Antonio (The Merchant of Venice)

Antonio is the title character in Shakespeare's ''The Merchant of Venice''. An influential, powerful, and wealthy nobleman of Venice, he is a middle-aged man and a merchant by trade who has his financial interests tied up in overseas shipments when the play begins. He is kind, generous, and honest to Christians, and is loved and revered by all the Christians who know him, but not by the Jew Shylock, whom he himself scorns.

Act 1

Antonio: Well, tell me now, what lady is the same
To whom you swore a secret pilgrimage
That you today promised to tell me of? ()

Bassanio then proceeds to tell Antonio of his depleted financial state due to his own excesses, making sure to note that he is aware he already owes him money. He laments his ill-fortune but cheers at the thought of solving his problems by marrying Portia, a woman who has come into a sizeable inheritance from her father and whom he thinks is predisposed to choose him. He compares himself with Jason and his quest for the Golden Fleece. He beseeches Antonio to back this venture knowing he is not likely to be refused by his generous benefactor. Indeed, Antonio, despite the fact that his capital is already at risk elsewhere, gives him a letter of credit and wishes him well.

Later Antonio enters the Rialto to assure Shylock that he will be bound for the 3,000 ducats Bassanio wishes to borrow. Antonio has belittled and harassed Shylock in public, and he loathes him because when Christian friends of his owed money to the Jews he paid off the debts, thus depriving them of their interest. Far from lamenting his ill-treatment of the Jew who accuses him of spitting on him and calling him a dog, Antonio replies persistently "I am as likely to call thee so again, /To spit on thee again, to spurn thee too." () He agrees to pay with a pound of flesh if he forfeits the bond in lieu of the usual interest.

Act 2

Antonio makes a brief appearance in this act in scene 6 when he runs into Mon and tells him he has twenty people out looking for him. He goes on to say there will be no masque and that Bassanio is at that moment preparing to leave for Belmont to win Portia.

Act 3

We hear no more from Antonio until after Bassanio wins the hand of the wealthy Portia by correctly guessing which of three caskets holds her portrait. Gratiano proposes to Nerissa, Portia's maid in waiting and friend. In the midst of his merrymaking, he receives a letter detailing Antonio's misfortune. None of the ships have returned to port and as such he has no funds to pay the bond with. His flesh is forfeit to the Jew who is intent on having it. He insists he does not regret helping Bassanio and even does not wish him to feel guilty. He only asks him to come and attend his death so that he can see him one last time. Bassanio, along with Gratiano, rushes off with three times the amount owed and his wife's blessing. The gentlemen leave in such a rush that they cannot consummate their marriages.

Act 4

This act begins with Antonio's trial. The Duke pleads with Shylock to give "a gentle answer", a double entendre on the word Gentile, which meant anyone, except a Jew. Shylock refuses to deny his bond. Bassanio and Gratiano are in attendance and advocate strongly that the Jew be thwarted by any means necessary. Bassanio attempts to bribe him three times the amount of the bond. Shylock says he will have nothing but his pound of flesh. All is lost until Portia and Nerissa arrive in the guise of young men pretending to be a learned doctor Balthasar and his clerk. Portia pleads for mercy and getting no further than the previous applicants she seems at first to confirm the strength of the bond and tells Antonio to prepare to pay it. When all seems hopeless Bassanio declares his despair:

Act 5

Antonio accompanies Bassanio home to Belmont to celebrate his good fortune and meet Portia. After some teasing, all discover the lady's deception in regard to the rings and the trial. Antonio plays the benefactor again, this time to Jessica when he gives her legal documentation to show that she is to inherit Shylock's property at his death. The play ends with Portia bearing good news that Antonio's much-anticipated ships have arrived safely in port. He is overjoyed at his good fortune so that while he remains the consummate bachelor he is not a poor one.

Antonio's relationship with Bassanio

Antonio's deep friendship and dependence on Bassanio, his willingness to risk his life on Bassanio's behalf, and his draining of his own finances to support Bassanio has been read as supporting the theory that Antonio is homosexual. Various interpreters began to read Antonio as homosexual in the 1950s, but there have been many objections. Some modern productions use the theory that Antonio is suffering from his love for Bassanio to explain his melancholic behavior.

Alan Bray's book ''Homosexuality in Renaissance England'' argues that in the time period of ''The Merchant of Venice''s composition, "homosexuality" did not refer to an individual's sexual identity but only to specific sexual acts any individual might engage in. As Bray writes: "To talk of an individual of this period as being or not being 'a homosexual' is an anachronism and ruinously misleading. The temptation to debauchery, from which homosexuality was not clearly distinguished, was accepted as part of the common lot. Homosexuality s understood in 16th-century Englandwas a sin 'to which men's natural corruption and viciousness ereprone'" (16–17, Rainolds quoted in ).

According to the Verity edition of ''The Merchant of Venice'', it is stated that Antonio and Bassanio are best friends; Bassanio is bound to Antonio for being his friend.

References

Sources

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Further reading

* Bloom, Harold. ''Shakespeare – The Invention of the Human''. New York: Riverhead Books, 1998.
* Campbell, Oscar James and Edward G. Quinn. ''The Reader's Encyclopedia of Shakespeare''. New York: Thomas Y Crowell Company (1834).
* O'Rourke, James L. "Racism and Homophobia in The Merchant of Venice." ''ELH'' 70. 2 (2003).
* Rosenshield, Gary. "Deconstructing the Christian Merchant: Antonio and The Merchant of Venice." Shofar 20.2 (2002)
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* Shakespeare, William, and Kenneth Myrick. ''The Merchant of Venice with New and Updated Critical Essays and a Revised Bibliography''. New York: Signet Classic, 1998.

External links

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"Shakespeare's Characters: Antonio (''The Merchant of Venice'')"
Shakespeare Online


Folger Shakespeare Library

"Character Analyses – Antonio"
CliffsNotes

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The Merchant of Venice
Literary characters introduced in 1590
Fictional Italian people in literature
Male Shakespearean characters