Shylock Is My Name By Howard Jacobson

Shylock Is My Name is both a retelling of Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice and a sequel to it. Jacobson’s characters are modern counterparts to Shakespeare’s, but the novel also carries the original story beyond the bounds of the play—at least, for one character. We meet Shylock himself, still wandering the earth centuries later, mourning his runaway daughter, and evading a forced conversion to Christianity. Shylock’s presence is one of the most fascinating parts of the book, but it does make it mostly a companion piece to the play rather than a novel that can stand on its own.