Shakespeare's Dimensions

Bassanio seems at first to be a cad, undeserving of all the affection his is shown. He puts his friend’s life at stake (Antonio), seeks marriage merely for financial gain (Portia) and treats his “enemy” with “unchristian” cruel disdain (Shylock). Certainly, with a plot’s normative he is destined for ill treatment as the good are rewarded with good fate and the bad punished for their behavior. One who does not examine his character carefully might be perplexed at this outcome, yet upon close reading it is plain that Bassanio is just as virtuous as Antonio.
Yes, Bassanio does allow Antonio to offer up a pound of his flesh to Shylock in order to fund his journey to woo Portia, but when Shylock attempts to cash in on Antonio’s debt with him Bassanio quickly offers up his own flesh. He professes, I must admit, a heart warming display of homosocial love. Bassanio says, “The Jew shall have my flesh, blood, bones, and all ere thou shalt lose for me one drop of blood” (4.1.111-112). Even though he seems to be doing this because it is truly his debt, I could easily see him doing the same if Antonio had staked his flesh for his own monetary needs.
It would be interesting to take a poll among men and women to see who would deem Bassanio’s act of offering up his wife in order to save his friend deplorable or commendable. My prediction is that men would see this as a proud moment, a moment of true friendship, to embody the (pardon the common colloquialism) “bro’s before ho’s” mantra. Women, I might suppose, would feel a slight twinge of hurt for Portia at the idea of forsaking their marriage for another man, especially with her present for the declaration.
I had considered Portia’s demanding of the ring she gave Bassanio (while in disguise as Balthasar) a cruel trick, but when reflecting upon his declaration, “My wife, and all the world are not with me esteemed above thy life and I would lose all, ay, sacrifice them all here to this devil, to deliver you” (4.1.278-82) I understand her motives. To remove the lens of gender here, in assuming that this is a common female mentality- to trick- , I will place Portia in Bassanio’s place, and Bassanio in hers. I thoroughly believe they would have acted in the same spiteful way if roles were reversed. Portia may see that he is not actually offering to give her up, but instead attempting to define the love he has for Antonio, yet his mentioning this with her in ear shot does deserve a little retribution.
What has all of this to prove about Shakespeare’s characterization? He shows that, although seemingly cliché, appearances and first impressions are not all in seeing one’s character. Shakespeare cleverly gives his characters multi-faceted qualities and personalities and they are not, as most might think, simply basic archetypes. Shylock, while cruel and gluttonous, is also sentimental about his wife and his offensive (in the sense that he is preemptively protecting himself) traits obviously stem from a history of abuse because he is an “outsider.” Bassanio is not the money-grubbing schemer he is initially portrayed as, but sweet and caring. Portia, while rational and sweet, is also blinded by love and swayed with revenge. Shakespeare not only gives them dharmas, or purposeful roles, but well rounded personalities that speak closer to reality than other writers before him (ex: Spenser or Chaucer’s one dimensional archetypes).