What on earth did I just read? I initially picked this book up knowing I was going to be re-reading William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice and had heard that Marlowe's The Jew of Malta had inspired the later work, so I wanted to compare and contrast the two plays. Little did I know, Marlowe's play is not so much a sister text, as it is Merchant's demented cousin.

If you want to read this to try and glean similarities to The Merchant of Venice, or see how it may have inspired Shakespeare, you may be disappointed. The only similarities between these two plays are some similarities between the characters Barabas and Shylock (who are both Jewish), and the Mediterranean settings. The list of similarities ends there.

While Shylock is part of an ensemble cast, Barabas maximizes screen time (or stage time). While Shylock is pained by his daughter's choices, Barabas goes and kills his daughter without a second thought (along with some Christian nuns for good measure). While Shylock's character dialogue allows for some leeway for an actor's interpretation, Barabas is a cartoonish, mustache-twirling villain through and through.

I suppose in Marlowe's defense, this play is supposed to be a dark comedy and the prologue does state, "I count religion but a childish toy, And hold there is no sin but ignorance." If the play is supposed to be an ironic or meta condemnation of religious bigotry, I'm not sure it succeeds in relaying these points.

Moreover, the writing is kind of lazy. The Merchant of Venice may not be the greatest of Shakespeare's work, and it might not convey the most nuanced interpretation of moral ambiguity (I clearly do not put it on a pedestal by any means), but at least the prose was well-written. On this point alone, I find it hard to believe that Marlowe had any kind of significant influence on Shakespeare.