"Katherina and Petruchio's marriage is stronger and more exciting than any other in the play. Though the shrew may be tamed, she is certainly not defeated". Do you agree with this viewof the play?

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“Katherina and Petruchio’s marriage is stronger and more exciting than any other in the play. Though the shrew may be tamed, she is certainly not defeated”. Do you agree with this view of the play?

In ‘Taming of the Shrew’, Shakespeare is stressing whether marriages that have been arranged by parents are deemed to fall apart or make a marriage stronger as time goes on. Shakespeare also contends with the flaws in the dealings of marriage. Shakespeare puts an emphasis on the errors in the marriages set up by parents, which are often set up for their personal gain. Relationships in Shakespeare's time differed from ours today. In Shakespeare's time weddings were arranged by the parents, and often occurred when a reasonable amount of money was offered for a woman, also known as dowry as well of this a good parenthood and family name was important. The father’s views on a suitor were also very important but not the feelings of the women that were being given away. This issue that this play covers is what brings the play into modern day terms, in some countries in the world this is still the way that marriage is arranged. Islamic views on marriage are consistent with the views of the characters in ‘Taming of the Shrew’. This view can bring up the views and rights of women in all countries. ‘Taming of the Shrew’ offers a look into different relationships. This is accomplished through many detailed exchanges of comments between father and daughters, as well as lovers.

Shakespeare didn't want us to jump from one extreme to the other; he simply was pointing out the failings, and warned us of the path we were following. Shakespeare throughout this play tackles with the idea of a prefect marriage. Although Shakespeare himself did not have a prefect marriage, but he is able to express his ideas on what he believes would produce a prefect marriage. Shakespeare writing in a time of a virgin queen, on the throne is not affected in his writing about view that are held about women and marriage. ‘Taming of the Shrew’ covers the different ways that marriage can come about. This play is defiantly in favour of arranged marriages and it shows how they can work. ‘Taming of the Shrew’ shows how two people can grow to love each other and create a stronger more trustworthy relationship. Shakespeare leaves an element of self interpretation of the relationship between Katherina and Petruchio. How does Katherina feel towards Petruchio?  

 ‘The Taming of the shrew’ by William Shakespeare is based around a family that live in the Italian town called ‘Padua’. The Minloa family is in the centre of all the action that goes on within the play.  The family is very complex with each member being total different in their own right. They are different for many reasons such as jealously, depravation and how they are seen in a social status. The family consists of the father ‘Baptista’ and two daughters ‘Katherina and Bianca ‘. Baptista is a widowed elderly gentleman, who has the job of finding husbands for his daughters. However he has decided that the eldest daughter, Katherina must be married first.  Katherina ends up marrying a rich man, Petruchio. Katherina starts by hating Petruchio and she is not in love by him by any stretch of the imagination.  Whether Katherina falls in love at the end of the play is debatable. She may be in love or she might be playing along with Petruchio. This is the main relationship within the play; I believe that Shakespeare is trying to be provocative to the traditional view of marriage. In a recent production that we saw they portrayed Katherina and Petruchio to be truly in love and I believe that this is the same message that Shakespeare was trying to say.

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Bianca marries Lucentio, who is genuinely in love with her from the beginning. This relationship is shown as being very false and Bianca is shown to be very twofaced. There is a debate on whether Baptista loves Bianca more than Katherina. This has arisen because of the way which Bianca acts up to her father. Whereas Katherina is straight up with her father and act how she feels. This is where her bad reputation has come from. Katherina in this play is shown to be very stubborn and stands up for what she believes are her rights even though it ...

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