The Taming of the Shrew by William Shakespeare
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Talk not to me. I shall go sit and weep
Till I can find occasion of revenge.
Like The Merchant of Venice, whose anti-Semitism makes us squirm, this play presents a sticky problem to modern audiences: was Shakespeare a misogynist? And it must be said that the misogyny present in this play is more difficult to excuse than the prejudice against poor Shylock, since Shakespeare is not clearly in sympathy with the titular shrew, Katherine, as he is with the Venetian merchant. So just as bardolaters have striven to distance Shakespeare from the badness of Titus Andronicus, so have they tried to complicate Shakespeare’s relationship to the explicit misogyny of the play.
First there is the induction, a seemingly extraneous introductory bit that frames the rest of the work, making it a play-within-a-play. Did Shakespeare do this to distance himself from the misogyny? A rather flimsy shield, if you ask me. Another way to excuse the bard has been historical relativism, noting that misogyny was universal in his day and thus excusable. But this explanation isn’t satisfying, either. The play presents Petruchio’s actions as unusual and noteworthy, so much so that the rest of the characters are awestricken by the end. In the context of Shakespeare’s own plays, too, the relationship between Petruchio and Katherine is far from typical.
But perhaps Shakespeare meant this as a negative example, not to emulate but to scorn? Maybe we are supposed to loathe Petruchio and gasp in horror at Katherine’s submissive ending monologue? This does not seem plausible to me; rather it strikes me as a wholly un-Shakespearean reading—with evil unapologetically triumphant, something that never happens even in his tragedies. Somewhat differently, Harold Bloom frees Shakespeare with irony. As he notes, the ending monologue is far too long, and can easily be read as satire on Katherine’s part. Using evidence such as this, Bloom asserts that Katherine is not tamed at all, but rather learns to dominate Petruchio. Yet avoiding her husband’s temper tantrums through unconditional obedience hardly seems like “dominance” to me.
We are thus left, uneasily, with simple misogyny.* And yet the play did not have a terribly unpleasant effect on me. This is because several factors serve to mitigate the main theme of shrew-taming.
For one, however unhealthy their relationship might be by modern standards, Petruchio and Katherine have undeniable chemistry. From the hilarious sexual raillery of the opening courtship to the “Kiss me, Kate” in the streets of Padua, the couple is electrifying to watch. Then there is the obvious ironic comparison with the relationship between Lucentio and Bianca. Bianca, the sweetly submissive girl who every suitor pursues, ends up deceiving her father and making her own choice of marriage; while Katherine, the infamous shrew, compliantly marries the first suitable suitor who comes along with no deception whatsoever. And it is also worth noting that, all the bizarre torture notwithstanding, Katherine does seem better off with Petruchio, who is deeply fond of her, than with her father, who finds her to be a pestilence.
In any case, this play can take its place alongside A Comedy of Errors as a light comedy with finely-drawn characters, full of life and wit—indeed in many ways it is far better. If only it wasn’t about subjugating a wife!
*Given that this play is very unusual in the context of Shakespeare’s oeuvre—full as it is of strong and compelling women—I doubt that it represented Shakespeare’s own views on the subject.
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