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Romeo, sighing and groaning because his lady will not look kindly upon him, runs from his friends who "jest at scars that never felt a wound" ... and finds Juliet! In The Merchant of Venice, Bassanio and Portia, Lorenzo and Jessica, Gratiano and Nerissa had all made love. Even young Gobbo, in a coarse, philandering way, had made love, too! In all the books he had read, women were prominent.
"Gratiano and the Gobbos will come in the next lot," sighed Teddie. "Seems as if I should die to be out of it all!" Jean Eastman was just ahead of them in the crowd. "Poor Teddie!" Barbara began, "I only wish " She broke off abruptly. She didn't want Jean for Shylock, but it would have been the height of impropriety to let even Teddie, whose misfortunes made her a privileged person, know it.
"Yes, yes," murmured Pasquale Capuzzi to himself, whilst his eyes sparkled with delight, "yes, yes, my dear, good Formica; he will marry his sweet Marianna, the happy Pasquale. He knew that the dear little darling had always loved him, and that it was only Satan who had led her astray." "Why then, everything is all right," said Doctor Gratiano, "and there's no cause for lamentation."
What is meant by it? Is Bassanio's daring in venturing so much for his chance with Portia itself a sign of his fitness, or the reverse? How is his casket significant of this test-stone i.e., adventurousness? Is the match of Nerissa and Gratiano an irrelevance to Portia's and Bassanio's courtship or an enhancement of their happiness?
* "Gratiano speaks an infinite deal of nothing . . . . his reasons are as three grains of wheat in two bushels of chaff." Other of the MSS., more ancient, wore a double veil.
And then Gratiano, who loved to copy what his lord did, thought he must make a speech like Bassanio's, and he said, in Nerissa's hearing, who was writing in her clerk's dress by the side of Portia, "I have a wife, whom I protest I love; I wish she were in heaven, if she could but entreat some power there to change the cruel temper of this currish Jew."
I gave my lord Bassanio a ring, and I am sure he would not part with it for all the world." Gratiano in excuse for his fault now said, "My lord Bassanio gave his ring away to the counsellor, and then the boy, his clerk, that took some pains in writing, he begged my ring."
Cast of characters: Othello, E. F. Dunlavey; Iago, Douglas Giffard; Duke of Venice, Charles Harper; Brabantio, Eugene Cosgrove; Cassio, Arnold Rosenfeld; Roderigo, Erwin Moore; Montano, Wilson Portherfield; Lodovico, Henry Geitz; Gratiano, William Fleming; Desdemona, Carrie Whitehill; Emilia, Gussie Rodgers; Bianca, Florence Otter; senators, officers, messengers and attendants.
Bassanio being so kindly supplied with money by his friend Antonio, at the hazard of his life, set out for Belmont with a splendid train, and attended by a gentleman of the name of Gratiano. Bassanio proving successful in his suit, Portia in a short time consented to accept of him for a husband.
"You swore to me, when I gave it to you, that you would keep it till the hour of death; and now you say you gave it to the lawyer's clerk. I know you gave it to a woman." "By this hand," replied Gratiano, "I gave it to a youth, a kind Of boy, a little scrubbed boy, no higher than yourself; be was clerk to the young counselor that by his wise pleading saved Antonio's life.
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