ABSTRACT
Scholars have seen the situation variously. In a work from many decades ago, G.G. Greenwood assumes that the bond is between Shylock and Antonio—he makes hardly any mention of Bassanio. A standard literary trope around making deals is the ill-advised contract. Think of the girl who trades her first-born child to Rumpelstiltskin or Faustus selling his soul to the devil. Antonio is a Christian and a citizen; Shylock is a Jew and an alien. The play doesn’t explicitly posit these characteristics as matters of inheritance, but to a large extent, they are, even if one can renounce one’s religious inheritance or change one’s citizenship. Bassanio’s story is largely structured by issues of inheritance.
