The Merchant of Venice: With notes, characters, plot and exam themes

In The Merchant of Venice, Shakespeare’s most controversial comedy, the merchant Antonio, on behalf of his friend Bassanio, seeks a loan from Shylock. The loan is required to help impress an heiress.

Shylock is a Jewish moneylender whom Antonio has always treated with the utmost contempt, and Antonio is to honour the debt with a pound of the merchant’s own flesh. When Antonio defaults on the loan, Shylock prepares to take his gruesome revenge – only to find that the law is a knife that can cut two ways. The play explores prejudice, tolerance and the true nature of justice.

This new edition includes the complete text with explanatory notes and a full introduction that describes the setting, summarises the plot and profiles the main characters. It discusses Shakespeare’s language and the play’s themes, and it gives typical essay and test questions to help students prepare for exams.

The book contains the following subjects:

• The merchants of Venice
• Merchant adventurers
• The Jews of Venice and England
• Money-lending and usury
• The story of The Merchant of Venice
• The play’s characters: Shylock, Portia, Antonio, Bassanio, Jessica, Lorenzo, Gratiano, Launcelot Gobbo
• Themes and language
• Love and friendship
• Men and women
• The value of money
• Justice and mercy
• Imagine you are in the play
• Shakespeare’s language
• Examining the play
• Typical exam questions

Trimmed Page Size: 193 x 124mm; Paperback; 176pp; Spine: 13mm: Weight: 141g

About the editor:

Angela Sheehan, who introduces the play, is a Shakespeare enthusiast. She has had a distinguished career editing encyclopaedias, educational texts and reference books for children, and published The Best-Loved Plays of Shakespeare and the Shakespeare for Everyone series.

ISBN: 9781842057988