What “The Merchant of Venice” Has to Say about Justice

“Just as it was in Shakespeare’s time, the questions of justice, mercy, and society remain as relevant as ever before, and we have much to learn from the great bard of Anglodom.”

The Merchant of Venice is one of Shakespeare’s grandest comedies standing alongside the Taming of the Shrew and A Midsummer Night’s Dream, notwithstanding As You Like It and Twelfth Night. While it is much easier now to transform the Merchant of Venice into a tragedy (where the crude “comedy” of modernity appears in implicit ridicule and hypocritical exposé of the now truncated Christian characters), to do so strips the play of its power and insight in contrasting legalistic justice and merciful forgiveness. These two themes reveal to us two polar opposite worlds, as well as Shakespeare’s passionate plea for the world of forgiveness instead of the world of strict justice, which reminds us of the Greek understanding of retributive punishment. Just as it was in Shakespeare’s time, the questions of justice, mercy, and society remain as relevant as ever before, and we have much to learn from the great bard of Anglodom.

Like the poets of antiquity, the Troubadours of France, and the poets of the late Renaissance, Shakespeare is preoccupied with the theme of love (and how it is often contrasted with politics). While the poets of old often found love in the form of struggle, especially in the context of war where love becomes the single refuge and respite from the chaotic storm of bloodshed, part of the Shakespearean revolution was to find the struggle for love in the adventure and misfortune of life itself (however mundane or exciting). Here, the Merchant of Venice undeniably shines as the struggle for love—specifically between Portia and Bassanio—is threatened by the turbulence of misfortune, revenge, and the legalities of justice. But love, in this play, is secondary to the thematic deconstruction of the strict legality of justice. Shakespeare, thus, is exploring the question of whether love can flourish in a world of dog-eat-dog justice.

It is important to remember that traditional comedy was a dramatic form that began in unhappiness and ended in happiness. Comedy was not about cheap laughs (to distract us from the daily grind of modern industrial life) at the expense of the target of ridicule (like most contemporary insult comedy is today). Rather, it was principally concerned with the struggle for happiness to manifest itself in a cruel, cold, and often dark world. The Merchant of Venice sets the somber tone of sadness with the weariness of Antonio (likely over losing his camaraderie with Bassanio): “In sooth I know not why I am so sad./It wearies me, you say it wearies you.”