Shakespeare’s the Taming of the Shrew Analyzing Kate

The Taming of the Shrew is one of Shakespeare’s most popular plays. It is both a witty and complex play with characters that are appealing and believable drawn from life and based on a keen understanding of human nature. One can see this in the main character of the play, the shrew Katherine. Critics and Shakespearean scholars have often wondered about Kate’s character. Conjectures for the reasons of Kate’s shrewd behavior as well as her tameness have puzzled scholars for ages. This essay will attempt to decipher Kate’s shrewish character from the beginning with her father and sister, through the middle with her first meeting of Petruchio, to the finale where she is finally tamed. There is a strong underlying notion that Kate’s†¦show more content†¦Clearly then, a case can be made for Baptista as a biased and thoughtless father, Bianca as a spoiled child who knows how to give herself an angelic appearance, and Katherine as a neglected, hurt, and humiliated daughter who disguises her grief from herself, as well as from others, with a noisy, shrewish temper. Katherine’s shrewdness finds itself at a plateau upon her first meeting with Petruchio. Although Petruchio initially seeks Katherine out for her dowry, we are given to believe that he likes her for her wit and her spirit, for Petruchio is a lively, adventurous man. This is clear in everything he says and does. The reader receives the impression that Petruchio decides to take on the taming of a shrew as a sort of challenge or sporting pastime. One feels, in fact, that Katherine’s wild temper is an attraction to this fiery man, and that he would be far less willing to marry Bianca for her fortune. If Petruchio is a mere fortune hunter, whey does he not seek Bianca’s hand? She not only has wealth to equal her sister’s, but she also has a mild temper to go with it. Petruchio’s attraction to Katherine’s spirit helps him penetrate her shrewd shell. He is delighted to hear that she has broken a lute over his friend’s head for it shows spirit and he thinks the better of her for it. This puzzles Kate, who has no alternative but to keep acting as the shrew she portrayedShow MoreRelatedAnalyzing Social Roles as Constructs Pertinent to Sex1100 Words   |  5 PagesFrancis Chechile Analyzing Social Roles as Constructs Pertinent to Sex. In Shakespeare’s Taming of the Shrew as well as Manuel Puig’s Kiss of the Spider Woman the characters feel conflict between society’s rules and their more private desires. They are forced to perform social roles that are in a more private respect artificial. This pertains mostly to social roles that define sexuality. 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