The Taming of Two Shrews

Similarities Betwixt the Girls

To what extent are two of Shakespeare's heroines from different plays similar?

Kate's Aggression with Petruchio

Both Kate and Beatrice are very aggressive when with their fiance/spouse.

Beatrice's Aggression with Benedick

Beatrice: Kill Claudio

Benedick: Ha! Not for the wide world!

……….

Beatrice: Is ‘a not approved in the height a villain, that hath slandered, scorned, dishonored my kinswoman? O that I were a man! What, bear her in hand until they come to take hands; and then, with public accusation, uncovered slander, unmitigated rancor- O God, that I were a man! I would eat his heart in the market place! (Shakespeare, 74).

Both Kate and Beatrice end up

truly loving their husband at the end.

Petruchio & Kate's Love at the End

Katherine

Come, come, you froward and unable worms!

My mind hath been as big as one of yours,

My heart as great, my reason haply more,

To bandy word for word and frown for frown;

But now I see our lances are but straws,

Our strength as weak, our weakness past compare,

That seeming to be most which we indeed least are.

Then vail your stomachs, for it is no boot,

And place your hands below your husband's foot:

In token of which duty, if he please,

My hand is ready; may it do him ease.

PETRUCHIO

Why, there's a wench! Come on, and kiss me, Kate

(Shakespeare).

Benedick & Beatrice's love at the End

Significance

This scene was the first moment in the play that Katherine actually shows true loving emotion towards Petruchio. Their kiss was genuine for the first time. In this scene, Lucentio had called Bianca to come to him, yet she denied. Hortensio had called his wife, the widow to come to him, yet she also denied. Yet with the marriage which seemed least sincere, Petruchio’s and Katherine’s, when Petruchio called Katherine to him she obeyed him and responded with the quote above.

Benedick: Suffer love! A good epithet. I do suffer love indeed, for I love thee against my will.

Beatrice: In spite of your heart, I think. Alas, poor heart! If you spite it for my sake, I will spite it for yours, for I will never love that which my friend hates (Shakespeare, 93).

Significance

Towards the end of the play, it can be assumed by these lines that Beatrice and Benedick have admitted their love for each other in their own stubborn way by saying that if "you can love me, I guess I can love you too."

Katherine (Kate)

• No past history with Pertruchio.
• Petruchio is very controlative of Katherine. He is to tame her.

PETRUCHIO

Marry, so I mean, sweet Katharina, in thy bed:

And therefore, setting all this chat aside,

Thus in plain terms: your father hath consented

That you shall be my wife; your dowry 'greed on;

And, Will you, nill you, I will marry you.

Now, Kate, I am a husband for your turn;

For, by this light, whereby I see thy beauty,

Thy beauty, that doth make me like thee well,

Thou must be married to no man but me;

For I am he am born to tame you Kate,

And bring you from a wild Kate to a Kate

Conformable as other household Kates.

Here comes your father: never make denial;

I must and will have Katharina to my wife

(Shakespeare).

Similarities

Arranging Petruchio

& Kate

Significance

In Taming of the Shrew, Petruchio with Kate are set up by different characters in the play.

Hortensio realizes that Petruchio is single and looking for a wife, no matter how crazy she is or what she looks like. Baptista, the father, agrees with the marriage in order to have his older daughter marry before his younger daughter, Bianca.

The marriage is fixed by having Hortensio please Petruchio by confirming that she is wealthy for

him, now that his father has passed away.

PETRUCHIO:

Such wind as scatters young men through the world,

To seek their fortunes farther than at home

Where small experience grows. But in a few,

Signior Hortensio, thus it stands with me:

Antonio, my father, is deceased;

And I have thrust myself into this maze,

Haply to wive and thrive as best I may:

Crowns in my purse I have and goods at home,

And so am come abroad to see the world.

HORTENSIO:

Petruchio, shall I then come roundly to thee

And wish thee to a shrewd ill-favour'd wife?

Thou'ldst thank me but a little for my counsel:

And yet I'll promise thee she shall be rich

And very rich: but thou'rt too much my friend,

And I'll not wish thee to her (Shakespeare).

Beatrice

• Younger relative is sought after first in marriage.
• Both marriages are arranged by different characters in the play.
• Female character is aggressive towards their fiance.
• Both Benedick and Petruchio are not in the same social class as their fiances. The women marry down their social class.

Arranging Benedick

& Beatrice

Don Pedro: Beatrice was in love with

Signior Benedick?

……….

Leonato: By my troth, my lord, I cannot

tell what to think of it, but that she

loves him with an enraged affection,

it is past the infinite of thought

(Shakespeare, 36-37).

Significance

Benedick and Beatrice experienced a relationship together in the past in where Beatrice describes as giving," a double heart for his single one"

(Shakespeare, 27).

Now that Benedick swears he will live a bachelor, Don Pedro and Claudio challenge themselves saying they will make him fall in love.

Benedick ends up falling for Beatrice because Don Pedro, Claudio, Leonato and Hero convince him that Beatrice is madly in love with him, just afraid to admit it.

The Taming of the Shrew

• Past history with Benedick
• Benedick had just come back from a war.
• In respect to the movie, similar to how Kate is represented, both women have a messier appearence, compared to their younger more attractive family members.
• Beatrice and Benedick are always insulting one another.
• Towards the end Beatrice and Benedick still have little arguments.
• They are not married by the end, their marriage is only hinted at.

Much Ado About Nothing

Written by Shakespeare in between 1590-1592.

Shrew is a metaphor for Katherine.

A shrew is defined as a bad-tempered or aggressively assertive woman.

Petruchio is like a circus

lion tamer the way he

dresses makes him seem

like a clown

(i.e. what he wears for

his wedding).

Differences

http://log.melaniethut.com/?p=2848

Written by Shakespeare in the 1600's.

Beatrice's younger cousin, Hero, is beautiful and wanted by all the men in the town. Hero has been asked to marry before Beatrice.

Beatrice is very aggressive. Benedick married her because Claudio and Don Pedro convince him that Beatrice loves him already.

http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/much-ado-about-nothing/images/1099711/title/beatrice-photo

Much Ado About Nothing:

Benedick and Beatrice are to be married at the end of the play.

Beatrice has no father to aid her in finding a husband.

Beatrice and Hero are cousins so the order in marriage is not of much significance.

Taming of the Shrew:

Petruchio and Kate are married at the end of the play.

Kate has a father who helps arrange their marriage.

Kate and Bianca are sisters, making the fact that Kate marries

first more

important.