What happens in The Merchant of Venice

Antonio, a wealthy Venetian merchant, is unaccountably sad, his money all tied up in ships still at sea. His closest friend, Bassanio, needs a loan. He wants to sail to Belmont and court Portia, a rich heiress, but he is in debt and cannot fund the trip. Antonio’s cash is at sea, so he agrees to stand surety while Bassanio borrows three thousand ducats from the moneylender Shylock. Shylock, a Jew long insulted and spat upon by Antonio, sees his chance. He lends the money interest-free but sets one condition: if the loan is not repaid on time, he may cut a pound of flesh from Antonio’s body. Confident his ships will return, Antonio signs.

In Belmont, Portia is bound by her dead father’s strange will. Suitors must choose among three caskets of gold, silver, and lead; the one who picks the casket holding her portrait wins her, and the rest must leave and never marry. The Prince of Morocco chooses gold and finds a skull. The Prince of Arragon chooses silver and finds a portrait of a fool. When Bassanio arrives, the man Portia already favors, he reasons past the showy metals and chooses lead, finding her likeness inside. They are betrothed, and his friend Gratiano pairs off with her maid Nerissa. Portia gives Bassanio a ring and makes him swear never to part with it.

The happiness curdles fast. Shylock has his own griefs: his daughter Jessica has eloped with the Christian Lorenzo, stealing a casket of his money and jewels, and converted to her husband’s faith. Worse for Antonio, news arrives that his ships have wrecked. The bond is forfeit. Shylock, bitter at the theft of his daughter and years of cruelty, refuses every offer of repayment and insists on the flesh. He wants the law, and the law is on his side. A message reaches Bassanio in Belmont, and he rushes back to Venice with Portia’s gold, though gold is no longer the point.

Portia acts in secret. She sends her servant to fetch legal robes and credentials from her lawyer cousin, then she and Nerissa disguise themselves as a young male doctor of law and his clerk and travel to the Venetian court. There Antonio stands ready to die. The Duke pleads for mercy; Shylock will not bend. The disguised Portia delivers a famous appeal for mercy, then, when he still demands his pound, springs the trap hidden in the bond’s own wording. He may take flesh, but not one drop of blood, since blood is not named. He cannot cut without spilling it. The case collapses on him. For plotting against a citizen’s life, Shylock loses half his wealth, must leave the rest to Jessica and Lorenzo, and is forced to become a Christian. Broken, he leaves the court.

Grateful and unaware, Bassanio presses the young doctor to take a reward. Portia asks only for the ring she made him swear to keep, and after a struggle he hands it over; Gratiano gives up his too. Back in Belmont by moonlight, the wives confront their husbands for losing the rings, claiming they must have given them to other women. The men squirm until Portia and Nerissa reveal they were the lawyer and the clerk all along. Letters arrive confirming that Antonio’s ships have, after all, come safely home. The three couples are reconciled, and the play closes in Belmont’s garden, leaving Antonio richer but alone.