Question

Q6: Organize a debate about the song, "Tell me where is fancy bred" as Bassanio
decides which casket to choose. Have one side argue that Portia unfairly leads
Bassanio to make the right choice, because she has fallen in love with him. Have
the other side argue that the song is a harmless interlude used simply to vary the
casket-choosing episode; moreover, Portia has already explicitly said that she will
not teach Bassanio how to choose and that if he loves her, he will choose
correctly.​

Answer 1

we all know that Portia had played that song just to let him find the right casket

• firstly, she had never played this song for the other two suitors. this clearly shows how biased she was.
• the song was basically about how we shouldn't rely on the outward appearance which was needed to be known in order to ace the casket test.
• and the most obvious point is that Bassanio actually took up those hints in the song and aced the test

so clearly, the casket test was rigged

though from an other perspective

• Portia had taken an oath that she would never reveal what was the correct casket. people living in that era used to take oaths very seriously and it was considered a sin to break an oath.
• Maybe Shakespeare just wanted to introduce a song to spice up the scene because they were the protagonists(like yk, how it happens in /bollywood/ movies)
• PLUS she had already said that if Bassanio truly loved her, he would choose the correct casket. which shows that she had complete faith in Bassanio and she had no reason to rig the test

( i am SO THANKFUL for bringing up this topic. i had fun typing this out so thank you !!)