The Taming of the Shrew/YMMV

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • Abuse Is Okay When It Is Female On Male: Am I the only Troper in the Queen's Commonwealth who notices that Kate is an abusive--oh, I don't know--shrew who binds her sister and whips her, throws things at complete strangers for reasons ranging from, "I don't like the song you played." to "You looked at my sister first." and is generally an unpleasant person to be around. Every scene of Petruchio pretending to throw a fit is an exact mirror of Kate's terrible rage, no different than the Ghost of Christmas Present repeating Ebenezer Scrooge's cold words back to him, but when he gives her her just desserts, it is sexist?!
    • A person being abusive doesn't give others license to abuse them. Abuse is never justified. Whether his treatment is sexist or not, it's still a man abusing his wife. One can argue Kate deserved to be punished, that Bianca and her father deserved protection, and that Kate might be able to be rehabilitated without condoning Petruchio's actions.
  • Alternate Character Interpretation: There is a theory that Kate doesn't genuinely submit to Petruchio but is putting on an act and merely becomes shrewd to get her way with her husband. Supporting this is how Kate doesn't gradually become submissive but, almost in exasperation, just starts agreeing with him in a completely unrealistic way, and this behavior gets Petruchio to do what she wants. (Thus learning the very lesson he's trying to teach: one catches more flies with honey than with vinegar.)
    • Another one: Petruchio is lampooning society (specifically gender roles) throughout the play; the "taming" is really him just trying to get Kate to play along with him without having to drop the joke by telling her in front of other people. (Crucial bit to reading this: in that scene where Kate starts to go along with him, "moon" and "sun" are metaphors for Petruchio).
    • Another: Petruchio's act is meant to show Kate how ridiculous her behavior must seem. She eventually catches on to this and the rest of the play is a prank on everybody else.
    • Yet another, for the last monologue, though it requires some side gags: Kate gets in on the bet and delivers the last monologue to get her and Petruchio the money.
    • The alternate alternate character interpretation is that Shakespeare means what he says and that attempts to read the play as "subversive" are a product of the modern audience's discomfort with the story.
    • And for that matter, the alternate alternate alternate character interpretation (whew!) is that Shakespeare was being sexist but Fair for Its Day, because Kate's last speech does not say only "wives submit to your husbands" but rather "wives submit to your husbands because they have your best interests at heart"
    • Another one: It's a Family-Unfriendly Aesop ("It's only okay to be rude to people if they're weaker than you are," which is essentially the lesson Kate learns in the end) Played for Laughs.
    • Gregory Doran's 2003 RSC production played Petruchio as a genuine madman driven to distraction by his father's death and Kate as a troubled woman who loves him enough to accept him the way he is, turning the whole play into a story about mutual support under difficult circumstances.
    • In terms of more minor characters, the 1992 RSC production drastically reimagined Tranio as a manipulator trying to steal Bianca for himself. In the end Lucentio wins thanks to some words of warning from Biondello, but a Bittersweet Ending ensues as Bianca still loves Tranio.
  • Angst? What Angst?: Played for Laughs in the Induction. When the Lord's servants tell Christopher Sly that he's been "in a dream" for fifteen years, he responds, "Fifteen years? By my fay, a goodly nap!" Upon being told that everyone he knew never existed, he adds, "Now, Lord be thanked for my good amends!"
  • Fair for Its Day: Many complain about the ending, but in historical context Shakespeare was writing in a time when women were just beginning to be treated like human beings rather than the property of men. The character of Kate was pushing the boundaries of what was acceptable in society, so some agree that Shakespeare added the themes of female submissiveness to appease his audience.
  • Magnificent Bastard: Petruchio
  • Rule-Abiding Rebel: The play is praised by some as a proto-feminist work. Kate's speech at the end is taken by them to be ironic. It is likely not.
  • Values Dissonance: Even the most subversive and proto-feminist interpretations can't make all of the sexism palatable to modern audiences. And if you don't read it as subversive--if you take the text at face value, as a story of a domineering man breaking a woman to his will and turning her into a submissive--the Values Dissonance is cranked Up to Eleven.
  • Why Would Anyone Take Him Back?
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