William Shakespeare, widely regarded as
the world’s greatest playwright, has revolutionized the world of English
literature with his plays. Some of these plays are clear-cut comedies and
tragedies, while others are more ambiguous. The Merchant of Venice is
a play that falls under the latter type, and it has been hotly contested
whether this literary work should be classified a comedy or a tragedy. However,
since the majority of the characters received a happy ending, the abundance of
comic relief scenes and characters, and lightheartedness of the plot relative
to other Shakespearean works leads me to conclude that The Merchant of
Venice is indeed a comedy.
One of the characteristics of a comedy is that it usually contains a happy
resolution of conflict, and this was definitely reflected in the conclusion of The
Merchant of Venice. “Happy endings” usually pertain to the protagonists or
the main characters surviving or outlasting misfortune. Antonio being spared
and cleared of any debt he owed Shylock by the Venetian courts is a prime
example of the protagonist receiving satisfactory closure. In the drama
building up to the court scene, Antonio’s best friend, Bassanio, had cut a deal
with the devil as he borrowed money from the shrewd Shylock, with the
stipulation that repayment would either be in ducats or a pound of Antonio’s
flesh. When Antonio’s business enterprise came crashing down abruptly, he had
no means by which to repay Shylock, thus setting up the major conflict of The
Merchant of Venice. Antonio’s ending is undoubtedly a happy one for his
character, since his life was spared and he was cleared of any charges. Another
example of a character with a favorable conclusion is Portia. Recently, her
father had been pushing her toward marriage, and because of her many biases,
she found it near impossible to find a suitable suitor. At the end of the play,
she does, in fact, end up with the only man that’s ever caught her eye,
Bassanio. These happy endings for primary characters are typical of
Shakespearean comedies.
The
Merchant of Venice is abounding with other typical Shakespearean
comedy techniques like comic relief; humor that manifests itself in both
situations and characters. The overall hilarity of the play is an ample reason
to classify it as a comedy rather than a tragedy. Shakespeare inserts comic
relief scenes at opportune times in this play to relieve tension, and Jessica
and Launcelot’s banter in the drama is an excellent example of this. In the
preceding scenes, Shylock has just hauled Antonio off to jail while Portia and
Nerissa attempted to devise a scheme to rescue their future husbands’ friend –
two very action-packed and intense developments in the story. However,
immediately following these two scenes, Launcelot and Jessica are seen having a
playful discussion about the correlation of Jewish refusal to consume pork and
the rising prices of bacon, a conversation so wacky and out of place that it
manages to diffuse much of the thickening tension. Comic relief is a literary
device that extends to characters as well. The interactions between Launcelot
and his father, Old Gobbo, are one of the more humorous moments of the play,
where Old Gobbo fails to recognize Launcelot as his son because of his ailing
senses. Shakespeare utilized plenty of jokes that would have appealed to the
audiences of his time here to rouse laughter. At its very root, a comedy is a
drama with a humorous or satirical tone, and The Merchant of Venice’s
comic relief scenes and characters provide the audience with this humorous air.
When compared to many of Shakespeare’s other dramatic works, The
Merchant of Venice’s storyline is much more lighthearted and tame. The
Merchant of Venice is heralded as a fine example of a comedy by some,
while asserted to be a tragedy by others. This play can be clearly categorized
as a comedy, because the majority of the characters received favorable
conclusions, comic relief is in abundance, and the lighthearted, quirky nature
of the plot.
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