PaulDumitracheAlex31 :
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE…. THE ANTI-SEMIT
Here it has come to this: the major British universities are now eliminating William Shakespeare from English literature courses, for… anti-Semitism. It is like eliminating in our country, from the Romanian Language and Literature specialization,… Eminescu, for anti-Semitism (well, this moment is not far off either, if they detained the lawyer Rapcea and confiscated his books about Eminescu). But what did the anti-Semite Shakespeare do, who had no idea about this word in his time? He wrote “The Merchant of Venice”, now considered one of the most anti-Semitic plays in the world. If you don't know the play, I will give it to you, in short, in a manner accessible today: Bassanio, a young, nobleman with a name that made his pockets empty, falls in love with Portia, a young, beautiful heiress. He couldn't win her over without expensive gifts of about 3000 thalers, or he didn't have any money, so he turned to Antonio's friend, a wealthy merchant. But Antonio didn't have cash, he had ships with goods sent on the run, but he wanted to help his friend, so he decided to borrow from a Jewish moneylender named Shiylock, known for lending money mostly to Christian merchants. Shiylock had also heard of Antonio, how he was rich, how he lent money to his friends without interest, how he helped others disinterestedly, that is, he felt that Antonio was making his usury a bit difficult, forcing him to keep the interest rate low. Moreover, he knew that Antonio was having a hard time with the Jews, he disdained them, he told jokes about them, and he even wanted them to leave Venice, which he said was poisoning it with their usury. Here is Antonio knocking on the moneylender's door, asking for a loan of 3000 thalers, for 3 months, with usurious interest, obviously. The Jewish moneylender Shylock speculates on Antonio's need, agrees to give him the loan, but with a notarial deed, with a guarantee, meaning that it should be mentioned that failure to repay the loan on time gives the moneylender the right to take (i.e. ..cut) one kilogram of the borrower's, Antonio's, flesh. He laughs when he hears it, it seems like a macabre joke to him...
2026-06-28 04:42:23