Document Type

Article

Publication Title

Yale Journal of Law & the Humanities

Abstract

Why is Portia such a crucial and overdetermined character for so many commentators, and for so many legal commentators in particular? Why has so much ink been spilled, with such vehemence and even vitriol, over what is in the end a fictive character in a play written in the late sixteenth century? My answer first invokes the framework outlined in Michael Walzer's Spheres of Justice. . . . I then argue that this framework, when applied to The Merchant of Venice, explains our obsession with Portia. . . . Third, I argue that while we view Portia's virtuosity in defining these boundaries with admiration, we also view it with anxiety. We may challenge both the means she employs to draw these lines and the ultimate determination of where these lines lie. . . . The application of Walzer's framework to the play thus leads us to an answer to our question. We focus on Portia because she represents our deepest anxieties about the persuasive power of rhetoric. And it is no accident that Portia acts as a "legal doctor" in the most famous scene of the play, for the line-drawing activity that is her primary preoccupation is also that most intimately aligned with the occupation of the lawyer. Ultimately, it may be that we as lawyers focus on Portia as part of an obsession of self-conception. What we say about her is what we say about ourselves, what we fear about her is what we fear about the profession.

First Page

183

Volume

9

Publication Date

1997

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