These plays display a completely opposite plot from one another. With desire for power running through Macbeth he made the choice to murder, his friend, Lord Duncan, so he could become the ruler. ‘Confounds us. Hark! I laid their daggers ready/He could not miss ‘em. Had he not resembled/My father as he slept, I had done’t’ , ‘I have done the deed. Didst thou not hear a noise?’ (Macbeth lines 15-19 Act 2 Sc 2). While in The Taming of the Shrew through all the obstacles the couple had to over come one was for Kate to change her old stubborn ways. The first time Kate shows change is when the couple is traveling and Petruccio is talking about the moon and the sun, ‘I say it is the moon’, ‘I know it is the moon’, ‘Nay, then you lie. It is the blessed sun.’ (The Taming of the Shrew lines 18-20 Act 4 Sc 5). Kate starts to agree with Petruccio so that way he will stop torturing her, but Petruccio sees what she is doing and disagrees to this so he changes what he is saying so that she will be disagreeing with him again and made to look like the bad person again. Theme also identifies the differences between The Taming of the Shrew and Macbeth.
Shakespeare’s writings have many different themes, making them unique. All of the stress that Macbeth feels due to his actions are starting to drive him insane. [Lady Macbeth] ‘He brings great news/the raven himself is hoarse/that croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan/under my battlements. Come, you spirits/that tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here/and fill me from the crown to the toe top-full/of direst cruelty. Make thick my blood/stop up th’ access and passage to remorse/that no compunctious visitings of nature/shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between.th’ effect and it. Come to my woman’s breasts/and take my milk for gall, you murd’ring ministers/whenever in your sightless substances/you wait on nature’s mischief. Come, thick night/ and pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell/that my knee knife see not the wound it makes/nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark/to cry “hold, hold!” [Macbeth] ‘Duncan comes here tonight.’ [Lady Macbeth] ‘And when goes hence?’ [Macbeth] ‘Tomorrow, as he purposes.’ [Lady Macbeth] ‘you shall put/this night’s great business into my dispatch/which shall to all our nights and days come/give solely sovereign sway and masterdom.’ ‘to alter favor ever is to fear/leave all the rest to me.’ (Macbeth lines 44-86 Act 1 Sc 6). Macbeth starts to show fear in what he has done to Duncan and Lady Macbeth is trying to break him down to get the fear out of him, but the things she say will only cause Macbeth to drive farther into insanity. With such a cruel and vicious theme for Macbeth, The Taming of the Shrew shows a more light hearted theme with Petruccio trying to change Kate into a better person he makes up the rules day by day so that Kate does not get what she wants. By all of the things Petruccio put Kate through, she finally gave into him and changed her ways this became known to others when Kate gave her speech. ‘Fie, fie! Unknitthat threat’ning unkind brow/and dart not scornful glances from those eyes/to wound thy lord, thy king, thy governor/it blots thy beauty as frosts do bite the meads/confounds thy fame as whirlwinds shake fair buds/and in no sense is meet or amiable/a woman moved is like a fountain troubled/muddy, ill-seeming, thick, bereft of beauty/and while it is so, none so dry or thirsty/will deign to sip or touch one drop of it/thy husband is thy lord, thy life, thy keeper/thy head, thy sovereign, one that cares for thee/and for thy maintenance commits his body/to painful labor both by sea and land/to watch the night in storms, the day in cold/whilst thou liest warm at home, secure and safe/and craves no other tribute at thy hands/but love, fair looks, and true obedience/too little payment for so great a debt/such duty as the subject owes the prince/even such a woman oweth to her husband/and when she is forward, peevish, sullen, sour/and not obedient to his honest will/ what is she but a foul contending rebel/and graceless traitor to her loving lord/I am ashamed that women are so simple/to offer was where they should kneel for peace.’ (The Taming of the Shrew Act 5 Sc 2). Kate tells the women that she is ashamed of them that they would not come when their name was called. For after all a husband does for a wife the least a woman could do was come to when her name was called. This shows that Kate has learned and became the wife that Petruccio was trying to create by taming her; Petruccio has truly tamed Kate.
Shakespeare was called the greatest English Language writer by many. Macbeth and The Taming of the Shrew are two popular plays of Shakespeare’s that are still being read today. Macbeth shows a very cruel script on how power can take control of a persons mind causing them to do absurd things, while The Taming of the Shrew shows a light hearted script to bring laughter to those watching by the idiotic acts and the taming of a crazy woman by a crazy man himself. Shakespeare wrote in many different style but no matter how he chose to write people loved his writings. Though he died long ago his writings still live on strong today.
