To be honest, The Taming of the Shrew is my absolute favorite Shakespeare play. It’s hilarious, well plotted, and contains one of the most interesting relationships between a couple that has ever been written.
And no one dies pointlessly, which is always a bonus.
However, in professing this opinion, I often get odd looks and the occasional insult. People ask how I can support a so obviously vicious and sexist play.
To this, I answer: either you didn’t read with even half your brain engaged, or you need to brush up on comprehension before reading Shakespeare.
And I can back it up.
The two main schools of thought towards the “taming” of Katherina is that either she’s tamed or she’s not; either that she means her speech at the end or she doesn’t. These two interpretations are generally how the character is played on film and on stage — which is a shame. Because I don’t think either are right.
And while I realize the enormous amount of hubris in declaring 90% of scholarship on this play null and void, I’d ask you hear me out. Because at the end of it, this play invokes Occam’s Razor — the simplest explanation is the best.
Those who take offense at Katherina’s “taming” start with the false assumption that there was nothing in her that needed changing in the first place. For heaven’s sake, this is a woman who ties up her sister when she suspects her of lying, who throws things and screams abuse is and is not just rude, but abusive herself.
So the first claim of “sexism” because a female character is changed is already no good — Katherina definitely needs a personality shift. Not a reversal, you see — but neither the play nor Petruchio call for that.
And here we come to Petruchio — the much-maligned other main character in the story. Yes, he marries Katherina for money. Boo hoo. Who is he putting out by doing so? Baptista was going to marry Katherina off — the question was only who and how fast could it happen. It might as well be to someone who actually liked Katherina.
Yes, I posit that he did. Because no one would marry someone — no matter what the dowry — as physically violent as Katherina if they didn’t actually think that they could stand being around her. This idea is cemented in their verbal sparring match in Act 2, where they are shown to be each other’s equals, both in general intellect and in quick-witted tongues (and a slightly bawdy sense of humor/way of speaking).
Petruchio proceeds to embarrass her. This is fact. But the question is why? Why make a fool out of himself (other than the simple fact that he didn’t care what people think of him)?
Answer? He’s showing her what she does. He does it a bit differently, but Katherina has been acting just as poorly in society as he is, and he’s showing her, possibly for the first time in her life, how she appears to others. Not the fierce person she sees herself as, but as someone who does not have the wits to belong in society.
Social niceties are a thing for a reason. They allow to the world to function. By acting so ridiculously abrasively and despotically, Katherina is truly positing herself as the most selfish person in the world.
Tl;dr? He’s showing her that she has flaws. Not quirks, but flaws. And while everyone does, she makes a point of imposing her flaws on others and tantruming when everything doesn’t go her way. So Petruchio does the same thing.
After the marriage, he shows her how obnoxious it is when someone dominates the terms of an argument, eventually wearing her down to the point where she agrees with whatever she says. And it’s after this that I’d argue that she finally gets the point. She finally understands exactly what Petruchio is trying to tell her — albeit in a roundabout way, because that’s just how Petruchio rolls (and because if he’d told her this outright, she wouldn’t have listened nor believed him).
And then, the natural conclusion is in the famous (and much derided) speech. And here’s the answer:
Katherine’s not tamed, in the awful sexist way that professors often want to point out as a way of devaluing this play (and often Shakespeare as a whole). What she has learned is how to be herself and be socially appropriate.
Look at the speech — it’s absolutely just as harsh and ‘shrewish’ as her speech to Bianca at the beginning of the play. So what’s the difference?
She’s learned how to discipline (and really, how to yell at) her sister while being socially appropriate. What names to use, what accusations to level, etc. It doesn’t matter if they’re true or not — some were true and some were false before. What’s important is that she’s learned that she can behave however she wants if she twists it slightly and puts forth the appearance of behaving as a polite lady should (such as coming when Petruchio asked her to — which, really, is simple politeness, not any sort of sexism).
She didn’t stop expressing herself. She learned to do it just a bit differently.
I adore Katherina. She’s my favorite character in the play — though the blustery, clever Petruchio is a close second. And so watching her change, and learn, is a phenomenal experience. It’s one of the reasons I love this play so much, and why I feel the need to correct people when they don’t get it.
Because the simplest answer here is that Katherina is the protagonist. As the protagonist, she needs to have an arc of character growth. And it’s a positive one.
And I think that’s something to scream about.
Something to Scream About 