Where Does the Order LieEssay title: Where Does the Order LieWhere does the Order Lie?The social and political orders of William Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure and Merchant of Venice vary, but still exhibit firm criticisms of the role of government within society. The conclusions of both of these plays return to their original order and the characters are resolved in their own ways. Measure for Measure gives the most demanding criticism of the role of political order out of most of Shakespeare’s plays. Through the actions of the Duke and Angelo, Shakespeare reveals the two distinct sides to patriarchal political order, punishment and forgiveness. Merchant of Venice shows the social order by the conflict that occurs between Shylock and Antonio. Through their conflict and eventual resolve, Shakespeare once again reveals his own personal criticisms of the justice system and a skewed image of the middle-class social order. Both of these plays represent different orders within society and also exhibit changes within them as the play progresses. The transformation and the eventual restoration of political and social order in these two Shakespeare plays provide certain similar criticisms about the role that order plays within the confines of society.
The political order in Measure for Measure is a strong, yet unstable patriarchy led by the Duke. The Duke orders Antonio to take his place and carry out Vienna’s “strict statutes and most biting laws” (1.1.19). These “strict statutes” and “laws” were obviously not carried out in the time of the Duke’s patriarchal reign over the city of Vienna. The Duke’s city is falling apart and is filled with sin and lechery. He gives his powers to Angelo, and according to the Duke, “Lent him our terror, dressed him with our love,” (1.1.20), signifying that there is only two ways to restore order, through passive forgiveness, or harsh punishment. These two very important aspects of the play are the essence of a patriarchal society in which Shakespeare criticizes throughout the play. Angelo represents the patriarchal order, and when he needed to he passed his power down to his deputy, which signifies a change in the political order in the play. By the conclusion of the play, the patriarch returns and everything returns back to the way it was at the beginning.
The original order in the beginning of Merchant of Venice lies within the conflict of the two characters, Shylock and Antonio. These two represent the social order that Shakespeare is criticizing throughout the play. This order plays a large role in this play because the characters are shaped through the binding contracts that they make with one another, even if that contract goes against basic humanity. Unlike Measure for Measure, the conflict of order is more privative and stays generally between the court system and the characters. Shylock’s proclamation for “A pound of man’s flesh taken from a man” (2.1.164) is a little extreme, but used by Shakespeare to show the extremities of the binding contracts of men. Shakespeare later shows the dependability of the courts to uphold this contract. Although the end of the play returns to its original state, Shylock’s actions are questioned on the grounds of humanity, not justice.
Shakespeare uses the incident between Claudius and Angelo to further enhance his criticisms of a patriarchal society. Pompey, the bawd proves to be one of the wisest characters in the play, and serves as Shakespeare’s guiding and moral voice. In a conversation with Escalus, he explains the state of the city and the tyranny of Angelo, “If you head and hang all that offend that way / but for ten year together, you’ll be glad to give out a commission for more heads” (2.1.237-9). This statement proves to be Shakespeare’s statement towards of the tyrannical patriarchal order that runs the city. The capturing of Claudius does not solve the problems of the city or intimidate any of the lechery that is occurring. Instead, Claudius is transformed into the embodiment of the city and represents the oppression that Antonio brings on society as a whole. The conflict between the two symbolize the conflict of a group of people against
a>one society, and also for that reason the story of the two is not only a allegory of freedom, but also of anarchy. As we get closer to Julius and the army, we will discover more of these elements of freedom being brought about by the violence of a patriarchal order.
This piece, however, leaves its mark on the history of political conflict in Italy and is presented in some subtle way against what I have written before for other non-political sources. A lot of thought comes to a number of critical points here, such as the fact that one does not see a lot of contradiction between the two political lineages of the early 15th century, and that the political parties and the general movement for a democracy as we know it were actually based on religious politics. The idea is to present the fact that there was a religious conflict in Italy between two groups of people who were of same religion, but with slightly different goals. I have been writing about this idea a few months ago, and in doing so it has not quite gone on to be completely understood, although some of it is certainly useful. One might argue that in a sense the problem here is that of the people that did not share political opinions, but they did share ideologies, and the idea was very complicated. However, it is clear that in most of these cases such people do share the ideologies. The people who did share the ideological ideals then are all considered as equally equal in power and the ruling class; thus, it could be argued that although not everything is equal in life, there are certain inequalities that are possible during an authoritarian system, such as the oppression and exploitation of other people.
In my view, the fact that there are political parties that have political ideas but that do not support the ideas of society in general and the idea that political society as a whole was not created during the late 1st and early 10th centuries, may be a big reason why so many people felt the need to make such an effort and so that they would eventually have better connections and have more political consciousness. However, I think that this may not be always the case, and it does not always take long for the political party to be formed based on the ideas being shared.
”The above section does nothing to directly address the criticisms with which I have made of the political parties and the political movement that emerged during that period. However, I would suggest that the point I want to focus on would require some kind of discussion of political philosophies. It does not necessarily mean that political parties and the movement for a democracy as we know it did not have more or less political views during that period, but to have such a discussion would be a good way of getting at certain areas which might be of interest to some people.
The other argument against such a thinking about political systems would be that the concept of liberty is not something which is based on values or even an independent concept, but rather is based on an idea about things which is fundamentally different and which has particular value to us as individuals. This argument is really the opposite of what is in vogue today and a serious point which is already taken into account as well, as we’ve discussed earlier. Although it might be argued that the idea that the world is divided into two parts and that people have different lives in some way does not imply a particular political idea, it does help to see a different way that the world can be divided up. Thus the idea of the world having different lives and different types of rights and freedoms