USQ Law Society Law Review
Hayley Cohen
Winter 2022
THE MERCHANT OF VENICE AND THE BODY OF LAW HAYLEY COHEN1 I
INTRODUCTION
Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice explores the politics over the “body of law” in fictional Venice and Elizabethan England. The play highlights the competing interests and power struggles over the law. Ultimately, it is the ruling class that legitimises law and sets normative standards of what it means to be morally right and just. The trope of justice in the play deals with the issues of the “stateless Other” and punishment. As Desmond Manderson argues, literature’s main purpose is not to provide didactic morality.2 Rather, cultural texts such as The Merchant of Venice are a space of discourse, critique and debate.
II
PUNISHMENT: AN APPEAL TO EQUITY
The Merchant of Venice is centred around a contractual bond between Shylock the Jewish moneylender and Antonio the merchant. Antonio agrees to give a bond as surety for a 3000ducat loan for his penniless friend Bassanio who needs the money to court Portia, a rich heiress.3 Since Antonio is against the practice of usury, Shylock agrees he will not charge interest on the loan.4 However, a penalty clause is attached to the bond that states Antonio will give a pound of his flesh5 if the loan is not paid within three months.6 When Antonio’s commercial ventures go wrong and he fails to meet the repayment, Shylock insists upon his pound of flesh. He subsequently appeals to the Venetian Duke.7 The trial scene in the Ducal Court dramatises the struggle between the “common law” and “equity”. In Shakespeare’s England, harsh penalties of money bonds were enforced under contract law. However, they could still be estopped in the Courts of Chancery if it was antithetical to natural law.8
1
This paper was originally submitted as assessment for the subject ENL3007 Law and Literature.
Desmond Manderson, ‘Modernism and the Critique of Law and Literature’ (2011) 35(1) Australian Feminist Law Journal 107, 107 (‘Manderson’). 2
William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice (Simon & Schuster, 2010) 486-9 (‘Shakespeare’); Joshua Nisker, ‘The (Comic) Tragedy of Formalism in Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice’ (2006) 15(1) Dalhousie Journal of Legal Studies 257, 263 (‘Nisker’). 3
4
Shakespeare (n 2) 477-8.
5
Ibid 486-9.
6
Ibid 327-36.
7
Ibid 1700.
8
Nisker (n 2) 263.
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