Common module: MOV flashcards

Question 1

Shylocks greed - depiction of the typical Jew

Answer 1

“There is some ill a-brewing towards my rest, For I did dream of money bags tonight.”

Question 2

Shylocks greed - the bond with Antonio

3 quotes

Answer 2

“Three thousand ducats, well.” - Idiosyncrasy
“Three thousand ducats for three months, and Antonio bound.”
“I’ll have my bond; I will not hear thee speak; I’ll have my bond, and therefore speak no more.”

Question 3

Shylocks experience of discrimination - name-calling

Answer 3

“You called me a dog;”
Duke refers to him as “A stony adversary, and inhuman wretch, Incapable of pity, void and empty from any dram of mercy.”
Called “Devil” “evil soul” and “villain” by Antonio
Called “Villain Jew” and “dog jew” by Solanio

Question 4

Shylocks experience of discrimination - speaking out (3 quotes)

Answer 4

“he hath disgraced me, and hindered me half a million, laughed at my losses, mocked at my gains, scorned my nation, thwarted my bargains, cooled my friends, heated mine enemies - and what’s his reason? I am a Jew.” - Shylock referring to Antonio
“The villainy you teach me I will execute, and it shall go hard but I will better the instruction” - referring to Christians, accusing Christians of hypocrisy
“Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections and passions?” - cumulation

Question 5

Shylocks experience of discrimination - using Antonio’s words against him

Answer 5

“I will have my bond, speak not against my bond; I have sworn an oath that I will have my bond. Thou call’dst me dog before thou hadst a cause, but since I am a dog, beware my fangs.”

Question 6

Shylocks hatred for Antonio

Answer 6

“So can I give no reason, nor I will not, More than a lodged hate and a certain loathing I bear Antonio, that I follow thus a losing suit against him. Are you answered?” - Cold but reasoned response to the Duke’s “We all expect a gentle answer, Jew.”

Question 7

Shylocks hatred for Christians

Answer 7

“These be the Christian husbands! I have a daughter: would any of the stock of Barabbas had been her husband, rather than a Christian!”

Question 8

Shylocks experience of betrayal by his daughter

Answer 8

“You knew, none so well, none so well as you, of my daughter’s flight.”

“My own flesh and blood to rebel!” “I say my daughter is my flesh and my blood.”

Question 9

Shylocks criticism of Christians

Answer 9

Comparison of his bond to the Christians and their slaves; “You have among you many a purchased slave, Which, like your asses and your dogs and mules, You use in abject and in slavish parts because you bought them.”
“Shall I say to you ‘Let them be free! Marry them to your heirs!… You will answer, ‘The slaves are ours.’ So do I answer you. The pound of flesh which I demand of him is dearly bought; ‘tis mine, and I will have it.” - Exposing Christian hypocrisy

Question 10

Shylock’s defeat (3 quotes)

Answer 10

“Down, therefore, and beg mercy of the Duke.” - Portia to Shylock
“Nay, take my life and all, pardon not that: You take my house when you do take the prop that doth sustain my house; you take my life when you do take the means whereby I live.”
“I am content”

Question 11

Jessica’s hatred of her father (2 quotes)

Answer 11

“Our house is hell, and thou a merry devil didst rob it of some taste of tediousness.”

“What heinous sin is it in me to be ashamed to be my father’s child!”

Question 12

Jessica’s deception (3 quotes)

Answer 12

“O Lorenzo… I shall end this strife, become a Christian and thy loving wife.”
“a daughter, lost” - dramatic irony
“What heinous sin is it in me to be ashamed to be my father’s child!”

Question 13

Jessica’s love (3 quotes)

Answer 13

“But love is blind, and lovers cannot see the pretty follies that themselves commit;”
“In such a night Medea gathered the enchanted herbs that did renew old Aeson.” - reference to greek mythology
“I such a night Did Jessica steal from the wealthy Jew and with and unthrift love did run from Venice…” - Lorenzo to Jessica

Question 14

Jessica’s loss of religion

Answer 14

“He tells me flatly there’s no mercy for me in heaven, because I am a Jew’s daughter;”

Question 15

Antonio’s sadness

Answer 15

“A stage where every man must play a part, and mine a sad one.”

Question 16

Antonio’s friendship and love for Bassanio

2 quotes

Answer 16

“My purse, my person, my extremest means lie all unlocked to your occasions.”

“Sweet Bassanio, my ships have all miscarried, my creditors grow cruel, my estate is very low; my bond to the Jew is forfeit… if I might but see you at my death. Notwithstanding, use your pleasure; if your love do not persuade you to come, let not my letter.”

Question 17

Antonio’s unconditional love for Bassanio, even with the threat of death present.
(4 quotes)

Answer 17

“All debts are cleared between you and I if I might but see you at my death.”
“Pray God Bassanio come to see me pay his debt, and then I care not.”
“Say how I loved you, speak me fair in death,”
“Repent but you that you shall lose your friend”

Question 18

Bassanio’s love for Antonio

Answer 18

“Dearest friend to me, the kindest man, the best conditioned and unwearied spirit in doing courtesies; and one in whom the ancient Roman honour more appears than any that draws breath in Italy” - Bassanio’s highly hyperbolised monologue

Question 19

Bassanio’s role in Antonio’s bond

2 quotes

Answer 19

“I have engaged myself to a dear friend, engaged my friend to his mere enemy, to feed my means.” - Bassanio
“Here is a letter, lady, the paper as the body of my friend, and every word in it a gaping wound issuing lifeblood” - personification of the paper as representation of Antonio’s fate

Question 20

Antonio’s discrimination against Jews

4 quotes

Answer 20

“The devil can cite scripture for his purpose, An evil soul producing holy witness is like a villain with a smiling cheek, a goodly apple rotten at the heart.”
“And say there is much kindness in the Jew.” pg 27
“Hie thee, gentle jew. The Hebrew will turn Christian, he grows kind.”
“As seek to soften that - than which what’s harder? - His Jewish heart.”

Question 21

Antonio’s hypocrisy (3 quotes)

Answer 21

“He seeks my life, his reason well I know: I oft delivered from his forfeitures” - ignoring religious concern
“… to render it upon his death unto the gentleman that lately stole his daughter.”
“for his favour he presently become Christian;”

Question 22

Threat of death for Antonio (4 quotes)

Answer 22

“My patience to his fury, and am armed to suffer with a quietness of spirit the very tyranny and rage of his.”
“You may as well use question with the wolf why he hath made the ewe bleat for the lamb.” - metaphor for his innocence
“Let me have judgement, and the Jew his will.”
“For if the Jew do cut but deep enough I’ll pay instantly with all my heart.” - dramatic tension

Question 23

Bassanio’s love for Antonio

3 quotes

Answer 23

“To you, Antonio, I owe the most in money and in love,”
“This is Antonio, to whom I am so infinitely bound.”
Antonio is referred to by Portia as his “bosom lover”

Question 24

Bassanio’s romantic love for Portia (3 quotes)

Answer 24

“she is fair, and - fairer than that word - Of wondrous virtues. Sometimes from her eyes I did receive fair speechless messages.”
“What find I here? Fair Portia’s counterfeit! What demi-god Hath come so near creation?”
Lead casket says - “You that choose not by the view chance as fair, and choose as true.”

Question 25

Bassanio - the ring

Answer 25

“But when this ring parts from this finger, then parts life from hence: O then be bold to say Bassanio’s dead!”

“Good sir, this ring was given me by my wife, and when she put it on, she made me vow that I should neither sell, nor give, nor lose it.”

Question 26

Portia’s power and status

Answer 26

“Renowned suitors, and her sunny locks hang on her temples like a golden fleece… many Jasons come in quest of her.” - Bassanio speaking - reference to greek mythology

Question 27

Portia’s discrimination

Answer 27

says the Prince of Morocco has “the complexion of a devil” - reveals how Elizabethans were judgemental of Europeans

Question 28

Portia’s love for Bassanio - the caskets (3 quotes)

Answer 28

“Before you hazard, for in choosing wrong I lose your company; therefore forbear a while.”
“O these naughty times put bars between the owners and their rights! And so though yours, not yours.”
“I speak too long, but ‘tis to peize the time, to eche it, and to draw it out in length, to stay you from election.”

Question 29

Portia’s love for Bassanio - declarations of love (3 quotes)

Answer 29

“Half of me is yours, the other half yours- mine own, I would say: but if mine then yours, and so all yours.” - Declaration of love from Portia
“For never shall you lie by Portia’s side with an unquiet soul.”

Question 30

Portia’s love for Bassanio - the ring (4 quotes)

Answer 30

“What ring gave you, my lord? Not that, I hope, which you received of me?” Bassanio - “If I could add a lie unto a fault, I would deny it…” Portia “Even so void is your false heart of truth. By heaven, I will ne’er come in your bed Until I see the ring.”

Repetition of “the ring”

Question 31

Portia’s cleverness - the princes

Answer 31

Nerissa - “First there is the Neapolitan prince.” Portia - “Ay, that’s a colt indeed, for he doth nothing but talk of his horse…”
Nerissa - “Then is there the County Palatine.” Portia - “he doth nothing but frown…”
Nerissa - “How say you by the French lord, Monsieur Le Bon?” Portia - “In truth I know it is a sin to be a mocker, but he! - Why, he hath a horse better than the Neapolitan’s, a better bad habit of frowning than the Count Palatine…” - Eloquent, satirical, hyperbolised speech

Question 32

Portia’s cleverness - her plan (2 quotes)

Answer 32

When we are both accoutred like young men I’ll prove the prettier fellow of the two, and wear my dagger with the braver grace, and speak between the change of man and boy with a reed voice and turn two mincing steps into manly stride…” - she knows the mannerisms of men and can put that into action - perceptive, cunning
“Like a fine bragging youth; adn tell quaint lies how honourable ladies sought my life, which I denying, they fell sick and died..”

Question 33

Portia’s cleverness - saves Antonio (2 quotes)

Answer 33

Portia, disguised as Balthazar, pleads to Shylock - “The quality of mercy is not strained, It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven upon the place beneath.”
“Take then thy bond, take thou thy pound of flesh, but in the cutting it, if thou dost shed One drop of Christian blood, thy lands and goods are by the laws if Venice confiscate unto the state of Venice.”

Question 34

Portia’s self-awareness and exposure of the patriarchy

2 quotes

Answer 34

“O me, the word ‘choose’! I may neither choose who I would, nor refuse who I dislike, so is the will of a living daughter curbed by the will of a dead father.”

“In terms of choice I am not solely led by nice direction of a maiden’s eyes. Besides, the lottery of my destiny bars me the right of voluntary choosing.”

Question 35

Portia and Nerissa’s friendship (4 quotes, 2 lines each character)

Answer 35

Portia - “By my troth, Nerissa, my little body is aweary of this great world.” Nerissa - “You would be, sweet madam, if your miseries were in the same abundance as your good fortunes are…”
Portia - “Good sentences, and well pronounced.” Nerissa - “They would be better if well followed.” - verbal sparring - depicts their friendship