The Merchant of Venice you wrong us, shall we not revenge?" Those who see the speech as sympathetic point out that Shylock says he learned the desire for revenge from the Christian characters: "If a Christian wrong a Jew, what should his sufferance be by Christian example? Why, revenge. The villainy you teach me, I will execute, and it shall go hard but I will better the instruction." Even if Shakespeare did not intend the play to be read this way, the fact that it retains its power on stage for audiences who may perceive its central conflicts in radically different terms is an
Jessica (The Merchant of Venice) Warburton's note—in his 1765 edition: "The commentator should have remarked, that this speech is not, even in his own edition, the speech of the "Jewess"." The lines in question are usually assigned Lorenzo. The next was by Edmond Malone in his 1790 edition. The editor of the "Second Folio" (1632) had emended the line "If a Christian do not / play the knave and get thee, I am much deceived", substituting "did" for "do". This changed the meaning, as an acerbic Malone points out: Malone's position turned out to be somewhat controversial. In his revised edition in 1821, multiple notes