The Taming of the Shrew by Shakespeare UGC NET ENGLISH PAPER II, UNIT 1. MODULE 14

A) Background of the Play :

• A comedy written in 1592 
•  probably Shakespeare's second play 
• the hero Petruchio reappears in Fletcher's "The Woman's Prize, or The Tamer Tamed", a comedy written in 1609-1611  in which he is tamed by his second wife Maria after Kate's death 
• "Kiss Me, Kate", the popular musical play first produced in 1948, with music and lyrics by Cole Porter has derived its title from this Shakespeare's play in which Petruchio repeats three times requesting 'kiss me, Kate' 
• source of the play: "Supposes", a comedy in prose by George Gascoigne in 1566 adopted from Ariosto's "I suppositi" 
•  an American-Italian Comedy film produced in 1967  staring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton is also based on this Shakespeare's play and has the same title

B) Summary of the Play :
The whole five acts play of Taming of the Shrew is quite unusually performed within another story in the form of Induction I and II.  Induction here is thus a framing story in which a local lord wants to play a prank on a poor drunken tinker - he orders his servants to take the tinker Christopher Sly to his bed,  dress him like a lord,  provide him with good wine and food . He also orders a troupe of players to perform a play and entertain the tinker and the lord's page boy Bartholomew has to join in the jest dressed in the attire of the tinker's wife to convince him that the happenings around him are real and he has just recovered from his long insanity. The play performed to entertain the tinker is the Taming of the Shrew.

The shrew mentioned in the title is Katherine and the hero who tames this shrew is Petruchio. The play is set in Padua where Baptista has two daughters -the elder daughter wild Catherine and the younger daughter mild Bianca. He wants a tutor for Bianca and a suitor for Catherine first.  Now even the already available hopeless suitors for the younger daughter  Hortentio and Gremio have to first find someone to marry Katherine. Petruchio who comes to Padua looking for a wealthy bride doesn't care about Katherine's nature and weds her at once and takes to his country house where he has planned to tame the shrew.

On the other side,  Lucentio who comes to Padua for further study is carried away by the beauty and submissive nature of Bianca. He pretends to be a tutor of classical language, wins the heart of Bianca and weds her eloping with her to the local church. Baptisto later forgives the couples since it's Lucentio's sincere love for Bianca that made him do so.  Hortentio who also tried to win Bianca in vain pretending to be a music teacher, now changes his mind and marries a wealthy widow.

How Petruchio trains his wild wife to bend to his will and succeeds in his attempt is the remaining part of the play.  Petruchio pretends to care for his wife more but at the same time makes her want of food,  sleep, fine clothes and all comforts. For instance,  he rages at the servants for the meals not being hot enough for his wife  and pushes the whole meals off the table wantonly to make the hungry Katherine still more hungry. The play ends with Katherine's stunning change into submissive nature and Petruchio's success in the competition for three Wives - Bianca, Katherine and the Widow (Hortentio's wife) to find out who among them is so submissive to their husbands.  Katherine, to everyone's surprise, gives a speech on the duties of a good wife to her husband.

C) Critical Appreciation of the Play:
Christopher Sly controlled by the local lord is a play thing to the lord just as the uncontrollable Katherine is a toy in the hands of Petruchio. "Shakespeare has no heros, only heroines. " said Ruskin. It's true with Shakespeare's most of the plays,  especially with Portio in The Merchant of Venice. But here in this play Shakespeare has given much weightage to the hero Petruchio and even Hortentio later proposes to come to this country 'taming school ' to learn the art of controlling one's wife.  The element of disguise is popular device to Shakespeare to produce dramatic irony but here the disguises are too much and the audience is likely to get lost - Lucentio in the disguise of a tutor called Camio, Hortentio disguised as a music teacher,  Lucentio's servant Tranio disguised as Lucentio, second servant as a servant to the disguised Tranio... What happened to Christopher Sly, the watcher of this entire play is completely ignored. However this second play from young Shakespeare is surprisingly rich in plot and characterisation.