An Analysis of the Character of Bassanio in the Play The Merchant of Venice Essay

Lead It OnIn The Merchant of Venice, the character of Bassanio creates a lot of stir. From the beginning, the reader sees him as opinionated and a little shallow, but as the novel progresses, Bassanio seems to take on a bit of a change, beginning to value morality and virtue over beauty and money. This change is most evident in his speech in Act III Scene ii.Beginning with a thorough analysis of Shakespeares rhetoric In lines 90-91, Bassanio tells the reader to look on beauty and see how it can be manufactured and bought. Oftentimes, beauty is unnatural, created by makeup. Bassanio then goes on to say it works a miracle in nature (92) and the ones that wear the most are the ones that are the ones that are the least respected. He then goes on to describe a womans hair using the word snaky (III. ii. 94) to allude to Medusa, implying that beautiful curly hair could, figuratively, turn a man to stone, meaning that the man is stopped, staring at the beautiful woman. Furthermore, the word wanton (III. ii. 95) is used, of which the denotation is sexually immodest or promiscuous, to describe the movement of a womans hair in the wind. Then Bassanio goes on to say that this, too, can be purchased, in the form of wigs, from the dowry of a second head (III. ii. 97) which is the hair of dead people. In lines 99-101, Bassanio says thus ornament is but the guiled shore to a most dangerous sea, the beauteous scarf veiling an indian beauty, which says that ornamentation and decoration are nothing more than dangers, posing to lure sailors off their course, especially when the seas are rough to begin with. The reference to a scarf is a reference to dark-skinned women who are beautiful and hide their faces with a scarf, thus making them more mysterious and seductive.Then Bassanio begins to address the...