ABSTRACT
The Merchant of Venice is one of Shakespeare’s early comedies which is famous for the successful moulding of a greedy and cruel merchant. Shylock has always been viewed as a clown standing on the opposite side of justice. Mean, selfish and narrow-minded, he is consequently the stereotype of negative characters. The paper first introduces two theories “Binary Opposition” and Deconstruction and their application in literary criticism; then it analyses Shylock’s image from the perspective of two theories respectively, combined with selections from The Merchant of Venice. After that it explores the reasons of Shylock’s multifaceted character from social background, Shylock’s personality and Shakespeare’s views of writing. The paper aims to deconstruct the unitary negative Shylock, display his another side of being eloquent, intelligent and family-caring, and finally reconstruct a more full and vivid Shylock in readers’ mind.
1. Introduction 1
2. Review of “Binary Opposition” and Deconstruction 2
2.1 Theory of “Binary Opposition” 2
2.2 Theory of Deconstruction 2
3. Analysis of Shylock’s image from the perspective of two theories 3
3.1 Stereotyped unitary Shylock in terms of “Binary Opposition” 4
3.2 Complex multifaceted Shylock in terms of Deconstruction 6
4. The factors influencing the formation of Shylock’s image 9
4.1 Social background in Shylock’s age 9
4.2 Shylock’s personality 10
4.3 Shakespeare’s views of creation 11
5. Conclusion 12
Acknowledgements 13
References 14
