This document is an analysis of Shylock's famous "Hath not a Jew eyes?" speech from The Merchant of Venice. The analysis compares Shylock's speech to the experiences of Native Americans, discussing how they have been disgraced, hindered, laughed at, and had their nation and bargains thwarted just for being Native. It argues that just as Shylock says a Jew can feel hurt, laugh, die and take revenge, so too can Native Americans experience the same human emotions and reactions.

1. "Cursed be my tribe, if I
forgive [them]."
An Interpretation of Shylock’s “Doth a Jew not hath eyes” speech
from William Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice.
Rhiannon Poolaw
Advanced Composition
Dr. William Carney
29 April 2014

2. [They] hath disgraced [us] and hindered [us]
[one hundred] million,

3. laughed at [our] losses, mocked at [our] gains,

4. scorned [our] nation, thwarted [our] bargains,
cooled [our] friends, heated [our] enemies

5. —and what’s [their] reason? I am a [Native].

6. Hath not a [Native] eyes? Hath not a [Native] hands,
organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions?

7. Fed with the same food,

8. hurt with the same weapons,

9. subject to the same diseases,

10. healed by the same means,

11. warmed and cooled by the same winter and
summer as a [white man] is?

12. If you prick us, do we not bleed?

13. If you tickle us, do we not laugh?

14. If you poison us, do we not die?

15. And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge?

16. If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble
you in that.

17. If a [Native] wrong a [white man], what is his
humility? Revenge.

18. If a [white man] wrong a [Native], what should his
sufferance be by [white] example? Why, revenge.

19. The villainy you teach me I will execute—and it
shall go hard but I will better the instruction.

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