← All monologuesFull work: The Merchant of Venice
The Merchant of Venice · William Shakespeare · c. 1597
SHYLOCK
A moneylender who has been spat on and mocked for years, finally saying the thing out loud.
The speech100 words · 4 beats
0:00 / 0:48
Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions?
Fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as a Christian is?
If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die?
And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge? If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble you in that.turn
- Speaking to
- Two men who have just asked what good his bond will do him.
- What just happened
- His daughter has fled, his enemy’s ships are rumoured lost, and Salarino has just asked what a pound of flesh is even good for.
- Objective
- To force them to admit he is a man exactly like them — and therefore entitled to the same revenge they would take.
- The turn
- ‘And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge?’ — the case for his humanity becomes the case for his cruelty.
- Watch out for
- The trap is playing the ending from the start. The logic is fair and calm until the last turn; that is what makes the turn land.