Merchant Of Venice: Portia Essay

The Merchant of Venice is a play set in a very male and Christian dominated society where other religions and women rights weren’t very well accepted by the community. However Portia, a rich woman who had previously been controlled by men, triumphs as she manipulates tricks and saves the lives of the men.

We see how she is manipulated by men through her father, who though dead, still manages to control who she marries from his will. He states in his will that from three different caskets the suitors will have to chose, in each of which will contain either a letter to the suitor or a picture of Portia. In one of the three caskets, either the lead, silver or gold casket, there will be a picture of Portia the suitor picking the casket containing the picture will be the suitor who will get to marry Portia. �I may neither choose who I would, nor refuse who I dislike, so is the will of living daughter curbed by the will of a dead father’ this shows that Portia would rather have a say as to who she gets to choose rather than being told who she has to marry. She overcomes that after two suitors who she wishes not to marry choose the wrong casket letting her know which casket contains her picture, so that when Bassanio becomes a suitor and she falls for him she is able to hint to him which casket to choose:

�Tell me where is Fancy bred,

Or in the heart, or in the head?

How begot, how nourishÐ"Ёd?’

She uses her linguistic knowledge to lead him to the lead casket by rhyming the words at the end of each line with вЂ?lead: bred, head & nourishÐ"Ёd’.

Throughout the rest of the play we see Portia fight back not only through giving herself control of who she marries but also through deceiving the Duke into believing that she is a clever, young lawyer named Balthazar by writing a letter that the Duke receives from, supposedly, Bellario telling him that he cannot make the court hearing but he has sent a young man, a disguised Portia, called Balthazar to take his place. She starts the letter with flattery, saying, вЂ?Your Grace shall understandвЂ¦Ð²Ð‚™ This makes the Duke feel elevated and respected because Your Grace is a sign of humbleness showing respect and a feeling of status. She then writes that Bellario is вЂ?very sick’ so that the Duke would have sympathy for Bellario and therefore be more likely to agree to Balthazar being the prosecution councillor. As she mentions Balthazar she says that Balthazar was there in вЂ?loving visitation’ which reassures the Duke because if he is to trust Bellario then he will trust a close friend of Bellario’s, which is what the two words imply. She then refers to Balthazar as вЂ?a young doctor of Rome’ the Rome bit is important because it links with the point of religion because the Pope is in Rome which makes Balthazar seem almost holy. You may think that calling him a young doctor isn’t a wise move because it’s not very reassuring but Portia reassures the Duke further down the letter when she says вЂ?I beseech you let his lack of years be no impediment to let him lack a reverend estimation, for I never knew so young a body with so old a head’ which means that don’t let the fact that he’s young stop you from letting him replace me because I have never met such a young boy that is as clever as a man with 50 years worth of experience. That is reassuring because Bellario seems to be a much respected Doctor of Law and we can therefore presume that he has met a number of very important people young and old and for him to say that of Balthazar will be put in very high regard with the Duke. She then writes after that, вЂ?we turned o’er many books together; he his furnished with my opinion, which, bettered with his own learning, the greatness whereof I cannot enough commend’ this is probably the most reassuring thing that she could write to the Duke and say because the Duke wanted Bellario in the first place having much respect for him on the understanding that he is one of the best doctors around, so for him to say that they have looked over the case and read many books is to say that about the case they know as much as the other. He also says that вЂ?his furnished with my opinion, which, bettered with his own learning’ so Bellario is saying that Balthazar has a great knowledge but with the opinions and thoughts of Bellario’s experience he has a greater knowledge than Bellario himself. By writing вЂ?the greatness whereof I cannot enough commend’ this is saying that he is speechless when it comes to the amount of knowledge that Balthazar seems to have, this could almost in it self make the Duke want to see Balthazar because to say, for example, that someone was so beautiful that you couldn’t put it into words, you would want to see for yourself just how beautiful this person is. He then repeats flattery at the end of the speech вЂ?I leave him to your gracious acceptance’ this suggests that he doesn’t want to over-do the whole letter because if he had ended it, for example, with вЂ?please, please take him I promise you that he will be the best and that if you don’t there’ll be consequences’ which possible makes him think that he’s not that good and that Bellario made it up to get out of the court hearing, but he leaves it in the Dukes hands and lets him make the decision. She adds persuasion at the end by saying that the trial would be better with Balthazar’s presence.

Another example of Portia fighting back is when Portia uses trickery to make Shylock stick exactly to the bond causing him to be condemned to Christianity and to give half of his belongings to Antonio