“I pray you, sir, is it your will to make a stale of me amongst these mates?”
This line does not give us any indication of what she is about or what her intension is. As we read on we see that she uses insults pretty much straight away we see this in lines 64-65 on page 16 of act 1. She says,
“To comb your noodle with a three legged stool and paint your face and use you like a fool”.
This comment is aimed at Hortensio, one of the many characters in the play. Already Shakespeare has presented Katherina as a sort of rude and unruly character. As we read on through this passage we see that Bianca, the younger of the sisters comes into the play. Her first line is,
“Sister, content you in my discontent”
This line sort of, not quite tells us she is quiet and does not step out of line. The weaker of the two sisters if you will. After Bianca says this line, she is not heard of again till scene 2.
Katherina exits this scene quite rudely while talking tot her father. Shakespeare again presents her as a bad character or nor rule abiding. The next time we hear from both of the sisters is in Act 2. They both are on set at the same time and are quarrelling.
Katherina has Bianca’s wrists binded and is screaming at her, she says,
“Minion, thou liest! Is’t not Hortensio?”
Minion, which is a term to describe a spoilt favourite child, is what Katherina is shouting at her younger sister. This then proves to us, the reader, that Katherina is the bully to her sister, Bianca.
Bianca is trying to get away from her sister and is pleading let her go. We can see that Bianca is scared of Katherina when she says,
“If you affect him, sister, here I swear I’ll plead for you myself but you shall have him”
This line is about Hortensio. At this point Bianca is saying anything to get away from her sister. Shakespeare does well at presenting these two characters as good and evil. Bianca being the good character and Katherina being the bad.
Katherina then strikes her younger sister Bianca with her hand. Just as this happens their father, Baptista enters the room. He unties Bianca’s hands.
Bianca escapes Katherina this time but as Bianca leaves the room Katherina says,
“Her silence flouts me, and I’ll be revenged”
This also gives us the impression that Katherina is the strong bullying one to Bianca and Shakespeare presents this very well.
Both sisters then leave the scene and the conversation about the incident then carries on between Baptista and Gremio.
The way that Shakespeare has presented the two sisters has been done in such a way that there are two completely different personalities.
Then halfway through this scene Katherina enters again and meets with Petruchio, who I mentioned to be seeking a wealthy wife. Petruchio begins to talk to Katherina but he starts to call her Kate. On hearing that he is calling her Kate she says,
“Well have you heard, but something hard of hearing they call me Katherine that they do talk to me.”
Petruchio then carries on talking to Kate or Katherina and proceeds to keep calling her Kate. I think that this is sort of a way that Petruchio is trying to tame Kate because he knows of her unruly behaviour. She does not seem to rise to the fact that Petruchio continues to call her Kate and not Katherine. She does creep in one insult to Petruchio, which reads,
“A joint stool”
This means a stool made by a joiner. This was an insult in them times.
Petruchio does not rise to her insult either and continued to talk to Kate. He says to her,
“Come sit on me”
Katherina then insults Petruchio again by saying,
“Not such a jade as you, if me you mean.”
A jade being a worthless horse, implying that he lacks sexual stamina.
Shakespeare still goes about presenting Kate as a shrew and is still rude to everybody and still has no respect for any being around her. They then continue to talk to each other and the insults are still flying in Petruchio’s direction. She says to Petruchio,
“If I be waspish, best beware my sting”
She is basically telling Petruchio that she is a bad person and that she is a tricky task to take on and she knows it. Petruchio then replies to that by saying,
“My remedy is then to pluck it out”
This tells us that eh likes her enough to continue trying to court her and that her likes the thought of trying to tame her and knows that he is up for the task.
They then continue to talk for a few pages, while Katherina is trying to convince Petruchio that she is not the right woman for him, but he does not give in. Shakespeare continues to present Katherina in this way to make her seem like she is not interested in anybody else but herself and he continues to do this for several pages.
