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[CHAPTER ONE
THE EARLY COMEDIES (I)
The Comedy of Errors
and
The Taming of the Shrew]
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- - - II - - -
In his next comedy, The Taming of the Shrew, Shakespeare enlarges on one aspect of his first, making matrimonial conflict his central theme, and shrewishness is seen as its principal cause. The shrewish wife, or scold, is a figure of great antiquity in folklore, and Chaucer's Wife of Bath is an early example in English literature. 1.45 Because of her experiences with five husbands, she regarded herself as being qualified 'To speke of wo that is in marriage' (Canterbury Tales III (D).3), 1.46 and yet she vigorously advocated the married state - on her own terms:
An housbonde I wol have, I wol nat lette,
Which shal be bothe my dettour and my thral,
And have his tribulacion withal
Upon his flessh, whil that I am his wyf.
I have the power durynge al my lyf
Upon his propre body, and noght he.
Right thus the Apostel tolde it unto me;
And bad oure housbondes for to love us weel.
(Canterbury Tales III (D).154-161)
Her final statement of the matter is even more forceful:
... Jhesu Crist us sende
Housbondes meeke, yonge, and fressh abedde,
And grace t' overbyde hem that we wedde.
(Canterbury Tales III (D).1258-1260)
It should be noted that although the Wife of Bath claimed the support of holy scripture - the 'Apostel' Paul said, 'So ought men to loue their wiues, as their owne bodies' (Ephesians 5:28) - scripture actually advocated male domination, as indicated in the passage I have already quoted from Ephesians in my discussion of The Comedy of Errors. 1.47 Kydd gives the Elizabethan stance succinctly in The Housholders Philosophie:
It is then a vertue in a woman to knowe howe to honor and obey her husband, not as a Seruant doth his Maister, or the bodye the mind, but ciuilly and in such sort as we see the Cittizens in wel gouerned Citties obey the Lawes, and reuerence their Magistrates. 1.48
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Perhaps the earliest case of contradiction of this inflexible order in English drama is Noah's wife in The Townely Play of Noah:
Noe.
We! hold thi tong, ram-skyt, or I shall the still.
Vxor.
By my thryft, if thou sayte, I shal turne the vntill.
Noe.
We shall assay as tyte. Haue at the Gill!
Apon the bone shal it byte.
Vxor.
A, so, Mary! thou smytis ill!
Bot I suppose
I shal not in thi det
Flyt of this flett!
Take the ther a langett
To tye vp thi hose!
(Play of Noah 217-225) 1.49
The accepted position of women in the divinely ordained order was inferior to men, and those who, like the Wife of Bath or Noah's wife, sought to upset this order were treated, at the best, with amused condescension. Furthermore, a man married to a dominant woman was commonly the butt of jokes, and his position was made laughable in drama through being characterised by quarrels with his wife, usually starting verbally and ending in physical violence. This disruption of order was frequently made complete by having the wife get the better of the husband, as we see from Alcon's position in A Looking Glasse, for London and England by Greene and Lodge:
... she will call me Rascall, Rogue, Runnagate, Varlet, Vagabond, Slaue, Knaue. Why, alasse sir, and these be but holi-day tearmes, but if you heard her working-day words, in faith, sir, they be ratlers like thunder, sir; for after the dew followes a storme, for then am I sure either to be well buffetted, my face scratcht, or my head broken ....
(A Looking Glass II.ii.590-597) 1.50
Use was made of the convention of the battered husband by Heywood in A Mery Play betweene Johan Johan, the Husbande, Tyb, His Wife, and Syr Johan, the Preest to achieve a novel comic effect: Johan Johan opens the play with a lengthy soliloquy proclaiming his mastery over his wife -
I shall bete her, and thwak her, I trow,
That she shall beshyte the house for very wo!
(Johan Johan 31-32) 1.51
but when Tyb enters he is immediately submissive, dominated by her to such an extent that in retrospect his threats of violence become comic bravado. The tradition of the wife as a shrew and its potential for comic treatment in drama must be borne in mind when assessing The Taming of the Shrew.
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Morris has noted how closely related the Introduction is 'to the play it encloses, in matters of theme, tone and proleptic irony', 1.52 and the comic violence which is to feature so prominently in the central action is introduced in the very opening words:
Begger.
Ile pheeze you infaith.
Host.
A paire of stockes you rogue.
Beg.
Y'are a baggage, the Slies are no Rogues.
(Ind.i.1-3)
This is obviously the middle of a conflict between a man and woman, the incorrigible Sly and an exasperated Hostess. They are arguing about compensation for the glasses Sly has broken, and have almost come to blows. The unusual word 'pheeze' could mean simply to drive away or frighten, or it could imply, as it does in the present context, a more direct threat of physical violence, a beating. 1.53 Although Sly does not actually strike the Hostess, it would be a very dull actor who did not make some gesture or attempt to follow up his threat, which would lead to the Hostess' call for the restraining stocks. The conflict degenerates into a very brief slanging match which terminates when the Hostess goes off to fetch the headborough, and Sly promptly falls in to a drunken slumber. As the Hostess is never seen again, and nor is the matter of the glasses pursued, the episode is clearly no more than an economical device to introduce the idea of conflict between man and woman, an end which can be furthered most effectively if the Hostess is played as something of a scold. She has only three speeches, the first and last threatening and the other decidedly nagging, and we should note that Sly is the one on the defensive, not the Hostess.
The bulk of the induction concerns the deception of Sly, and is related in many minute details to the play proper, particularly to its central themes of wooing, matrimonial conflict and taming. An important aspect of Petruchio's taming is his use of falconry techniques to induce in Katherina a sense of unreality, to disorient her, and both the technique and its results are prefigured separately in the induction. Falconry is mentioned only in passing, but closely associated with it is hunting, which features prominently:
Dost thou loue hawking? Thou hast hawkes will soare
Aboue the morning Larke. Or wilt thou hunt,
Thy hounds shall make the welkin answer them.
(Ind.ii.44-46)
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This, of course, is all said to induce a sense of unreality in Sly, and his resulting mental conflict is much the same as Petruchio will produce in Katherina:
Am I a Lord, and haue I such a Ladie?
Or do I dreame? Or haue I dream'd till now?
(Ind.ii.69-70)
This state of confusion arises because Sly is addressed and treated as if he were a lord, and Katherina's case is similar: Petruchio initially deals with her as if she were the mildest, most desirable of women which she, aware of her own shrewishness, knows she is not. Sly is further removed from reality by the suggestion that he has fits of madness:
Hence comes it, that your kindred shuns your house
As beaten hence by your strange Lunacie.
...
... though you lay heere in this goodlie chamber,
Yet would you say, ye were beaten out of doore,
And raile vpon the Hostesse of the house.
(Ind.ii.29-30 and 85-87)
Instead of being led to believe she herself is mad, Katherina has to cope with the apparent insanity of her groom, and the descriptions in the induction of Sly's supposed mad behaviour prepare us for Petruchio's eccentricity, which, as will be seen, is really a parody of Katherina's shrewishness.
One further aspect of the induction which is relevant to the main action deserves comment: Sly's supposed wife must appear as perfect and desirable as the rest of his dream world, and so the Lord instructs his page to
... beare himself with honourable action,
Such as he hath obseru'd in noble Ladies
Vnto their Lords, by them accomplished,
Such dutie to the drunkard let him do:
With soft lowe tongue, and lowly curtesie,
And say: What is't your Honor will command,
Wherein your Ladie, and your humble wife,
May shew her dutie, and make knowne her loue.
(Ind.i.108-115)
And so it is, when the page meets Sly, he says, 'My husband and my Lord, my Lord and husband | I am your wife in all obedience' (Ind.ii.107-108). Sly's comic confusion (he does not recall being married) is quickly overcome, and he invites his 'wife', actually the Page in disguise, to
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bed with him. This awkward situation is averted, however, when Sly is restrained by advice that he 'tarrie in despight of the flesh & the blood' (Ind.ii.128) lest his malady recur, which prefigures similar restraints placed on Katherina by Petruchio in order to tame her. It must be stressed that the subservience shown to Sly by his wife was, in accordance with divinely instituted order, the accepted norm of society.
By the time the induction reaches its close, with Sly and his model wife settling down to watch a play, the audience has been alerted to the main themes of the action, and after an apparently irrelevant conversation concerning education and philosophy, the anticipated themes of wooing and shrewishness are introduced when the heroine of the main plot enters. In this brief episode the serious conflict between Katherina and Bianca is introduced, being based on the fact that Katherina finds herself in the unfortunate position of having no suitors, while her younger sister has many. This is the source of much jealous hostility on Katherina's part, directed not only towards the obvious target, her sister, but also towards her father and the suitors. It is interesting to speculate on the significance of the names of the two sisters, since they have similar connotations. Bianca derives from the Italian word meaning 'white', and signifying purity, while Katherina derives from the Greek name Αίκατερίνα which was associated with καθαρος, 'pure'. The similarity in names may have been an Elizabethan quibble involving the popular theme of conflict between appearance and reality: could two women with much the same name really be so different? As the play progresses we learn that Bianca is the real shrew, while Katherina's appearance of shrewishness belies her true worth. Petruchio affords another example of this conflict: his mad behaviour is a contradiction of reality, and the audience knows that he is actually sane. Appearance and reality were prefigured in the induction, where Sly was deceived by the appearance of those sent to gull him; the function of the conflict between what is real and what is apparent in the present context is to warn us at the outset to keep an open mind, not to condemn Katherina out of hand. That she is a shrew is obvious, but Shakespeare is careful not to present her in a totally unsympathetic light, and her name tells us that she may have hidden virtues. The suitors bring much shrewish wrath on themselves by their constant levity at her expense, exemplified in Gremio's very first words, where he responds to Baptista's invitation to woo Katherina:
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[Bap.]
Leaue shall you haue to court her at your pleasure.
Gre.
To cart her rather. She's to rough for mee.
(I.i.54-55)
Carting was a punishment, usually reserved for prostitutes, whereby the guilty party was paraded through the streets on the back of a cart, 1.54 and Morris adds that whipping was also part of the penalty. 1.55 Although Gremio's remark is meant to be comic, the physical violence it suggests gives it an unpleasant edge, making it a suitable counterweight to Katherina's rough behaviour. It is also highly insulting, reflecting on Katherina's chastity as it does, and she appeals to her father:
I pray you sir, is it your will
To make a stale of me amongst these mates?
(I.i.57-58)
Her use of the word 'stale' indicates that she has fully grasped the implications of Gremio's 'cart her', for a stale was a decoy prostitute working in conjunction with thieves, who would rob her customers. 1.56 The idea of stale simply as a decoy is also implied here, since Katherina sees herself as being used to attract undesirable suitors away from Bianca, and she wonders if her father realises this.
The only answer she gets to her question, however, is another goading, this time from Hortensio:
Mates maid, how meane you that? No mates for you,
Vnless you were of gentler milder mould.
(I.i.59-60)
This provokes Katherina beyond endurance and she rounds on the one she sees as the source of all her trouble, Bianca:
I-wis it is not halfe way to her heart:
But if it were, doubt not, her care should be,
To combe your noddle with a three-legg'd stoole
And paint your face, and vse you like a foole.
(I.i.62-65)
Katherina has some insight as far as the character of her sister is concerned, for, although we never see Bianca actually use the violence attributed to her here, in the play's final scene she holds her husband somewhat in contempt, which comes as a surprise to Hortensio and Baptista, but not to Katherina. The word 'noddle' could be used either in jest or contemptuously, and her it is the latter, in keeping with the contemptuous tone of the whole speech, underlined by Katherina's
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reference to her sister only in the third person (which the discerning actress will emphasise in delivery: 'I-wis it is not halfe way to her heart'). The actions described are such as we would associate with Katherina rather than Bianca, and Hortensio either cannot believe his ears, or he deliberately, comically misinterprets the lines so that they apply to the shrew, from whom he recoils in mock horror: 'From all such diuels, good Lord deliuer vs' (I.i.66). Later Gremio refers to her as 'this fiend of hell' (I.i.88), all of this being intended to provoke Katherina, which is precisely what it does. Katherina, because of her shrewish behaviour, is an object of fun, and, although the audience may sympathise with her, they also enjoy the fun at her expense.
That Katherina is at odds with society at large and her sister in particular is by now obvious. I have mentioned that much of her ill-humour can be attributed to jealousy - at least that is the point Shakespeare seems to be making, for the two women are constantly being compared in this scene, and always to Katherina's disadvantage. Lucentio's reply to Tranio's comment is typical:
[Tra.]
That wench is starke mad, or wonderfull froward.
Lucen.
But in the others silence do I see,
Maids milde behauiour and sobrietie.
(I.i.69-71)
Heilman has noted that 'the text simply does not present Baptista as the overbearing and tyrannical father that he is sometimes said to be', 1.57 and in fact, he makes every effort to remain impartial even under very difficult circumstances, for he never criticises Katherina in this scene. Although rather ineffectual, Baptista is an agent of order, and his impartiality exhibits itself largely in his attempts to restore peace to his troubled household. Katherina, however, feels differently, as can be seen in her jealous reaction here:
[Bap.]
And let it not displease thee good Bianca,
For I will loue thee nere the lesse my girle.
Kate.
A pretty peate, it is best put finger in the eye, and she knew why.
(I.i.76-79)
In an attempt to pacify Katherina, Baptista insists that she should be married before her younger sister, and he bars Bianca's suitors from her. Naturally Bianca resents this, but her resentment is less openly hostile than Katherina's, and smoulders:
Sister content you, in my discontent.
Sir, to your pleasure humbly I subscribe:
My bookes and instruments shall be my companie,
On them to looke, and practise by my selfe.
(I.i.80-83)
It is here that the relevance of the discussion on education which opened the scene becomes apparent, for Baptista intends to hire schoolmasters to educate Bianca, since she is no longer free to be courted. Her humble submission to her father's pleasure in this matter is cunning, for she and her suitors use education to hide their affairs from him, and the remainder of this scene is devoted to the formulation of plans to this end, perhaps more socially disruptive than the open hostility of Katherina. In encouraging her suitors Bianca directly contradicts the will of her father - a serious breach of order; she is also jointly responsible with Lucentio for arranging their clandestine marriage, to the annoyance of Baptista, who asks 'haue you married my daughter without asking my good will?' (V.i.122-123). Her shrewish behaviour towards Lucentio in the final scene indicates that she will continue to be a disruptive force, since her husband cannot control her.
In Katherina's first, brief appearance, then, Shakespeare has revealed her violent, shrewish nature, and also given her some grounds for anger - the jealous conflict with her sister. That this is not the sole cause of Katherina's ill-humour is soon revealed, for although she is married before Bianca is, she still remains a shrew. What we are shown, in fact, is a woman who reacts shrewishly because it is her nature to do so, or, in Draper's words, 'her violence is really part and parcel of her actual disposition'. 1.58 Houk, on the other hand, finds it impossible 'that Shakespeare in The Shrew thinks of Katherine's shrewishness ... as any kind of physical or mental disorder; his conception is rather that of the traditional shrew of literature'. 1.59 While it cannot be denied that Katherina in many respects resembles her literary forebears, it is the reactions of other characters to her that are stereotyped rather than Katherina herself. No matter what she says or does, Gremio, Hortensio and the rest respond as if to an archetypal shrew, not a woman of flesh and blood whose feelings may be hurt, and who reacts violently when provoked. It is in this most important respect, his attitude to Katherina, that Petruchio differs from the other men in the play.
It is interesting that while no physical violence occurs in Katherina's first scene, we nevertheless associate her with violence
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largely as a result of three comments: Gremio's 'To cart her rather. She's too rough for me'; Hortensio's 'Vnlesse you were of gentler milder mould'; and Katherina's own 'To combe your noddle with a three-legg'd stoole'. The same method of suggestion is not used for Petruchio, however, as after only fifteen lines of his first scene we have
Will it not be?
'faith sirrah, and you'l not knocke, Ile ring it,
Ile trie how you can Sol, Fa, and sing it.
He rings him by the eares
(I.ii.15-17)
This is the culmination of a quarrel between Petruchio and his servant, illustrating Petruchio's propensity to violence; 1.60 but, as may be expected in a play by Shakespeare, there is a good deal more to be revealed about this major character at his first appearance than a violent disposition. Many critics have noted the fundamental cause of the conflict, 1.61 namely, Grumio's deliberate misunderstanding of Petruchio's order to knock at the gate. 1.62 Such behaviour is typical of the relationship between masters and servants in comedy and accounts for the many comic beatings received by the latter. In administering punishment the masters are attempting to control the anarchic tendencies of those below them. In the moralistic A Looking Glasse, for London and England Greene and Lodge show us the Smith brought to submission by a violent beating given him by his servant, and Oseas comments:
Where seruants against masters do rebell,
The Common-weale may be accounted hell.
For if the feete the head hold in scorne,
The Cities state will fall and be forlorne.
(A Looking Glass III.iii.1301-1304)
Petruchio's handling of Grumio is thus crucial to his position of authority in the play, and introduces him as an agent of order. We should note first of all that the whole argument hinges on a nice insistence by Petruchio on the use of a particular word, 'knock':
Petr.
... I trow this is his house:
Heere sirra Grumio, knocke I say.
Gru.
Knocke sir? who should I knocke? Is there any man ha's rebus'd your worship?
Petr.
Villaine I say, knocke me heere soundly.
Gru.
Knock you heere sir? Why sir, what am I sir, that I should knocke you heere sir.
Petr.
Villaine I say, knocke me at this gate,
And rap me well, or Ile knocke your knaues pate.
(I.ii.4-12)
His first instruction, in view of their having just arrived at Hortensio's gate, is beyond any misinterpretation, but it is the role of comic servants such as Grumio to seize on every opportunity for fun, and this one is not allowed to slip by. Grumio's 'rebus'd' is a humorous twisting of 'abused', the suggestion being that somebody has physically abused Petruchio, who is ordering Grumio to retaliate physically on his behalf. Instead of putting Grumio right unequivocally, Petruchio mischievously uses an unusual construction, the ethic dative, 1.63 'knocke me heere soundly', an open invitation to word-play taking the suggestion of physical violence from Grumio's 'rebus'd'. Naturally Grumio follows the lead offered by his master, and in his next speech Petruchio even reinforces the misinterpretation by using two more ethic datives, 'knocke me at this gate ... rap me well', following them with the same verb, but this time with a direct object, 'Ile knocke your knaues pate'.
This insistence on a particular use of language by Petruchio reveals two facets of his character: his interest in words, and his stubborn will, the latter perhaps best summed up by his final imperious command after wringing Grumio's ears, 'Now knocke when I bid you: sirrah villaine' (I.ii.19). Both his interest in words and his stubborn will are to play and important part in his dealings with Katherina, to which the knocking episode is a prelude. Knocking is a polite preliminary to entering at a door, which signifies the beginning of a new venture - as found at least as far back as the early Christian church:
... beholde, I haue set before thee an open dore, and no man can shut it .... Beholde, I stand at the dore, and knocke. If anie man heare my voyce and open the dore, I wil come in vnto him, and wil suppe with him, and he with me.
(Revelation 3:8 and 20)
In this particular instance Petruchio's knocking may also stand for sexual entry, just as did Antipholus' in The Comedy of Errors; 1.64 for the gate to which Petruchio wishes to gain entry is Hortensio's, and he it is who will shortly suggest to Petruchio that he woos Katherina. Naturally Hortensio paints Katherina as a typical shrew, but Petruchio is not bothered much by this: he says of himself, 'wealth is burthen of my woing dance' (I.ii.67), and his attitude is that her shrewish character is no serious impediment to marriage, 'so monie comes withall' (I.ii.81). The grounds for his lack of concern are revealed, to some extent, as the scene progresses; in this respect two speeches are important, the first by Grumio:
A my word, and she knew him as wel as I do, she would thinke scolding would doe little good vpon him. She may perhaps call him halfe a score Knaues, or so: Why that's nothing; and he begin once, hee'l raile in his rope trickes. Ile tell you what sir, and she stand him but a little, he wil throw a figure in her face, and so disfigure hir with it, that shee shal haue no more eies to see withall then a Cat: you know him not sir.
(I.ii.107-115)
Here Grumio humorously predicts that Katherina will meet her match in Petruchio as far as words are concerned: she may 'call him halfe a score knaues, or so', but he, unperturbed, will 'raile in his rope trickes'. The term 'rope trickes' has a host of associations, but I think Morris is correct in suggesting it is a nonce-word derived by Grumio from 'rhetoric'. 1.65 To 'raile' implies verbal abuse, and further, the 'figure' to be thrown in Katherina's face could be a figure of speech. Morris compares this corruption of 'rhetoric' with the earlier corruption I have already mentioned, 1.66 'rebus'd'; however, I think it important to note that while the earlier corruption seems comically accidental, this one is comically deliberate - there is a deliberate linking of violence with rhetoric throughout the speech.
The rope had comic associations, for 'ropery' was equivalent to knavery or trickery, 1.67 but it could also be a violently derisive cry, as seen in
Winchester Goose, I cry, a Rope, a Rope.
Now beat them hence, why doe you let them stay?
(1 Henry VI I.iii.53-54) 1.68
and it could also refer specifically to the hangman's noose. 1.69 Another violent association of the rope was in the term 'rope's end', 1.70 which had already been used in The Comedy of Errors:
... buy a ropes end, that will I bestow
Among my wife, and their confederates,
For locking me out of my doores by day.
(Errors IV.i.16-18)
There the outcome was the comic beating in V.iv, using the rope's end on Dromio of Ephesus who had fetched it. In The Taming of the Shrew, the present linking of violence and rhetoric continues with the comically absurd idea of throwing a figure in Katherina's face and disfiguring her with it, resulting in her having 'no more eies to see withall then a Cat'. This final comparison seems inappropriate, as cats are usually considered to have sharp eyes; 1.71 however, the statement may be
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interpreted ironically: what seems to have escaped observation is that 'cat' here is the first pun on Katherina's name in this play (thus possibly inspiring Petruchio's later ones), and so what Grumio may be saying is that Petruchio's verbal tirades will actually educate Katherina, or, in terms of the metaphor used, open her eyes.
Later, having heard Katherina's faults repeated several times, we fear another speech which significantly diminishes the threat Petruchio might be expected to feel from a shrewish woman. This time it is Petruchio himself who speaks: 'Thinke you, a little dinne can daunt mine eares?' (I.ii.198), and he follows this question with an impressive array of sounds, increasing in violence, which have never caused him concern:
Haue I not in my time heard Lions rore?
Haue I not heard the sea, puft vp with windes,
Rage like an angry Boare, chafed with sweat?
Haue I not heard great Ordnance in the field?
And heauens Artillerie thunder in the skies?
Haue I not in a pitched battell heard
Loud larums, neighing steeds, & trumpets clangue?
(I.ii.199-205)
This crescendo of noise is followed by a deliberate anti-climax:
And do you tell me of a womans tongue?
That giues not halfe so great a blow to heare,
As wil a Chesse-nut in a Farmers fire.
Tush, tush, feare boyes with bugs.
(I.ii.206-209)
Thus by using violent, masculine images, Petruchio diminishes the supposedly formidable prospect of marrying a shrew to its proper dimensions, and particularly effective is the mild, homely image of 'a Chesse-nut in a Farmers fire', which reduces the nagging wife to the status of a familiar domestic phenomenon.
During the next scene Shakespeare continues carefully to prepare his audience for the wooing of Katherina by Petruchio: each is involved in a further episode before the wooing takes place about half way through the scene. Morris has noted how the scene presents 'a four times repeated pattern of contest and recuperation, rising to a climax in the parodic 'wooing'. ... Balancing this overarching structure is a subsidiary pattern which contrasts physical violence with the eloquence of persuasions and the rituals of debate'. 1.72 This assessment is essentially correct, but I think the idea a little laboured when applied to the second 'contest' Morris identifies, the bargaining between Petruchio and
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Baptista over Katherina's dowry: there is no real contest or conflict here, as there is only one suitor, and every proposal made is met with immediate consent.
The scene opens violently with the conflict between Katherina and Bianca having degenerated into open hostility. This is an extension of what we have already seen between the sisters in their first scene, where physical violence was clearly latent, and Katherina's aggressive nature is confirmed here, the physical assault being completely one-sided as Bianca's hands are tied. Even verbally Bianca is entirely on the defensive, trying to placate her sister's jealous wrath in every speech. Perhaps the most telling lines in the whole episode are these:
[Bap.]
Why does thou wrong her, that did nere wrong thee?
When did she crosse thee with a bitter word?
Kate.
Her silence flouts me, and Ile be reueng'd
Flies after Bianca
(II.ii.27-29)
Bianca's lack of hostility infuriates Katherina, for it necessarily puts her in the wrong at every turn - it is not Bianca's fault that Katherina has no suitors, but despite this she irrationally makes Bianca the target of her abuse and sees her father's intervention as open favouritism. In view of Baptista's restrictions concerning Bianca's suitors this is illogical, but Katherina's jealous anger will not let her see it in any other way:
She is your treasure, she must haue a husband,
I must dance bare-foot on her wedding day,
And for your loue to her, leade Apes in hell.
(II.i.32-34)
Violent disagreements between women were suitable subjects for mirth: Stevenson had Gammer Gurton and Dame Chat fight violently over the lost needle (Gammer Gurton III.iii), and Peele in The Old Wiues Tale similarly used conflict between Zantippa, 'the curst Daughter', and Celanta, 'the fowle wench', for a display of comic violence (Old Wives' Tale 603-621). 1.73 In The Taming of the Shrew it is Katherina who is the aggressor, but the fight never has the full expression of violence found in the plays of Stevenson and Peele which I have cited, and for this reason it loses much of its humour. Its major function, apart from confirming Katherina's shrewishness, is to heighten dramatic tension, for the more we see Katherina behaving in this way, the more we wonder what will happen when she and Petruchio finally meet. The tension subsides
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somewhat in the next episode, the arrangement between Petruchio and Baptista of Katherina's dowry, which I have already mentioned. Here violence is replaced by the intercourse of civilised, reasoned debate, but this is not the most remarkable aspect of this interlude, which serves principally to reveal more of Petruchio. What strikes most forcibly is his unexpected heavily ironic appraisal of 'Katerina, faire and vertuous' (II.i.43); he refers to her
... beautie, and her wit,
Her affability and bashfull modestie:
Her wondrous qualities, and milde behauiour.
(II.i.48-50)
This description is bound to induce laughter, coming only moments after Katherina has left the stage in a passion of seething, jealous anger, but its serious intent (and Petruchio should deliver the lines in such a way as to convey this, without loss of humour) is to show that Katherina really is as he describes her, as far as he is concerned. His own dominant nature, he is confident, will hold sway in any conflict between them; and, we should note, the caring father insists that Petruchio gains her love, above all, and the latter is sure this will present no difficulties: Baptista says the contract may be drawn up
Bap.
... when the speciall thing is well obtain'd
That is her loue: for that is all in all.
Pet.
Why that is nothing: for I tell you father,
I am as peremptorie as she proud minded:
And where two raging fires meete together,
They do consume the thing that feedes their furie.
Though little fire growes great with little winde,
yet extreme gusts will blow out fire and all:
So I to her, and so she yeelds to me,
For I am rough, and woo not like a babe.
(II.i.128-137)
Then, to confirm our assessment of Petruchio, to heighten once again the dramatic tension, and also to provide comic relief after the formal discussion with Baptista, violence is reintroduced. As before, Katherina is the perpetrator, and although we do not see the act, it makes her seem even more daunting: she breaks a lute over Hortensio's head, giving rise to his lament that she is not destined to be a musician - 'she'l sooner proue a souldier, | Iron may hold with her, but neuer Lutes' (II.i.145-146). Petruchio's reaction is by now predictable:
Now by the world, it is a lustie Wench,
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I loue her ten times more then ere I did,
Oh how I long to haue some chat with her.
(II.i.160-162)
Before he starts wooing, Petruchio reveals his initial strategy, which harks back to his ironical praise of Katherina earlier in the scene. He plans to woo her by contraries, such as:
Say that she raile, why then Ile tell her plaine,
She sings as sweetly as a Nightinghale:
Say that she frowne, Ile say she lookes as cleere
As morning Roses newly washt with dew,
(II.i.170-173)
and others besides. The effect of all this will be to throw Katherina off balance, to disarm her; but, as may have been expected, the effect is slow in coming. The conflict starts even in the very greeting, for Petruchio uses the affectionate 'Kate', while Katherina insists on 'Katerine'. Petruchio ignores this, countering with no fewer than eleven 'Kates' in his next speech, and it is the preferred name he retains for her for the rest of the play. This insistence on a particular form is similar to his first conflict in the play - his knocking at the gate with Grumio. In fact many of the wooing scene conflicts centre on words and their shifting meanings. An early example has some significance:
Pet.
... come sit on me.
Kate.
Asses are made to beare, and so are you.
Pet.
Women are made to beare, and so are you.
Kate.
No such Iade as you, if me you meane.
Pet.
Alas good Kate, I will not burthen thee.
(II.i.198-202)
The insult is passed from one to the other with a slight change in meaning every time, as each tries in their antagonism to outwit the other. Petruchio uses 'beare' with two sexual meanings: women bear children, and they also bear the weight of the man in sexual intercourse. 'I will not burthen thee' is thus prophetic, in view of the nuptial evening speech on continence, a speech in which Dash finds special significance - that Petruchio rejected rape as a means of taming his wife. 1.74 In fact this is characteristic of his whole approach to Katherina, for although he has said 'I am rough, and woo not like a babe', we never see him using physical violence on her. This is illustrated a few lines later, after a series of particularly indecent quibbles:
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Pet.
What with my tongue in your taile.
Nay come againe, good Kate, I am a Gentleman,
Kate.
That Ile trie. she strikes him
Pet.
I sweare Ile cuffe you, if you strike againe.
Kate.
So may you loose your armes,
If you strike me, you are no Gentleman.
(II.ii.216-220)
It is Katherina who is violent here, and Petruchio remarkably restrained; the former is expected, the latter not, if we are to believe what we have heard of Petruchio so far. His actions do, however, satisfy an instinctive, primeval pattern of behaviour, as noted by Andressen-Thom: 'Male cool in the face of female attack is an unmistakable sign of male superiority in the animal world'. 1.75 Petruchio never loses physical control, never resorts to direct violence, but his verbal attacks continue, and just once, we get the impression that Katherina is not quite as confident in her verbal thrust and parry as she was initially, for instead of a witty rejoinder, all she manages is 'Where did you study all this goodly speech?' (II.i.256). The lapse is temporary, however, for her resistance continues after this as spirited as ever, until she is whisked off the stage by Petruchio.
The final conflict of this scene, the deliberate auctioning of Bianca to the highest bidder by Baptista, emphasises the rivalry for Bianca, and we find this continued also in the following scene, the music lesson. Although rivalry is prominent here, its display is not the principal function of the scene; rather, we should note the character of Bianca in her role as an agent of disorder, not only deceiving her father but also playing her lovers off against each other.
Of the three marriages in The Taming of the Shrew, the one which seems least likely to succeed at its inception is that between Petruchio and Katherina. There is still serious conflict between the pair, and even on their wedding day Katherina is provoked by Petruchio's late arrival into calling him 'a mad-braine rudesby, full of spleen' (III.ii.10). When Petruchio does finally arrive, her invective seems justified, for he is outlandishly dressed and quite unprepared for the wedding ceremony. This is as bewildering for the audience as it is for the bride, and their curiosity is not at all diminished by Tranio's assertion that 'He hath some meaning in his mad attire' (III.ii.122), since the meaning is far from clear. The comment, however, indicates that the groom's dress is not intended merely to provoke laughter, and as the scene progresses we see that Petruchio wishes his whole wedding day
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to be a burlesque of normal wedding celebrations. As Morris observes, Petruchio replaces the ceremony itself 'with a violent, disrespectful travesty of it - which is what he believes marriage to an unreformed shrew to be'. 1.76 Petruchio is doing exactly what he set out to do, quench her fire by being a raging fire himself (to use Petruchio's metaphor). Even the spectators vie with each other as to who is worse:
Tra.
Curster then she, why 'tis impossible.
Gre.
Why hee's a deuill, a deuill, a very fiend.
Tra.
Why she's a deuill, a deuill, the deu[i]ls damme.
Gre.
Tut, she's a Lambe, a Doue, a foole to him.
(III.ii.152-155) 1.77
Petruchio does everything on this important day in defiance of convention. When he says 'To me she's married, not vnto my cloathes' (III.ii.115) the sentiment expressed is pious but his actions are not, for piety in such matters presupposes adherence to the norms. What Petruchio does on his wedding day is to show Katherina the value of ordered, decorous behaviour in society. 1.78
Katherina's reactions to Petruchio's dress and behaviour at the church are left to our imagination, but his final disruption of social order is presented on stage, and we see her indignation. The wedding feast should reflect the harmony established between bride and groom, but here the groom insists on leaving with his bride before the feast has even started, which is in keeping with their state of conflict. If the significance of this is not clear, it is reinforced by the fact that Katherina angrily opposes the will of her husband. He tries to placate her in vain, and she responds with a wonderfully comic, shrewish line, turning on Baptista (who has been ineffectually silent for over twenty-five lines):
Pet.
O Kate content thee, prethee be not angry.
Kat.
I will be angry, what hast thou to doe?
Father, be quiet, he shall stay my leisure.
(III.ii.213-215)
Petruchio has deliberately brought the conflict between himself and Katherina into the public eye, and not only do all on stage eagerly anticipate a domestic brawl, but the audience as well is caught up in the tension, anxious to see how Petruchio reacts to his wife's assertion of her will. Unexpectedly, his response is an overbearing, peremptory statement of his rights:
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I will be master of what is mine owne,
Shee is my goods, my chattels, she is my house,
My houshold-stuffe, my field, my barne,
My horse, my oxe, my asse, my any thing,
And heere she stands, touch her who euer dare.
(III.ii.227-231)
It is hard to imagine this speech, which so offends our modern sensibilities, as ever having been entirely acceptable even in Shakespeare's day. There is no humour here, no comic irony to soften the harshness of the idea expressed - but this idea was in fact what society demanded, that women be subservient to men in the divinely instituted order. 1.79 Nevertheless, I think that under normal circumstances few Elizabethan men would have ventured to put the idea quite in Petruchio's terms. Petruchio's circumstances are not normal, however, and he is forced to adopt his extreme position by his shrewish wife. His aim in doing so is not to dominate her or to break her spirit, but merely to put her in her correct position (as seen then) in the social ladder, below him, the necessity for which is stated in the final scene:
Marrie peace it boads, and loue, and quiet life,
An awfull rule, and right supremicie:
And to be short, what not, that's sweet and happie.
(V.ii.109-111)
When this is realised, the shrew-taming takes on a new significance, for it is the mutual love and happiness of the marriage partners Petruchio wishes to establish.
There are three taming scenes in which Katherina is shown in various states of disorientation and degradation, and while the taming is not pleasant, Shakespeare does make it humorous. In the first scene we have the ordeal of the journey home described by Grumio, as a prelude to the arrival of the married couple, and we should note the effect on Katherina of Petruchio's excessive violence:
... how he beat me because her horse stumbled, how she waded through the durt to plucke him off me: how he swore, how she prai'd, that neuer prai'd before.
(IV.i.68-71)
Such is Petruchio's violent abuse of Grumio that she feels bound to plead for moderation, and we see the same thing happen in the domestic turmoil of the wedding night: 'Patience I pray you, 'twas a fault vnwilling' (IV.i.143) and again, 'I pray you husband be not so disquiet' (IV.i.155). In this scene Katherina, in a totally new environment, is quite overawed
and has little else to say, but in the next scene her confidence has returned to some extent. Initially, over the matter of food, she is relatively submissive, and learns the civility of giving thanks; when the tailor arrives, however, Petruchio's behaviour so provokes her that she speaks her mind - to no avail:
Kate.
Ile haue no bigger, this doth fit the time,
And Gentlewomen weare such caps as these.
Pet.
When you are gentle, you shall haue one too,
And not till then.
(IV.iii.69-72)
This witty retort is Petruchio's most direct statement so far to his wife on how he expects her to modify her behaviour. After the tailor retreats from the fray the tension subsides, and Katherina's contradiction of Petruchio's absurdities is essentially respectful:
I dare assure you sir, 'tis almost two,
And 'twill be supper time ere you come there.
(IV.iii.186-187)
Meanwhile the action of the sub-plot advances in a way recalling The Comedy of Errors, for a mercantile pedant from Mantua is gulled by Tranio into thinking he is under sentence of death if found in Padua, the reason given being a dispute between the governing authorities. At Tranio's instigation the pedant disguises himself as Vincentio, thus preparing the way for another comic scene of knocking at a gate and being denied entry. In this interlude, the beating of servants, confusion and loss of identity, threats of arrest and the idea of death are all reminiscent of The Comedy of Errors, but the resulting comic violence here never seriously threatens to disrupt the action as it had done in the earlier play. We see Vincentio, a stranger in the town, denied entry to his son's house, his identity questioned, and he is also threatened with arrest for impersonation. In his impatience at Biondello's equivocation he beats the servant, who responds by suggesting that Vincentio is insane; and, to add to his troubles, Vincentio thinks Lucentio has been murdered. This mounting confusion and disorder is interrupted when Lucentio and Bianca, just married, arrive and reveal their deception to their fathers, both of whom leave the stage threatening revenge. These threats must not be taken too seriously, as there are signs that peace can be made: Vincentio says, 'Feare not Baptista, we will content you' (V.i.124) and Lucentio adds, 'Looke not
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pale Bianca, thy father will not frown' (V.i.127). Thus Bianca seems to have achieved a happily married state without any great trials, unlike her poor sister. The confusions and violence in the sub-plot do not directly bear on Bianca and Lucentio in any way comparable with the experiences of Katherina and Petruchio in the main action; and while disruption in the sub-plot is purely comic, it plays a vital part in bringing about the happy conclusion to the taming of Katherina, who is brought to value order by being made to live in extremes of disorder.
The comic violence of the first two of Katherina's taming scenes, that is, the physical abuse of servants in the first and the verbal abuse of the tailor in the second, has no counterpart in the final taming scene. This is significant, for it implies that Petruchio no longer has to resort to violence to show Katherina its effects. Instead of disruption, there is much gentle humour, and it is impossible to view the scene with distaste when it is realised that Katherina participates in the fun, a fact made obvious form the way she enters into the spirit of Petruchio's absurdities:
Yong budding Virgin, faire, and fresh, & sweet,
Whether away, or whether is thy aboade?
Happy the Parents of so faire a childe;
Happier the man whom fauourable stars
A lots thee for his louely bedfellow.
(IV.v.36-40)
She is submissive, but not humiliated, and the same should be observed of the final scene of the play. Here conflict between Katherina and Petruchio has been resolved entirely, as seen earlier when, in deference to his wishes, she kisses him in public. There is genuine love in her 'Nay, I will giue thee a kisse, now praie thee Loue staie' (V.i.136). Not all conflicts are resolved, however, and as the play draws to a close Shakespeare emphasises disruption not so much to remind us of the real world, where conflict is an accepted part of human existence, as to highlight the happiness of the central couple. There is still rivalry between the two sisters, which leads Frye correctly to observe that when we take leave of Katherina 'she is still bullying Bianca, but she has learned how to do it with social approval on her side'. 1.80 It gives Katherina a good deal of pleasure to deliver her speech on womanly submission to her petulant sister and the widow, particularly after their verbal clashes with Petruchio earlier in the scene. It should also be noted that there is much rivalry between the men - as there was before
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they were married - but the emphasis has shifted from competition for the women to a desire to display a maximum of male dominance, the man with the most obedient wife being deemed superior to the others. However, we should not forget amid the conflicts of this final scene that it centres on a banquet, denoting concord; and, significantly, on this occasion Petruchio and Katherina participate in the feast, which they did not do on their wedding day. The play is a celebration of the founding of a secure, loving relationship between two unlikely people, while the less fortunate couples, with their associated conflicts, merely act as foils, making Petruchio and Katherina's happiness even more radiant.
Warburton said The Comedy of Errors and The Taming of the Shrew 'are certainly not of Shakespeare. The most that can be said of them is, that he has, here and there, corrected the dialogue, and now and then added a scene'. 1.81 Fortunately, more recent opinion has been kinder to these plays and, imperfect though they may be, they provide a valuable insight into the young playwright's concept of disruption, and how he made use of it in his writing for the stage. The Taming of the Shrew may be viewed as a study of the conflict and violence which can arise between men and women both before and after marriage, with particular emphasis on the idea that an insubordinate woman could be the source of not only her own unhappiness, but also that of her husband. Bearing in mind the horrors of the branks and the cucking-stool, 1.82 Shakespeare's treatment of the theme of taming a shrewish woman is remarkable for its lack of violence. Its central taming theme is strongly motivated by the belief in a divinely instituted order, and that the observance of this order is necessary if true happiness is to be attained. In The Comedy of Errors Shakespeare also briefly studied the effects of a wife's shrewishness on marital harmony, and in this play, too, emphasis is placed on the fact that for complete happiness in marriage attention has to be paid to the observance of divinely instituted order. Adriana's marriage is further troubled by the unfaithfulness of her husband, something which Katherina never had to deal with. The effect of this additional factor is to make the audience more sympathetic to the wife's cause and correspondingly to reduce the apparent importance of divine order in marital relationships. In the earlier play, however, we are actually shown the resulting
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disruption when order is ignored, while in The Taming of the Shrew we have only Petruchio's word that order is necessary, although the final discomfiture of Hortensio and Lucentio by their headstrong wives is intended to help in convincing us of the necessity.
In both of these plays there are elements of farce, and associated with farce we find comic violence, such as the beating of supposedly disobedient servants. However, while such violence provokes laughter, it frequently has serious undertones as well. Thus, in The Comedy of Errors, it is an integral part of the general decline of order observed during the course of the play, and it also contributes to the serious theme of loss of identity and disorientation, while in The Taming of the Shrew violence is used to illustrate a facet of Petruchio's character, his stubborn will, and it is also a means of revealing to Katherina the disruption caused by extremes of behaviour, thus bringing her to plead for moderation when Petruchio becomes violent. In the earlier scenes of The Taming of the Shrew violence is also used to contrast the characters of Petruchio and Katherina, he being capable of violence, but never using it indiscriminately, and certainly not on Katherina; she being capable of violence and using it frequently, whenever things do not go her way.
In many instances there is an element of sadism in comic violence, 1.83 and this may be traced in both of these plays. When the Dromios are beaten by their masters, or Petruchio beats Grumio, there is some relish in the wielding of authority and power, particularly when it is accompanied by a victory in verbal wit, such as we see when Petruchio bids Grumio knock at the door. Once Petruchio has married Katherina there can be little doubt that he enjoys dominating her and reducing her to submission. She, too, delights in her intimidation of Bianca, and when she has her tied up, completely at her mercy, the violence she uses is partly and indulgence of her sadistic streak. This is continued even after her taming, in a sublimated form: Katherina rejoices in her own submission to Petruchio because it humiliates her old enemy, Bianca, who is now shown to be a disruptive force. In The Comedy of Errors the most sadistic behaviour is seen in the abuse of Pinch by Antipholus and Dromio of Ephesus. Here the violence used is deliberately comic, almost flippant, as indicated by the Messenger's report that they treated him 'like a foole', and such levity points to a degree of sadism in those administering the punishment. The presence of this sadism in the violence of these plays does not diminish the audience's enjoyment; rather, they share, in some measure, the feelings of those in power on
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the stage, modified by the fact that they, as observers, are outside the play's action and therefore able to view events in their comic perspective.
In The Comedy of Errors violence is used to highlight marital conflict, as seen in the shutting out of Antipholus of Ephesus from his own house and the feast in progress within. The servants' beatings and Adriana's shrewishness can also be accounted for indirectly by the domestic upsets of the Ephesian Antipholus household; and the restraining of the supposedly mad men is Adriana's drastic but misguided attempt at restoring marital harmony by the curing of Antipholus. It results in the beating of Pinch and the confrontation between Emilia and Adriana, in which some of the problems in the marriage are revealed. In The Taming of the Shrew the shutting out of Vincentio is reminiscent of The Comedy of Errors, and is associated with a general decline in order resulting from the machinations of the disobedient lovers, Bianca and Lucentio; it serves to heighten the tension before the final revelation of the clandestine marriage and Lucentio's true identity. Much more important is the violence associated with Katherina, firstly within Baptista's household, which is in a state of constant turmoil resulting from the continuing conflict between his daughters; and secondly between Katherina and Petruchio, both before and after their marriage. The harmony in marriage between this couple could not have been achieved without their common consent: they refrain from violence to each other once Katherina has learnt the benefits of taking her position in the accepted order of society.
A further conflict in The Comedy of Errors is the clash between the public mercantile world and the private domestic world, a conflict present in both the overarching action with its serious, violent threat of death, and in the central action in which Antipholus of Ephesus is seen to have harmonious relationships with the public figures of merchants and courtesans, but not his wife. There is no corresponding conflict in The Taming of the Shrew, although the mercantile world makes its presence felt in the scenes in which Baptista bargains with the various suitors for the hands of his daughters.
It may be stated, then, that in these two early comedies Shakespeare has chosen plots in which violence is, to a large extent, an integral part of the action. His development of this aspect shows his concern for more serious issues than the apparently farcical nature of the action suggests, something particularly clear in The Taming of the Shrew, where
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extreme violence on the part of the taming husband was a traditional part of folklore, 1.84 but was eschewed by Shakespeare in his considerably refined version of the story. Even at this early stage, the comedies do not merely induce laughter; they introduce conflicts which not only heighten the dramatic interest, but also lead to a consideration of some of the weightier issues of human existence.
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- - - NOTES: CHAPTER ONE - - -
1.45 Brookes sees a parallel between sections of The Canterbury Tales and The Taming of the Shrew: Charles Brookes, 'Shakespeare's Romantic Shrews', Shakespeare Quarterly, 11 (1960), 354. return
1.46 The edition cited is F.N. Robinson, ed., The Works of Geoffrey Chaucer, 2nd ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1979). return
1.47 Ephesians 5:22-24; see p.11. return
1.48 Frederick S. Boas, ed., The Works of Thomas Kydd: Edited from the Original Texts with Introduction, Notes, and Facsimiles, 1901; rpt (London: Oxford University Press, 1955), p.255 lines 12-16. return
1.49 The edition cited is Kenneth Sisam, ed., Fourteenth Century Verse and Prose, 1921; rpt (London: Oxford University Press, 1975). That Noah's wife should be a shrew may have been traditional, for in The Deluge, a play of the Waterleaders and Drawers in Dye of Chester, she is 'ever froward' (194) and, as in The Townely Play of Noah, this leads to comic violence, seen in the stage direction, 'Et dat alapam vita' (242). (The edition of The Deluge cited is that of Adams.) In Heywood's The Playe Called the Four PP the Pedlar went as far as suggesting two-thirds of all (if not all) women were shrews:
Of eche thre, two, iustly by nomber,
Shall be founde shrewes - excepte thys fall,
That ye hap to fynde them shrewes all!
(The Four PP 1080-1082)
(The edition cited is that of Adams.) return
1.50 The edition cited is that of Collins. return
1.51 The edition cited is that of Adams. return
1.52 Morris, p.115; line numbers to quotations cited are taken from the edition by Morris. return
1.53 O.E.D. V, 808: 'feeze ... v. ... 1. trans. To drive; to drive off or away ... c 890 ... 2. To frighten c 1440 ... 3. ... a. vaguely, To 'do for' ... (a person). b. To beat, flog. a. 1596 ... b. 1610'. The word is used only twice in Shakespeare (see Marvin Spevack, The Harvard Concordance to Shakespeare (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1974), pp.404 and 976), the other occurrence being in Troilus and Cressida ('ile phese his pride' (Troilus II.iii.206)); in The First Part of King Henry IV it may be intended when Falstaff compares his men with 'an old-fac'd Ancient' (1 Henry IV IV.ii.31), meaning a beaten old man. (Line numbers are taken from William Shakespeare Troilus and Cressida, ed. Kenneth Palmer (London: Methuen, 1982) and William Shakespeare The First Part of King Henry IV, ed. A.R. Humphreys, 1960; rpt (London: Methuen, 1985).) It is also found in Jonson's The Alchemist, where Lovewit offers to fight with Kastril: 'Come, will you quarrell? I will feize you, sirrah' (Alchemist V.v). (The edition cited is Benjamin Jonson, The Workes of Beniamin Jonson (London: Will Stansby, 1616).) In each case a degree of violence is implied in the use of the word, and we may be reasonably sure this is so in The Taming of the Shrew as well. return
1.54 O.E.D., II, 924-925: 'cart ... v. ... 2. spec. To carry in a cart through the streets, by way of punishment ... (esp. as the punishment of a bawd). ... 1596'. O.E.D. cites Shakespeare's use in The Taming of the Shrew as the earliest instance, but there is an earlier use in Gammer Gurton's Needle, where Hodge, defending himself against Dame Chat's accusations, cries out, 'A carte, whore! a carte!' (Gammer Gurton's Needle V.ii.114). return
1.56 O.E.D., XVI, 466: 'stale ... sb.3 ... 4. More fully common stale: a prostitute of the
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lowest class, employed as a decoy by thieves. Often (? associated with STALE a.) used gen. as a term of contempt for an unchaste woman. ... 1592'. return
1.57 Robert B. Heilman, 'The Taming Untamed, or, the Return of the Shrew', Modern Language Quarterly, 27 (1966), 156. return
1.58 John W. Draper, 'Kate the Curst', Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 89 (1939), 758. return
1.59 Raymond A. Houk, 'Shakespeare's Heroic Shrew', Shakespeare Association Bulletin, 18 (1943), 122. return
1.60 That Petruchio uses considerable violence here, with Grumio actually ending up on the floor, may be gleaned from Hortensio's 'Rise Grumio rise, we will compound this quarell' (I.ii.27) a few lines later. return
1.61 For example, E. Berry, Rites, pp.128-129; Ralph Berry, Shakespeare's Comedies: Explorations in Form (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1972), p.63 (hereafter cited as R. Berry, Comedies); Irene G. Dash, Wooing, Wedding and Power: Women in Shakespeare's Plays (New York: Columbia University Press, 1981), p.38. return
1.62 Nowhere in this scene does Shakespeare refer to Hortensio's door: the entrance used is a gate; but that he thought of the two as being synonymous may be seen from Act V, where Vincentio seeks Lucentio: 'gate' is used once (V.i.15) and 'doore' twice (V.i.7 and 25) for the same entrance. The associations which I discuss later (p.29) apply equally well to both terms. return
1.63 This came into English from Greek via Latin. See Henry Watson Fowler, A Dictionary of Modern English Usage, ed. Ernest Gower, 1926; rpt, 2nd ed. (London: Oxford University Press, 1965), p.170, where 'Quid mihi Celsus agit?' is cited as an example. The English construction, by Shakespeare's time, generally expressed surprise (Morris, p.184 n.), and so is strictly speaking out of place here. return
1.66 Ibid., pp.189-190 nn. return
1.67 O.E.D., XIV, 98: 'ropery ... 2. Trickery, knavery, roguery. ... 1592'. return
1.68 Line numbers are taken from William Shakespeare, The First Part of King Henry VI, ed. Andrew S. Cairncross (London: Methuen, 1981). return
1.69 O.E.D., XIV, 94-95: 'rope ... sb.1 ... I. ... 3.a. ... the hangman's cord. ... 1290 ... c. As an allusive or derisive cry. ... 1591'. return
1.70 Ibid., XIV, 98: 'rope's end, sb. ... 1. The end of a rope; esp. a piece from the end of a rope used as an instrument of punishment ... c 1460-70'. return
1.73 The edition cited is George Peele, The Old Wiues Tale: A Pleasant Conceited Comedie, Played by the Queenes Maiesties Players (London: Iohn Danter, 1595), with line numbers taken form Ashley Thorndyke, ed., The Minor Elizabethan Drama, II vols, Everyman's Library Nos 491-492, 1910; rpt (London: Dent, 1951). return
1.74 Dash, pp.36-37 and 54-55. return
1.75 Martha Andresen-Thom, 'Shrew-Taming and Other Rituals of Aggression: Baiting and Bonding on the Stage and in the Wild', Women's Studies, 9 (1982), 130; Andresen-Thom applies a study of aggression in animals by Konrad Lorenz to The Taming of the Shrew. return
1.77 The print in all copies of Folio that I have consulted is not clear in line 154,
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where either 'deuils' or 'deulls' may be the reading. There is no doubt, however, as to what is intended, and F2 has 'devils'. return
1.78 Leggatt, p.53, says, 'He seems to be demonstrating to her the importance of small social amenities, by denying them to her and forcing her to realize how much she depends on them'. return
1.79 If the idea of female subservience is repulsive to us, Heilman, p.159, draws a good analogy: 'The easiest way to deal with it is to say that we no longer believe in it, just as we no longer believe in the divine right of kings that is an important dramatic element in many Shakespeare plays'. Nevertheless, Petruchio's unacceptably blunt statement of male domination could have been the playwright's way of voicing his own disapproval. return
1.80 Northrop Frye, A Natural Perspective: The Development of Shakespearean Comedy and Romance (New York: Columbia University Press, 1965), p.80. return
1.81 Hugh Blair, ed., The Works of William Shakespeare, in Eight Volumes: In Which the Beauties Observed by Pope, Warburton, and Dodd, Are Pointed out: Together with the Author's Life, a Glossary, Copious Indexes, and, a List of the Various Readings, 1753; rpt, VIII vols (Edinburgh: Bell & Bradfute, J. Dickson, W. Creech, J. & J. Fairbairn, and T. Duncan, 1795), I, xlviii. return
1.82 O.E.D., II, 491: 'branks ... 1. A scold's bridle; an instrument of punishment used in the case of scolds, etc., consisting of a kind of iron framework to enclose the head, having a sharp metal gag or bit which entered the mouth and restrained the tongue. 1595'; and IV, 105: 'cucking-stool ... An instrument of punishment formerly in use for scolds, disorderly women ... etc., consisting of a chair (sometimes in the form of a close-stool), in which the offender was fastened and exposed to the jeers of the bystanders, or conveyed to a pond or river and ducked. ... c 1308'. return
1.83 This was suggested to me by Professor Ferguson. return
1.84 See the various analogues quoted by Morris, pp.70-76 and 310-316. In these traditional stories, the husband's sadism is not comic as it is in Shakespeare's play, and the wife is usually beaten, sometimes senseless. return
Proceed to Chapter Two