By the end of the trial scene, do you think true justice and mercy was achieved? Reflect and write on the following questions:
1. Is there true justice? Why?
2. Is there true mercy, as expounded by Portia? Why?
3. Justice and Law can be manipulated by people in power. Comment on this with reference to the text and other real-life cases and examples.
I do not think that there was true justice as i fully empathized with Shylock's plight as he rightfully deserved his pound of flesh from Antonio. As i believe what one owes one must return but Portia came with a play of words on the agreement stating that there was no blood to be spilt and Shylock has to cut a pound of flesh without spilling a drop of blood else he would have broken the christian laws. Portia as a christian already has a biased opinion on Shylock as he is a Jew.But Portia and the duke had already given him 3 chances to do otherwise taking triple the amount Antonio owed him instead but Shylock refused till the end so Portia was faced with no choice but to force him to convert to Christianity and lose all his land and riches as i believed she did not want to do this , to hurt Shylock this badly. Justice and Law could be manipulated by people in power. Like the case in Merchant of Venice we see how the Duke of Venice said few words when Portia was speaking. Portia was disguised as a learned, young lawyer from Padua which Dr Bellario sent to take over him. Portia was the one who has the power to make the final verdict with only the Duke there as a representative of the Venetian Law to help grant Shylock's life. She bends the words and laws to slowly build her verdict.As in the modern world context justice and law is executed by humans and human in most cases would rather do things out of benefit for themselves not others but here is still some who would uphold the law fervently. It would really depend as humans can be manipulated, overcome with greed, as executors of Law so can justice and law be manipulated.
Your whole answer was simply unclear. You simply threw everything all 3 questions into 1 paragraph. Please structure your answer more clearly with better paragraphing. Your first sentence had really given me this impression. It must be noted that true justice itself is not defined by your own opinions. There are also many grammatical mistakes in your post,eg, there was no correct capitalisation and comas inserted. You are also contradicting with yourself. At first, you claimed that there was no true justice for Shylock. But later on, you sided with his Christian opponents that there was justice given. Or maybe that part was for the second question. I do not know. Hope you improve next time!!
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