her father dies leaving her with so much wealth, menservants, and maidservants. Her big mansion is privileged for her uneducated mind. Portia knows pretty well that the right man she should marry amid her father’s casket games is Bassanio. When Bassanio visits she is very inquisitive and concerned lest Bassanio, her choicest man fails to choose the right casket. The Three caskets are made of gold, silver, and lead. Her father decides to hide treasure in the leaded casket, maybe to prove the saying that not all that glitters is gold.
“I would not lose you, and you know yourself” (3.2.5)
She speaks to Bassanio of her deepest fears that are connected to the possibility that she might lose him because of her father’s method of choosing the right groom for her life. Portia delights to have Bassanio as his master, love, and king yet, a month remains before he picks the casket that could win him the bride that his heart burns for in the entire of Belmont. Portia an illiterate English girl raised in Belmont trusts that the assets and all the possessions she has inherited and worked for are safe with Bassanio who is a brilliant man. A word has spread for as far as the Kingdom of Aragon and as far as the Kingdom of Morocco and in the entirety of Belmont. Great men in the dynasties of the age desire her hand for a tinge of romance and a lifetime of love. She is such a beautiful species, trading her beauty, wealth, and intelligence for any man that is worthy of the true casket. Portia warns Bassanio with a voice that is almost of a cry to tarry for a month or two that he may learn how to pick the right casket. This wisdom is rare and is connected to the wealth she possesses.
‘I would detain you here some month or two
Before you venture for me. I could teach you
How to choose right, but I am then forsworn’ (3.2.9-10)
Lucky for her, the Prince of Morocco goes directly smiling for gold and its exuberant stare while the Prince of Aragon melts upon the silver casket. Both gentlemen miss where the true beauty and treasure lies. The treasure remains with Bassanio who is a son to the soil from which Portia is birthed.
‘This house, these servants, and this same myself
Are yours, my lord’s. I give them with this ring,
Which when you part from, lose, or give away,
Let it presage the ruin of your love” (3.2.174-177)
Portia shows her intentions to hand over the authority and right to possession to Bassanio who just wins the battle of the caskets. Her mind of investment thinks more of multiplying the wealth she has more than just having the assets stagnant not producing. The notion of Lord Antonio’s investments crossing seas and returning wealth for him makes her more concerned for his friend Bassanio who will automatically know how to convert the assets into more wealth. The other aspect that Portia sees is Lord Bassanio’s charm; the beauty in his face she compares with hers telling him she wishes she would have been prettier, lovelier, and educated just like him. Such a thought is a business yield curve aimed at protecting her bargains through the spectrum of Bassanio’s brilliant mind. She gives Bassanio a ring to keep in on check when he is away from her. The ring acts as the fragrance of connectivity coded in their heart so that their marriage can last as the sun and the moon can last. It is a brilliant idea she proposes to give him a precious ring and swears him that lest he gives it away, or loses it or sells it, their marriage is still intact.
Portia hears of Lord Antonio’s predicament, having sold his heart to a selfish Jew with the name Shylock, whose contract for Bassanio’s loan hangs on Lord Antonio’s pound of flesh. Portia prepares herself to save Lord Antonio and more importantly to recover the wealth Bassanio wants to give to the sadist who only cares for himself. The old man, Shylock uses his wisdom and experience to harm the young inexperienced Duke whose worry is his fleet of ships held by the winds of hell in the deep seas. Antonio takes the loan for Bassanio with the security that his ships will bring him good fortune in time to pay back the villain. Failure of the ships to arrive on time sets him up before a jury as Shylock the Jew who is the complainant charges him of defaulting his money, three thousand ducats.
Portia sits as a jury clerk and her witty words put Shylock in a daze. Her dressing restrains the audience’s sight to notice who she is. She asks Shylock to take a specific mass of Antonio’s pound of flesh where if there be a little more or a little less weight he dies. Shylock surrenders and does not retrieve his three thousand ducats. Bassanio is pleased to reward the ‘woman’ who saves his friend from the ordeal. Portia who wants to test Bassanio’s ability to cherish Antonio’s risk he takes to secure him the loan asks for the ring. It still doesn’t matter is she gives it to a certain ‘woman’ who stands as a judge because it is Portia, but Portia needs to test his loyalty for Antonio for in such he will be loyal to his wife Portia.
“Good sir, this ring was given to me by my wife.
And when she put it on she made me vow
That I would neither sell, nor give, nor lose it” (3.3. 223)
The climax of the play in act 5 sets the stage with romantic lovebirds meet at Portia’s Mansion to celebrate their love and victories. Lorenzo and Jessica just win their freedom to fly far from her father while Bassanio and Portia have their love consummates to something immortal. Gratiano and Nerissa unite on such a lovely evening.
Reference
Shakespeare, W (2010). The Merchant of Venice: A Contemporary English Version, Emended and Rectified with Notes and Commentary by Jonathan Star (54)3:174-177