The Taming of the Shrew

  Synopsis

William Shakespeare's play The Taming of the Shrew is about four hundred years old. A man named Baptista Minola had two beautiful daughters: Katherina or Kate, very bad-tempered (a shrew), and Bianca, loved by everyone. Baptista Minola told Bianca's wooers that no one would marry her until after he had found a husband for Kate. He also said that he would let Bianca have tutors to instruct her. Three men loved Bianca. One was Lucentio. He and his servant, Tranio, decided to trick Baptista. Tranio pretended to be the wealthy Lucentio and tried to get Baptista to agree to a wedding. Meanwhile Lucentio pretended to be a tutor named Cambio, so that he could be near Bianca. An old suitor, Gremio, hired Cambio to teach Bianca. The old fool hoped Cambio would tell Bianca how wonderful he was -- but he didn't know that Cambio was wooing Bianca for himself. The third suitor, Hortensio, had a similar idea: he would pretend to be a tutor named Licio. His friend Petruchio agreed to tell Baptista Minola that Licio was a good music teacher. But what made Hortensio even happier was that Petruchio said he would woo, wed, and tame the bad-tempered Kate. Once Kate was married, Bianca could choose a husband. Petruchio and Kate met and immediately disagreed. But when Baptista Minola came into the room, Petruchio said that he and Kate got along beautifully, wanted to marry, and had agreed that she would pretend to be reluctant. Baptista believed this story and the match was made.

Petruchio came late to the wedding and wore old clothes. He behaved badly during the service and refused to stay for the feast afterwards. All the time, he said he loved Kate, praised her beauty, and assured her he was acting in her best interests. When they got to his home, he prevented her from eating: the food wasn't good enough for her. He stopped her from sleeping: the bed wasn't made right. He ordered new clothes for her and tore them up: they weren't sewn correctly. Until Kate agreed with his madness, she could not get what she wanted.

Meanwhile at Baptista Minola's, Bianca was being wooed by her two tutors. She showed that she liked Cambio (that is, Lucentio) better, so Licio (Hortensio) went away to find another wife. But now a terrible problem arose: Minola agreed to let Lucentio (that is, Tranio in disguise) marry Bianca, providing that Lucentio could show that his father had given permission. The solution? Tranio and Lucentio bribed a traveller to be a phony father to the phony Lucentio. While everyone prepared for the marriage, Bianca and the real Lucentio would elope.

Kate, Petruchio and their house guest, Hortensio, decided to come to Bianca's wedding. Along the way they were joined by an old man travelling to Padua to surprise his son, Lucentio. When they arrived, they found great confusion, until the lovers finally confessed and were forgiven. At a feast to celebrate the wedding, the three new husbands (Petruchio, Lucentio, and Hortensio) bet on their wives' obedience. Petruchio won.

  Some Thoughts from Fran

The Taming of the Shrew is a play that I have often taught over the past thirty years. Once upon a time, I taught it because my students always enjoyed its comedy. In fact I recall one of my doctoral students (a fairly serious fellow)  telling me that he'd gone to watch a video version in the Main Library and had been laughing so loudly that the staff threatened to throw him out. Yet  for the past five or ten years, my students have resisted the play's silliness. Instead it makes them uncomfortable. I can understand why. Here's a play in which a smart, funny, and articulate person is deprived of sleep and food until she backs down and does what she's told to do. Or, to put it another way, what Kate really learns in this play is how to lie.

But I  think the play could still be funny again. When an audience sees this play as one about a man breaking a woman's will, it's not funny but creepy. If  an audience were able to see this play as one about people in love doing silly things or two stubborn individuals becoming so intent on out-doing one another that they somehow stumble into love, then I think the play would work well. So I've done my switching of the genders.

Parts of  this revision gave me terrific problems, but the speech I thought would be most difficult -- the one when Katharina says, "It is a shame that women are so simple . . ."  -- turned out to be one of the easiest to alter. I gave an early version to Ben to read, since he's a bit skeptical about the whole idea. His response gave me hope, because he said that every time he got to a section that troubled him with its unlikeliness, he'd realize that the passage would be unlikely in the original version as well.

Anyhow, I'm including below the three essay topics I used to assign students when I taught this play, not because I think that anyone needs to write essays. Just think of those as the three questions I'm trying to answer for myself by directing the show.
  Topics for Discussion

1. In four hundred years our society's attitudes toward women, servants, and old people have changed radically. Because Shakespeare's play is so rooted in those old, discredited attitudes, it can offer nothing of pleasure to a modern audience. Agree or disagree, giving specific examples to support your position.

2. Who is the more important character, Kate or Petruchio? In other words, is this play about the Shrew or the Tamer? Remember to support your points and to disarm any significant arguments against your position.

3. Some people argue that great art is necessarily didactic (that is, it teaches a moral lesson). Other people argue that great art transcends morality and teaching. Certainly Shakespeare's plays are great art, if anything in English literature is. Does this play seem to you didactic or not?

  Some Handy Links