Stereotypes are ideas that generalize a group of people, and are forced onto someone to isolate or weaken them. Stereotypes are integrated into all forms of literature and can be important to the progression of the plot. This is true in William Shakespeare’s play The Merchant of Venice. Shylock, a Jewish money lender in the play, has been ridiculed by a Christian merchant, Antonio, and his friends for years. Antonio, in need of three thousand ducats, decides to go to Shylock for a loan and the two
Desdemona is a white, Venetian debutante that chooses to marry a black man, a Moor, over the wishes of her father. At the beginning of the play, merely six hours after being married, Desdemona’s father attempts to stop her from accompanying Othello on military duty. He relents