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Scene Study prepares you to perform key scenes for your theater class or audition. We've got all the information you need for a great performance.
Excerpt from Act 2, Scene 2 Monologue: Launcelot
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Understanding the Given Circumstances
- Launcelot Gobbo is the servant of Shylock, a Jewish businessman in Venice.
- Almost every other character in the play hates Shylock because he lends money with interest and because he is not Christian. Working for Shylock, therefore, creates a moral conundrum for Launcelot Gobbo, which he tries to resolve with this speech.
- Launcelot Gobbo is often referred to as a “clown,” which has a particular resonance in Shakespeare’s plays. Shakespearean clowns are not circus clowns in the modern sense; they are typically outsiders with low social status who can nevertheless comment on the relationships and behaviors of the other characters in the play. They also provide some manner of comic relief or insight for the characters whom they serve.
- Launcelot Gobbo wrestles with his sense of what is right and wrong in this scene. In this monologue, he personifies these conflicting impulses as two characters: “Conscience” and “The Fiend.” Conscience propels him to stay, while the Fiend demands he leave Shylock’s service.
Blocking and Movement
In theater, blocking is the process of planning the actors’ physical movements and positions. Be sure to show respect and establish trust when working with scene partners. As you prepare to block this scene, ask yourself the following questions:
- Although this is a monologue, the same actor plays three characters: Launcelot Gobbo, Conscience, and the Fiend. How might you distinguish the three characters physically? Vocally? Where are they on the stage?
- Launcelot Gobbo speaks of “fleeing” or “running.” How literal is this impulse? What keeps him on the stage?
- Launcelot Gobbo has a special fondness for Jessica, Shylock’s daughter. Although we have not met her yet, she is nearby, in Shylock’s home. This scene takes place on the street in Venice, close to that house, which is where Launcelot Gobbo works, and where he will flee from. How can the staging of this scene make it clear where the decision to stay with Shylock (or flee from him) would take him?
Meaning in Heightened Language
When approaching a piece of Shakespeare for performance or audition, it’s important to closely examine the text so that you have a clear understanding of it. Begin by studying this scene in SparkNotes’ No Fear Shakespeare Translation of The Merchant of Venice, so you can be sure to know what each unfamiliar word or phrase means.
Gobbo’s language is heightened in an unusual way. He is talking to himself, and his characters speak to him with different voices. He’s speaking in wild alliterative repetitions: “Gobbo,” “Launcelot Gobbo,” “Good Launcelot,” “Good Gobbo,” or “Good Launcelot Gobbo.” His characters speak in different voices as well.
Consider the following questions:
- How might the audience perceive the characters of the “fiend” and the “conscience”?
- How does the fiend talk, and how does the conscience talk? How does Gobbo himself talk?
- How might the language Gobbo uses sway the audience one way or the other in his decision-making?
- How might you perform the heightened language and to what effect?
Historical Context
When Shakespeare wrote The Merchant of Venice, the practice of Judaism had been banned in England for centuries. The famous trial and execution of Queen Elizabeth I’s personal physician, who had converted to Christianity from Judaism, had fueled anti-Semitic fervor in England in the years leading up to the play’s first performance.
In much of Europe, anti-Semitism wasn’t perceived as a reprehensible quality; many considered it morally correct. Although the play brims with anti-Semitic tropes and prejudices that are obviously abhorrent in today’s context, Gobbo’s speech introduces a complicated and conflicted sense of morality and humanity. If anti-Semitism was indeed the accepted norm in the world of the play, Gobbo’s speech offers an alternative worldview, imperfect and provocative though it may be.
Launcelot Gobbo almost literally wrestles with the arguments for and against serving Shylock. If Hamlet contemplates the existential question, “To be, or not to be,” Launcelot Gobbo works through the question, “To flee, or not to flee?” Launcelot Gobbo personifies anti-Semitism in his mind as “the Fiend.” This “devil” wants Launcelot Gobbo to abandon his responsibilities to Shylock, who is also “the very devil incarnal.” On the other side of that argument is Gobbo’s “Conscience,” which he feels is a weight “hanging about the neck” of his heart. “Conscience” represents an argument for empathy, responsibility, and trustworthiness. The right thing to do, according to Gobbo’s “hard conscience,” is to remain with someone his society sees as “a kind of devil.” Gobbo’s thoughts are muddled here, which might reflect Shakespeare’s own view of anti-Semitism, a more complex (if not exemplary, by today’s standards) perspective than that of his characters.
