Wow, it's been forever since I last posted. Yikes.

Anyways, on Monday, Stephi and I saw "The Merchant of Venice" with Al Pacino. Wow, what a thought-provoking, weird Shakespeare flick - at least in the interpretation of the movie (which by the way only used the "original dialog"), everyone but the Jewish lender (played by Al Pacino) seems to be more or less Anti-semitic (one of the "hero figures" spits at the Jew at the beginning of the movie), and the Jew himself craves revenge and is not exactly Mr. Nice Guy either. However, there's this brilliant dialog piece where the Jewish lender (supposedly the villain!) very eloquently speaks out against the Anti-Semitism of his age:

He hath disgrac'd me, and hindered me half a million, laughed at my losses, mocked my gains, scorned my Nation, thwarted my bargains, cooled my friends, heated mine enemies, and what's the reason? I am a Jew: Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs dimensions, senses, affections, passions; fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, heal'd by the same means warm'd and cool'd by the same winter and summer as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die? And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge?

I think that was a pretty much revolutionary thought for your average Joe Blowe ;) in Shakespeare's time.

So the Jewish lender's problem is he needs to learn mercy, everyone else needs to learn tolerance. Problem is, at the end, noone really seems to have learned anything.

Anyhow, very strange, but I'd recommend it if you're into deep stuff. ;) Here's the Wikipedia entry on the play.