The Merchant of Venice: Schools, Libraries, and Censors

Introduction The censorship of William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice commenced in this country before the First World War. In 1911, a citizen's committee in Connecticut asked their local school board to "eliminate the study of Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice from the curricula of Meriden schools" (Nelson and Roberts 4). The committee argued that Shylock was a "grossly exaggerated caricature of anything human" (4), and the board agreed the play created anti-Semitic feeling. The Merchant was subsequently removed as a textbook. The play was banned in Boston in 1937 (Gray 56). Voluntary home study was permitted provided the play and Shylock were not discussed in the classroom. By 1937, over 100 public schools had similar proscriptions (56). In 1940, Hazleton Spencer added her support of those schools that "wisely removed" a work with an "anti-Semitic edge" (Spencer 239). In Florida in 1987, the Bay County Superintendent of Schools Leonard Hall banned 64 books within parts of his district, including Fahrenheit 451, The Great Gatsby, and The Merchant (Associated Press; Delfattore 105-107). Students could still read the play, outside of class. No teacher could discuss it within a classroom that had received notice that it was "forbidden" material (Delfattore 107). Some parents protested and asked that the classics be restored. Eventually, a compromise between the school board and the parents was reached. A more lenient "review process" would decide which classics would be part of the curriculum (112). Superintendent Hall proved he was not unique, "not alone in his conviction that no literary merit justifies the use of books that present immoral behavior" (113). Through legal wrangling, Hall's decision was reversed in time for the following fall term. High court decisions have not assured the protection of classics in the classroom, including The Merchant. Although protest over the book has decreased in the last fifty years, the problem is not completely dormant. ALA Office for Intellectual Freedom writes that as of 19 November 2007, "there have been no reported challenges to Merchant of Venice [sic] in our database since 1990" (Campbell). Other web sites refer to distant prohibitions that do not seem to impact required reading courses today. The University of Pennsylvania reports a banning of The Merchant, yet, this occurred almost thirty years ago ("The Online Books Page"). What is one to believe about the present threat of censorship? One the one hand, from ALA, there is no documentation of a challenge to The Merchant in the last 18 years. ALA also states it "does not claim comprehensiveness in recording challenges" (ALA Top 10). It should be considered that other districts have removed The Merchant without reporting the outcome. Gladys V. Veidemanis reports the play "largely eliminated from the secondary curriculum" in the early 1990s (371) although ALA reported no challenges after 1990. Though precise information is wanting for the cause of the elimination, Veidemanis infers that it is due to a perceived bias of anti-Semitism. Another writer confirms trouble for the play. Robert J. Wilson reports, "Between 1988 and 1995 the teachers of Suffern High School were forbidden from teaching MV [The Merchant] despite numerous verbal protests from the faculty of the English Department" (44). When a new superintendent arrived in 1995 to the Ramapo Central School District in New York, the play was reinstated officially. Wilson complains that the effort was insufficient. "Suppression wimpers" as Shakespeare's Othello replaced The Merchant: old copies of the latter were "removed" and new copies were not budgeted for replacement (Wilson 44-45). Based upon articles from Wilson and Veidemanis, it can be inferred that that there are still unreported cases of opposition to the play that have resulted in a decision not adopt it in the curriculum. The teacher and librarian must prepare themselves to explain Shakespeare's message of humanity to those who object that Shylock is an instrument of intolerance. …