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The Controversy In Shakespeare's The Merchant Of Venice

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The Merchant of Venice, is one of Shakespeare's most well known plays, but also one of the most controversial because some people think that it it anti-semitic. The Merchant of Venice is anti-semitic because you can see how poorly they treat Shylock, you don’t see any Christians being treated this poorly, the Jews are very much segregated out, and the courtroom is full of Christians voting to help Antonio, but no Jews there for Shylock.
Throughout the play, Shylock and all the other Jews, get treated extremely poorly. In all of the scenes Shylock is in, he is getting spat at, called names, talked down to. Even when he is making the deal with Antonio. While he is asking Antonio why he would lend him the money if he called him a dog, and
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Throughout the play he is criticized and abused because of his religion and his business practices. He was mostly insulted and abused in the Rialto by Antonio when he called him a “misbeliever, cutthroat dog, and spat upon his Jewish gabardine” (Act 1 scene 3; line 21-22). This is one of many quotes that support the fact that Shylock is the victim in the play, since he was tormented and verbally abused by Antonio for being a Jew. Furthermore, it informs the reader that Jews at that time were treated with disrespect. Another quote that shows Shylock being treated poorly was when Solanio said “Let me say amen betimes, lest the devil cross my prayer, for here he comes in the likeness of a Jew.”

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