The Merchant of Venice E-Book

William Shakespeare

• Herausgeber: Sovereign
• Kategorie: Poesie und Drama
• Serie: Timeless Classic
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 111

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2015

Beschreibung

Bassanio, a young Venetian of noble rank, wishes to woo the beautiful and wealthy heiress Portia of Belmont. Having squandered his estate, he needs 3,000 ducats to subsidise his expenditures as a suitor. Bassanio approaches his friend Antonio, a wealthy merchant of Venice who has previously and repeatedly bailed him out.

Leseprobe

William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare

The Merchant of Venice

LONDON ∙ NEW YORK ∙ TORONTO ∙ SAO PAULO ∙ MOSCOW

PARIS ∙ MADRID ∙ BERLIN ∙ ROME ∙ MEXICO CITY ∙ MUMBAI ∙ SEOUL ∙ DOHA

TOKYO ∙ SYDNEY ∙ CAPE TOWN ∙ AUCKLAND ∙ BEIJING

New Edition

Published by Sovereign Classic

www.sovereignclassic.net

This Edition

First published in 2015

Copyright © 2015 Sovereign Classic

Contents

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

ACT I

ACT II

ACT III

ACT IV

ACT V

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

THE DUKE OF VENICE

THE PRINCE OF MOROCCO, suitor to Portia

THE PRINCE OF ARRAGON,

ANTONIO, a merchant of Venice

BASSANIO, his friend, suitor to Portia

SOLANIO, friend to Antonio and Bassanio

SALERIO,

GRATIANO,

LORENZO, in love with Jessica

SHYLOCK, a rich Jew

TUBAL, a Jew, his friend

LAUNCELOT GOBBO, a clown, servant to Shylock

OLD GOBBO, father to Launcelot

LEONARDO, servant to Bassanio

BALTHASAR, servant to Portia

STEPHANO,

PORTIA, a rich heiress

NERISSA, her waiting-maid

JESSICA, daughter to Shylock

Magnificoes of Venice, Officers of the Court of Justice,

Gaoler, Servants, and other Attendants

SCENE: Venice, and PORTIA’S house at Belmont

ACT I

SCENE I. VENICE. A STREET.

Enter ANTONIO, SALARINO, and SALANIO

ANTONIO

In sooth, I know not why I am so sad:It wearies me; you say it wearies you;But how I caught it, found it, or came by it,What stuff ‘tis made of, whereof it is born,I am to learn;And such a want-wit sadness makes of me,That I have much ado to know myself.

SALARINO

Your mind is tossing on the ocean;There, where your argosies with portly sail,Like signiors and rich burghers on the flood,Or, as it were, the pageants of the sea,Do overpeer the petty traffickers,That curtsy to them, do them reverence,As they fly by them with their woven wings.

SALANIO

Believe me, sir, had I such venture forth,The better part of my affections wouldBe with my hopes abroad. I should be stillPlucking the grass, to know where sits the wind,Peering in maps for ports and piers and roads;And every object that might make me fearMisfortune to my ventures, out of doubtWould make me sad.

SALARINO

My wind cooling my brothWould blow me to an ague, when I thoughtWhat harm a wind too great at sea might do.I should not see the sandy hour-glass run,But I should think of shallows and of flats,And see my wealthy Andrew dock’d in sand,Vailing her high-top lower than her ribsTo kiss her burial. Should I go to churchAnd see the holy edifice of stone,And not bethink me straight of dangerous rocks,Which touching but my gentle vessel’s side,Would scatter all her spices on the stream,Enrobe the roaring waters with my silks,And, in a word, but even now worth this,And now worth nothing? Shall I have the thoughtTo think on this, and shall I lack the thoughtThat such a thing bechanced would make me sad?But tell not me; I know, AntonioIs sad to think upon his merchandise.

ANTONIO

Believe me, no: I thank my fortune for it,My ventures are not in one bottom trusted,Nor to one place; nor is my whole estateUpon the fortune of this present year:Therefore my merchandise makes me not sad.

SALARINO

Why, then you are in love.

ANTONIO

Fie, fie!

SALARINO

Not in love neither? Then let us say you are sad,Because you are not merry: and ‘twere as easyFor you to laugh and leap and say you are merry,Because you are not sad. Now, by two-headed Janus,Nature hath framed strange fellows in her time:Some that will evermore peep through their eyesAnd laugh like parrots at a bag-piper,And other of such vinegar aspectThat they’ll not show their teeth in way of smile,Though Nestor swear the jest be laughable.

Enter BASSANIO, LORENZO, and GRATIANO

SALANIO

Here comes Bassanio, your most noble kinsman,Gratiano and Lorenzo. Fare ye well:We leave you now with better company.

SALARINO

I would have stay’d till I had made you merry,If worthier friends had not prevented me.

ANTONIO

Your worth is very dear in my regard.I take it, your own business calls on youAnd you embrace the occasion to depart.

SALARINO

Good morrow, my good lords.

BASSANIO

Good signiors both, when shall we laugh? say, when?You grow exceeding strange: must it be so?

SALARINO

We’ll make our leisures to attend on yours.

Exeunt Salarino and Salanio

LORENZO

My Lord Bassanio, since you have found Antonio,We two will leave you: but at dinner-time,I pray you, have in mind where we must meet.

BASSANIO

I will not fail you.

GRATIANO

You look not well, Signior Antonio;You have too much respect upon the world:They lose it that do buy it with much care:Believe me, you are marvellously changed.

ANTONIO

I hold the world but as the world, Gratiano;A stage where every man must play a part,And mine a sad one.

GRATIANO

Let me play the fool:With mirth and laughter let old wrinkles come,And let my liver rather heat with wineThan my heart cool with mortifying groans.Why should a man, whose blood is warm within,Sit like his grandsire cut in alabaster?Sleep when he wakes and creep into the jaundiceBy being peevish? I tell thee what, Antonio--I love thee, and it is my love that speaks--There are a sort of men whose visagesDo cream and mantle like a standing pond,And do a wilful stillness entertain,With purpose to be dress’d in an opinionOf wisdom, gravity, profound conceit,As who should say ‘I am Sir Oracle,And when I ope my lips let no dog bark!’O my Antonio, I do know of theseThat therefore only are reputed wiseFor saying nothing; when, I am very sure,If they should speak, would almost damn those ears,Which, hearing them, would call their brothers fools.I’ll tell thee more of this another time:But fish not, with this melancholy bait,For this fool gudgeon, this opinion.Come, good Lorenzo. Fare ye well awhile:I’ll end my exhortation after dinner.

LORENZO

Well, we will leave you then till dinner-time:I must be one of these same dumb wise men,For Gratiano never lets me speak.

GRATIANO

Well, keep me company but two years moe,Thou shalt not know the sound of thine own tongue.

ANTONIO

Farewell: I’ll grow a talker for this gear.

GRATIANO

Thanks, i’ faith, for silence is only commendableIn a neat’s tongue dried and a maid not vendible.

Exeunt GRATIANO and LORENZO

ANTONIO

Is that any thing now?

BASSANIO

Gratiano speaks an infinite deal of nothing, morethan any man in all Venice. His reasons are as twograins of wheat hid in two bushels of chaff: youshall seek all day ere you find them, and when youhave them, they are not worth the search.

ANTONIO

Well, tell me now what lady is the sameTo whom you swore a secret pilgrimage,That you to-day promised to tell me of?

BASSANIO

‘Tis not unknown to you, Antonio,How much I have disabled mine estate,By something showing a more swelling portThan my faint means would grant continuance:Nor do I now make moan to be abridgedFrom such a noble rate; but my chief careIs to come fairly off from the great debtsWherein my time something too prodigalHath left me gaged. To you, Antonio,I owe the most, in money and in love,And from your love I have a warrantyTo unburden all my plots and purposesHow to get clear of all the debts I owe.

ANTONIO

I pray you, good Bassanio, let me know it;And if it stand, as you yourself still do,Within the eye of honour, be assured,My purse, my person, my extremest means,Lie all unlock’d to your occasions.

BASSANIO

In my school-days, when I had lost one shaft,I shot his fellow of the self-same flightThe self-same way with more advised watch,To find the other forth, and by adventuring bothI oft found both: I urge this childhood proof,Because what follows is pure innocence.I owe you much, and, like a wilful youth,That which I owe is lost; but if you pleaseTo shoot another arrow that self wayWhich you did shoot the first, I do not doubt,As I will watch the aim, or to find bothOr bring your latter hazard back againAnd thankfully rest debtor for the first.

ANTONIO

You know me well, and herein spend but timeTo wind about my love with circumstance;And out of doubt you do me now more wrongIn making question of my uttermostThan if you had made waste of all I have:Then do but say to me what I should doThat in your knowledge may by me be done,And I am prest unto it: therefore, speak.

BASSANIO

In Belmont is a lady richly left;And she is fair, and, fairer than that word,Of wondrous virtues: sometimes from her eyesI did receive fair speechless messages:Her name is Portia, nothing undervaluedTo Cato’s daughter, Brutus’ Portia:Nor is the wide world ignorant of her worth,For the four winds blow in from every coastRenowned suitors, and her sunny locksHang on her temples like a golden fleece;Which makes her seat of Belmont Colchos’ strand,And many Jasons come in quest of her.O my Antonio, had I but the meansTo hold a rival place with one of them,I have a mind presages me such thrift,That I should questionless be fortunate!

ANTONIO

Thou know’st that all my fortunes are at sea;Neither have I money nor commodityTo raise a present sum: therefore go forth;Try what my credit can in Venice do:That shall be rack’d, even to the uttermost,To furnish thee to Belmont, to fair Portia.Go, presently inquire, and so will I,Where money is, and I no question makeTo have it of my trust or for my sake.

Exeunt

SCENE II: BELMONT. A ROOM IN PORTIA’S HOUSE.

Enter PORTIA and NERISSA

PORTIA

By my troth, Nerissa, my little body is aweary ofthis great world.

NERISSA

You would be, sweet madam, if your miseries were inthe same abundance as your good fortunes are: andyet, for aught I see, they are as sick that surfeitwith too much as they that starve with nothing. Itis no mean happiness therefore, to be seated in themean: superfluity comes sooner by white hairs, butcompetency lives longer.

PORTIA

Good sentences and well pronounced.

NERISSA

They would be better, if well followed.

PORTIA

If to do were as easy as to know what were good todo, chapels had been churches and poor men’scottages princes’ palaces. It is a good divine thatfollows his own instructions: I can easier teachtwenty what were good to be done, than be one of thetwenty to follow mine own teaching. The brain maydevise laws for the blood, but a hot temper leapso’er a cold decree: such a hare is madness theyouth, to skip o’er the meshes of good counsel thecripple. But this reasoning is not in the fashion tochoose me a husband. O me, the word ‘choose!’ I mayneither choose whom I would nor refuse whom Idislike; so is the will of a living daughter curbedby the will of a dead father. Is it not hard,Nerissa, that I cannot choose one nor refuse none?

NERISSA

Your father was ever virtuous; and holy men at theirdeath have good inspirations: therefore the lottery,that he hath devised in these three chests of gold,silver and lead, whereof who chooses his meaningchooses you, will, no doubt, never be chosen by anyrightly but one who shall rightly love. But whatwarmth is there in your affection towards any ofthese princely suitors that are already come?

PORTIA

I pray thee, over-name them; and as thou namestthem, I will describe them; and, according to mydescription, level at my affection.

NERISSA

First, there is the Neapolitan prince.

PORTIA

Ay, that’s a colt indeed, for he doth nothing buttalk of his horse; and he makes it a greatappropriation to his own good parts, that he canshoe him himself. I am much afeard my lady hismother played false with a smith.

NERISSA

Then there is the County Palatine.

PORTIA

He doth nothing but frown, as who should say ‘If youwill not have me, choose:’ he hears merry tales andsmiles not: I fear he will prove the weepingphilosopher when he grows old, being so full ofunmannerly sadness in his youth. I had rather bemarried to a death’s-head with a bone in his mouththan to either of these. God defend me from thesetwo!

NERISSA

How say you by the French lord, Monsieur Le Bon?

PORTIA

God made him, and therefore let him pass for a man.In truth, I know it is a sin to be a mocker: but,he! why, he hath a horse better than theNeapolitan’s, a better bad habit of frowning thanthe Count Palatine; he is every man in no man; if athrostle sing, he falls straight a capering: he willfence with his own shadow: if I should marry him, Ishould marry twenty husbands. If he would despise meI would forgive him, for if he love me to madness, Ishall never requite him.

NERISSA

What say you, then, to Falconbridge, the young baronof England?

PORTIA

You know I say nothing to him, for he understands