Portia is the heroine of he play. She is a beautiful and rich lady who is living on the will of her dead father, the person who wanted to marry her have to try his luck to choose one of the three caskets and in one casket is a portrait of Portia and if the suitors fail he cannot marry a woman in his life. She is very famous and people from all over the world come to propose her and try their luck. She says to Nerissa her friend : O me, the word 'choose! ' I may neither choose whom I would nor refuse whom I dislike; so is the will of a living daughter curbed by the will of a dead father. Is it not hard,Nerissa, that I cannot choose one nor refuse none? this clearly states that she is not happy with her dead father's wishes but still she is loyal and dutiful daughter because still she was doing what her father wished to.
She also is a racist because when the suitors came to propose her she bases her opinions on their physical appearance, where they came from instead of what sort of persons they are or their nature. When the Prince Of Morocco came to propose her, she gave side comments on him that, “If he have the condition of a saint and the complexion of a devil, I had rather he should shrive me than wive me. and said that Prince Of Morocco have devil skin. She also gave side comments about other suitors also who come from all side of the world to marry her. She loved Bassanio and when he came to choose the caskets Portia could tell about the right casket but she didnt.
When Portia and Bassanio got married Bassanio told Portia that how his friend lend him three thousand ducats and his ships have shipwrecked now he is not able to payback so Portia without thinking she gave six thousand ducats to Bassanio to give Antonio to payback.When everyone failed to save Antonio she came at that place disguised as a lawyer Balthazar and saved Antonio from Shylock, and after that disguised as a lawyer she played a funny role that she asked for the ring that she gave bassanio at the time of the wedding and said that " my lord’s. I give them with this ring, Which when you part from, lose, or give away, Let it presage the ruin of your love And be my vantage to exclaim on you" and bassanio was not giving her but when Antonio told bassanio to give he gave it.
