The Taming of the Shrew Author: William Shakespeare | Language: English | ISBN:
0812416716 | Format: PDF
The Taming of the Shrew Description
Folger Shakespeare Library
The world's leading center for Shakespeare studies
Each edition includes:
• Freshly edited text based on the best early printed version of the play
• Full explanatory notes conveniently placed on pages facing the text of the play
• Scene-by-scene plot summaries
• A key to famous lines and phrases
• An introduction to reading Shakespeare's language
• An essay by an outstanding scholar providing a modern perspective on the play
• Illustrations from the Folger Shakespeare Library's vast holdings of rare books
Essay by Karen Newman
The Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C., is home to the world's largest collection of Shakespeare's printed works, and a magnet for Shakespeare scholars from around the globe. In addition to exhibitions open to the public throughout the year, the Folger offers a full calendar of performances and programs.
--This text refers to the
Mass Market Paperback
edition.
- Series: Folger Shakespeare Library
- Hardcover: 251 pages
- Publisher: Perfection Learning (January 1, 2004)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 067148835X
- ISBN-13: 978-0812416718
- ASIN: 0812416716
- Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 4.1 x 1 inches
- Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
"The Taming of the Shrew" is probably William Shakespeare's second most controversial play -- nobody can figure out if it's misogynistic or a biting double satire on the sexes. Whatever it is, it's still a witty and hilarious comedy that pits the titular "shrew" against a crazy guy determined to browbeat her into traditional subservience... and while they're no Beatrice and Benedick, it is lots of fun.
Framing device: a local lord and his hunting party stumble across a drunken tinker, and decide to play an elaborate prank on him. They dress him in rich clothes, arrange fine food for him, and even drag a protesting servant boy in to pretend to be his wife. And they put on a performance for him as well: Baptista Minola has two daughters, the hot-tempered razor-tongued Katharina and the quiet, demure Bianca.
Since Bianca is not allowed to marry until Katharina is, her suitors form an alliance to get the elder sister out of the way, which is made more complex when a young student named Luciento falls in love with Bianca, and comes up with a clever plan to woo her. Enter Petruchio, an impoverished nobleman with as sharp a wit as Katharina -- and since he's the only one willing to marry her, her father jumps on the chance. From the very beginning, Petruchio beats her over the head with crazy reverse psychology, a ridiculous wedding ceremony, and a honeymoon from hell.
It's often debated whether "The Taming of the Shrew" is a sexist play or not, since the strong-willed, independent Katharina ends up another little obedient wifie, lecturing the other wives on giving their husbands "love, fair looks and true obedience." Blech.
'The Taming of the Shrew' is Shakespeare's most purely enjoyable play, especially in the theatre. Its language is easy to understand, with very little of the elaborate figures that can be difficult to follow on stage; the plot, with various suitors vying for the hands of sisters beautiful Bianca and shrewish Katerina, a web of disguises and mistaken identities, with servants pretending to be masters and vice versa, is pure bawdy farce. this fluidity of social roles is quite subversive - fixed hierarchies are shown to be merely a case of good acting.
Formally, 'Taming' is one of Shakespeare's most audacious, as a play-withing-a-play-within-the-play - it starts with an aristorcrat and his servant playing a joke on a drunken peasant, by making him believe he is a lord; the play put on for him, 'The Taming of the Shrew', is full of comic and thematic echoes of this framing plot, in thich the servant dresses as the peasant's noble wife. Within this play, characters play roles and stage plays for various unwitting audiences.
for all its entertainment and brilliance, however, 'Taming' has always been one of Shakesepeare's most notoriously uncomfortable plays - we are asked to watch the subduing of a strong, vocal, witty, satirical, indepedent woman by a bullying braggart. There are moments within the general sneering, when we are allowed sympathise with Kate in her loneliness and feelings of being made the butt of abuse and jokes, but it is difficult to watch scenes with a gang of men holding the stage, deciding the fate of the women.
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