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Part II Ro Of The Shrew

The ta of the shreritten, possibly, in 1593 or 1594, is a play within a play At least it starts out so hat Shakespeare calls an "Induction" ("Introduction") representing the frame within which the play proper is presented

Richard Conqueror

The Induction begins with Christopher Sly,thrown out of an alehouse by an irate landlady who delasses he has broken; money he refuses to pay

With the owlish gravity of drunkenness, he rejects the names she calls him He says:

the Slys are no rogues

Look in the chronicles: we came in with Richard Conqueror

- Induction, scene i, lines 3-4

Christopher Sly is, as he says later, a tinker, a profession lost to the modern world A tinker was a solderer and repairer of kettles, pots, and other such householdfroainst the utensil

It did not take ence to be a tinker, and while tinkers acted as though they were general handy o much beyond solder or a nail, so thathave the verb "to tinker,""to fiddle with, rather unskillfully"

Tinkers could scarcely hbors' kettles to co their few tools on their backs and going froers usually are, and perhaps a number of them used the tinker's equipars, or even smalltime thieves and con men At any rate, tinkers were traditionally considered rascals and rogues

Christopher Sly, then, being a tinker, and showing himself in costu in clai to be descended froland in the eleventh century

What's amation of William the Conqueror and Richard the Lion-Hearted (the latter was the great-great-grandson of the former) helps the humor with the audience Even the least sophisticated of the Elizabethans would surely catch the error

for Semiramis

Christopher Sly falls into a drunken slu party co Sly, it occurs to the Lord to play an elaborate practical joke They are to take Sly, dress him in fine clothes, and, when he wakes, convince hireat nobleht himself a pauper

This is done, and in the second scene of the Induction, Sly, awakening with a call for small beer, finds himself attended by a variety of obsequious servants ait on hireatest tenderness and with a wealth of classical allusions The Lord himself plays a role as servant and says respectfully:

wilt thou sleep? We'll have thee to a couch

Softer and sweeter than the lustful bed

On purpose trimmed up for Semiramis

- Induction, scene ii, lines 37-39

Seendary Queen of Assyria who had becoe I-403)

Adonis painted

As dealing with ical subjects Thus, one servant says:

We will fetch thee straight

Adonis painted by a running brook

And Cytherea all in sedges hid,

- Induction, scene ii, lines 49-51

This refers to thewhich Shakespeare had written a long poee I-5)

Cytherea is an alternate name for Venus, derived from the fact that an important seat of her worship was the island of Cythera, just off the southeastern corner of Greece

We'll show thee Io

The Lord offers a second choice:

We'll show thee Io as she was a maid

And how she was beguiled and surprised

- Induction, scene ii, lines 54-55

Io was a daughter of the river god Inachus in the Greekto say about hoas "beguiled and surprised," though Jupiter used guile on other young ladies, notably Europa (see page I-44) The myth concentrates instead on the manner in which Jupiter's jealous wife, Juno, persecuted Io afterward (see page I-86)

Daphne roa

A third choice is presented:

Or Daphne roah a thorny wood,

Scratching her legs that one shall swear she bleeds,

And at that sight shall sad Apollo weep,

- Induction, scene ii, lines 57-59

Daphne was a nyinity whom Apollo loved She rejected his advances and fled from hiht her, but at the last oddess), turned her into a laurel tree

Little by little, then, Sly is convinced that after all he is a lord He even begins to speak in blank verse instead of the usual prose And to cap the climax, a play is presented for his edification, and it is this play which is e usually think of as The Ta of the Shrew

fair Padua

The play within a play opens with two youngLucentio summarizes the situation:

Tranio, since for the great desire 1 had

To see fair Padua, nursery of arts,

I am arrived for fruitful Lombardy,

- Act I, scene i, lines 1-3

Padua is a city in northeastern Italy a little over twenty miles west of Venice and noted for its university

Medieval Italy was, in fact, fa had taken new root there while it was still all but dead in the countries beyond the Alps The first hty miles southwest of Venice, in 1088 It specialized in the study of Roal studies for centuries afterward

Bologna had its quarrels and probleroup of its professors and students broke away and established a co university at Padua, and it was this which na, supported a great law school and the tere great rivals

Padua was an independent city-state through the Middle Ages but in 1405 it was absorbed into the territory of the Venetian republic and was still part of it in Shakespeare's time (and remained so till 1797) Padua was not actually part of Lombardy in the medieval or modern sense Lombardy is located in northwestern Italy with Milan as its chief city, and even at its closest approach, Lombardy is fifty miles west of Padua

This, however, is not as bad as it sounds In the eighth century all of northern Italy was under the control of the Loht therefore be used in a poetic sense for northern Italy generally (Nevertheless, Shakespeare may well have been a little hazy on the fine points of Italian geography This shows up more clearly elsewhere)

Pisa

Lucentio has come to Padua for an education, but he pauses also to announce his birthplace:

Pisa, renowned for grave citizens,

Gave

- Act I, scene i, lines 10-11

Pisa is located on the western coast of Italy, about 140 es it was for a tireat commercial city, the rival of Genoa and Venice It was at its height between 1050 and 1250, and in 1173 it built what is now its leading feature, a bell tower that, through some flaw in its foundation, settled out of the vertical It is the Leaning Tower of Pisa

Toward the end of the thirteenth century Pisa was defeated in a long ith Genoa and began a steady decline In 1406 it was captured by the forces of the city of Florence, forty-five miles to its east, and reh Shakespeare's time (and, indeed, until 1860) In fact, Lucentio describes himself as:

Vincentio's son, brought up in Florence,

- Act I, scene i, line 14

Florence, the home city of Dante, was the very epitome of Renaissance culture It was the Athens of Italy, and one would boast of being brought up there as one ht up in Athens in ancient times or in Paris in modern times

As Ovid

Tranio is a little nervous at Lucentio's grandiloquent speech, for he vieith some concern the prospect of a close course of study He says:

Let's be no stoics nor no stocks, I pray,

Or so devote to Aristotle's checks

As [to make] Ovid be an outcast quite abjured

- Act I, scene i, lines 31-33

Tranio's distaste for Stoics (see page I-305) or for Aristotle (see page I-104) is not so puzzling in aman

As for Ovid, whom he prefers, his best-knoork is his Metae I-8) However, a more notorious piece of as his Ars A style, a course in seduction for young men

Ovid insisted it was intended to deal only with the relations of young men and women of easy virtue, but it could easily be applied to anyone, of course, and the Eed at its publication It was one of the reasons why Ovid was banished to a far corner of the Empire a few years later

It is undoubtedly The Art of Love of which Tranio is thinking, and he is urging Lucentio not to be so wrapped up in his studies as to forget to have a little fun now and then

hear Minerva speak

Tranio need not have worried Lucentio is, actually, all on the side of Ovid too, and so comes up at once to prove it

A rich merchant of Padua, Baptista, cohters, Katherina (or, for short, Kate) and Bianca Trailing hier Hortensio

Both Gre for the hand of Bianca, the younger daughter, a gentle girl, who stands with eyes cast down and rarely speaks (Her very nah to emphasize her color-lessness)

Baptista will have none of this, however He will not allow Bianca to marry until the elder sister, Kate, is married The two suitors can have their chance at her If one marries her the other may woo Bianca

But it turns out at once that Kate is a furious shrehose every word is a threat, whose eyes flash fire, and who is ready at a moment's notice to commit mayheet away from her

Tranio and Lucentio are watching from the sidelines Tranio is amazed at the shrewishness of Kate, but Lucentio has eyes only for the gentle Bianca When Bianca hue, Lucentio is ravished with her modest words He says to Tranio:

Hark, Tranio, thou mayst hear Minerva speak

- Act I, scene i, line 84

Minerva was the Rooddess of wisdo "ue of the Greek Athena

love-in-idleness

Baptista and his daughters go off, but not till after the fatherfor a music teacher for Bianca

Grerin and decide that the only way they can e to pursue their suit of Bianca is to find so to marry Katherina After all, Baptista is enor her shrewishness and the difficulty of getting rid of her) would coe dowry

They leave too, and Lucentio comes out of his wide-eyed trance to find hiht with Bianca He says to Tranio:

But see, while idly I stood looking on,

I found the effect of love-in-idleness

- Act I, scene i, lines 150-51

Love-in-idleness is the pansy, which was thought in Elizabethan nature folklore to have the effect of a love potion (see page I-34) Lucentio decides to be utterly frank about his feelings and plans, for he says to Tranio:

Thou art to me as secret and as dear

As Anna to the Queen of Carthage was,

- Act I, scene i, lines 153-54

Anna was the sister of Dido (see page I-20) and her confidante Lucentio goes on to say:

/ saeet beauty in her face,

Such as the daughter of Agenor had,

That reat Jove to humble him to her hand

When with his knees he kissed the Cretan strand

- Act I, scene i, lines 166-70

Agenor was a hter was Europa, for whose sake Zeus (Jupiter, or Jove) turned hie I-44)

Love gives Lucentio an idea He will i Bianca While he is doing this, his servant, Tranio, can pretend to be Lucentio, perfor the educational and social tasks that the real Lucentio ought to be doing (and concerning which his father, Vincentio, back in Pisa, will expect to hear of now and then)

Would 'twere done

At the end of the first scene, attention is suddenly drawn to Christopher Sly, the tinker, sitting in the balcony He is dreadfully bored, but doesn't like to say so When the page, who is pretending to be his wife, asks how he likes it, he says:

'Tis a very excellent piece of work, madam lady

Would 'twere done!

- Act I, scene i, lines 252-53

But Christopher Sly is done, for we hear no more of him ever From this point on, the play within a play is the play itself, while Christopher Sly, the Lord who fools hi servants vanish from the scene

It's possible that Shakespeare siot about them Shakespeare had, apparently, borrowed the device fro of a Shrew ("a" rather than "the"), which used the play within a play technique It ot so interested in the play about the shrew that he grew iet in his way and dropped it

Why, then, did he not go back and cross out the Induction and these few lines at the end of the first scene? In this connection, we end that Shakespeare prided hi

Another possibility is that Shakespeare did keep the frame but that the later parts were omitted by accident from the particular copy that survived and was used as the basis for the first collection of his plays

Verona, for a while

The second scene opens with the entrance of Petruchio, the hero of the play He says:

Verona, for a while I take my leave

To see my friends in Padua

- Act I, scene ii, lines 1-2

Verona is another city of northern Italy and is located some forty miles west of Padua In Shakespeare's time, Verona, like Padua, was part of the Venetian republic

Florentius" love

Petruchio is accoether they are on the doorstep of Hortensio's house, Hortensio being one of the friends Petruchio has come to see

There is a contretereat a shrew in his way as Katherina is in hers He orders Gruate, but Grumio takes him to mean to strike Petruchio himself, and refuses There is a loud clamor, at which Hortensio opens the door

Petruchio and Hortensio embrace each other and the former explains that he has come to Padua to seek his fortune Hortensio at once has the notion of suggesting that Petruchioher shrewishness, hesitates to play so foul a trick on a friend

Petruchio, however, urges him on He is after money and that is the only requirement he has Aside from that:

Be she as foul as was Florentius' love,

As old as Sibyl, and as curst and shrewd

As Socrates' Xanthippe or a worse,

She moves me not

- Act I, scene ii, lines 68-71

Florentius is the nae I-181) The plot is one in which a knight is forced towho has helped hie as reco his word is that the hag turns into a beautiful e

"Sibyl" is from the Greek sibylla, their name for a priestess attached to a shrine or temple who had the ability to utter prophecies Such a woman would fall into real or pretended fits (which -induced) and would utter incoherent sounds which a priest would then interpret in the foruous sentences

Sibyls were supposed to attain great ages, for after all, an old woht e than a young one Besides, prior to the nineteenth century, births of coistered and individuals who lived to their seventies were rare A wrinkled old crone was an unusual and soht and it was easy to believe she had strange powers (of a sibyl in ancient times, of a witch in later times) and had lived for a century and more

A mythic explanation is that Sibylla, beloved by Apollo, offered to give herself to hiift of prophecy and for as raranted the wish and Sibylla reneged on her own proirl had asked for years of life and not for youth and allowed her to grow older and older and older

As for Xanthippe, she was Socrates' wife, and the tales told of her show her to have been a scolding shrew To be sure, any impartial person would have to adlected his fa philosophy and teaching rich noblemen without pay, so that his family was always in want Nevertheless, people aren't iht of as the wisest of an saint, Xanthippe is frowned upon for co

Fair Leda's daughter

The corow Petruchio insists he oo and win Katherina for her ard for her shrewishness Whereupon it occurs to Hortensio (as earlier it had occurred, independently, to Lucentio) to disguise hiht to the house under the patronage of Petruchio If Petruchio offers to woo Katherina, surely the delighted Baptista will accept his protege for the post of teacher and Hortensio would then be on the inside track with Bianca

At this point, though, in couised Lucentio Greuised Lucentio for the post of teacher, planning to have the man plead Gremio's cause with Bianca Then in couised as hisfor Baptista's house to woo Bianca

When Grerandly:

Fair Leda's daughter had a thousand wooers;

Then well one more may fair Bianca have

And so she shall Lucentio shall make one,

Though Paris came in hope to speed alone

- Act I, scene ii, lines 243-46

Leda was a queen of Sparta hom Jupiter fell in love He visited her in the shape of a sith the result that eventually Leda laid an egg, out of which Helen was hatched Helen, as the very epitoe I-90), but was eventually snatched away by Paris

There are thus four men now after Bianca There is 1) Greuised as a teacher; 3) Lucentio, already disguised as a teacher; and 4) Tranio, disguised as Lucentio

All understand thoughdepends on how Petruchio fares with Katherina, and Greloomily, that that task is liable to be harder than Hercules' twelve labors put together

dance barefoot

In Baptista's house, er sister, Bianca, whose hands she has bound Katherina is deirl likes best, and one may easily suppose that Kate is annoyed at the ease hich Bianca gains love, while she herself remains with no one

This is made the clearer when Baptista comes in, rescues Bianca, and scolds Katherina Katherina at once accuses Baptista of favoritism:

Nay, now I see

She is your treasure, she must have a husband;

Iday,

And, for your love to her, lead apes in hell

- Act II, scene i, lines 31-34

To dance barefoot on the wedding day symbolizes the humiliation of an older une Leading apes in hell is the traditional fate of women who die spinsters

Shakespeare seeirl who desperately wants love and who doesn't kno to go about getting it She lacks the natural charirl, and the fascination that goes with a spirited temper is somewhat less obvious

Shakespeare does not give us the early history of Katherina, but it is not difficult to suppose that her teer sister caer, the baby of the family, would draw the attention of the father, and with every sign of favoritisnation and Baptista would cling all the more closely to the little one

There is no sign that Baptista is actually cruel to Kate, and he is trying to get her a husband, but he cannot conceal the fact that he likes Bianca better, so that the vicious cycle continues till Katherina is virtuallyso has made it impossible for herself to receive love even if it were offered-or almost impossible

in Mantua

Now the pack of suitors enters Baptista's house Petruchio tackles his Hercules' labor at once, announcing hi that he has come to woo Katherina, of whose reat deal While Baptista stands there gasping at this novel description of his older daughter, Petruchio blandly introduces Hortensio in disguise, urging his acceptance as a uised friend:

His name is Litio, born in Mantua

- Act II, scene i, line 60

Thus, another north Italian city is mentioned Mantua is sixty miles southwest of Padua