Means to an End: Sex and Ulterior Motives in Taming of the Shrew
The Taming of the Shrew is itself a poignant investigation into the intricacies of gender and courtship, but its conclusion brings a deeper level of intrigue to the work. For three of the five acts of the play, there is an inversion of classical patriarchy. Katherine is the most authoritative voice for where the plot moves. Her father, her suitor, Petruccio, and her sister’s suitors are all subject to her will; whether she will marry and allow her sister to marry, if and when she will be seen, whether she will be cold or kind– the goals of all of these men hinge on her action. Petruccio courts her with this in mind. If he wishes to marry her, he will have to play the game and let her believe she is in control. Once his goal is met and the two of them are married, he no longer spoke to Katherine as an equal nor tolerated her brash spirit. There was a radical return to the status quo once authority was endowed to Petruccio. In the instant that their marriage was finalized, he changed. Petruccio’s self-emasculation and performance of feminine submission was an intentional act to achieve a goal, and I see this most clearly displayed in 5.2.100-105,
KATHERINE. What is your will, sir, that you send for me?
PETRUCCIO. Where is your sister and Hortensio’s wife?
KATHERINE. They sit conferring by the parlour fire.
PETRUCCIO. Go fetch them hither. If they deny to come, swinge me them soundly forth unto their husbands. Away, I say, and bring them hither straight.
Shakespeare is notorious for his fluid and playful approach to gender roles, along with the ambiguity of his sentiments toward women. Because of this, it’s incredibly unclear whether the text of The Taming of the Shrew is a mockery of misogyny or an affirmation. What is certain though, is Petruccio’s status as misogynist wearing the disguise of passivity. During their courtship, Katherine’s father is amazed that a young man would be willing to marry someone as mean and unforgiving as Katherine. Petruccio claims to enjoy her sharp tongue. The two of them have long stretches of banter and insult each other as equal interlocutors. Katherine does not have to preform feminine meekness, and she is drawn to Petruccio because he is the first suitor who has not attempted to force a disguise onto her. This is how the majority of their relationship follows and the reader is none the wiser that Petruccio is performing. The illusion is maintained even up until the bridal dinner in Act 3.2. 208-210, 216.
PETRUCCIO. O Kate, content thee; prithee, be not angry.
KATHERINE. I will be angry; what hast thou to do?– Father be quiet; he shall stay at my leisure.
PETRUCCIO. Obey the bride, you that attend on her.
Following this final gasp of submission, Petruccio hurriedly whisks her off to consummate the marriage. In traditional western marriages, consummation entails that the groom officially becomes the head of household. He is not in a hurry to make love to her– he is in a hurry to seize the power that is promised to him. We know this because of the “uncharacteristic” behaviour that follows immediately after and extends to the end of the play. Petruccio has become a different man, and the reader becomes privy to who he is and who he was pretending to be.
In Act 4.1.170, 175-177, Petruccio’s soliloquy explicitly informs us of his intentions and of what he understands the return of his masculinity to signify, “Thus have I politicly begun my reign and tis my hope to end successfully… To make her come and know her keeper’s call/That is, to watch her as we watch these kites/That bait and beat and will not be obedient”. He believes that to be a husband is to reign with absolute authority. Kate can protest as much as she wants, but she is now a wife and there is no option but to become submissive. The two did not take up the submissive mask for the same reason. For Petruccio, it was of his own free will. He engaged in this persona to get the power he wanted. Katherine embodied the feminine ideal for pure survival (see 5.2.100-105 for how Petruccio threatens her sister). Her change in behaviour post-marriage was for the simple goal of not being beaten and starved as Petruccio threatens to do. In Act 4 and 5, she is a scared woman realizing that she has been tricked into relinquishing autonomy. The change we observe in her is not a preplanned disguise like Petruccio’s, and we know this because there is no equivalent evidence of deception like what is given in 4.1.170, 175-177. It is authentic fear shaping her into an inauthentic version of herself, which is exactly what Petruccio wanted.
Act 5.2.100-105 stands as the prime example of all that has been argued thus far. She asks “What is your will, sir, that you send for me?” and he demands that Katherine bring the other women of the household to him and should beat them if they refuse. What’s so interesting here is that all of the women in question are married and have their own husbands “reigning” over them, but Petruccio is of the opinion that he reigns over all women of the household because of his newly embodied masculine dominance. He holds more power than a domineering Kate could have ever dreamed of and is more of a shrew than was ever possible for a woman. Kate’s dominance was annoying, but Petruccio’s dominance has real power backing it as the head of household. This is because, in a patriarchal society, the male version of a shrew is a tyrant. In trading places with Kathrine, he bested her at her own game. Not only does Petruccio have the absolute power she craved, but he doesn’t receive any of the backlash she suffered. He has truly won.
To Petruccio, unlike Katherine, gender (as understood in a binary of dominant and submissive) is something to be taken on and off. It is fluid and performative, and to be in the service of the performer. Gender to him is something to use rather than something to be. Katherine’s character doesn’t show any evidence of preplanning nor inauthenticity. She is a shrew simply to be a shrew, but Petruccio is a shrew to get what he wants. This quote in Act 5.2 is the true manifestation of his goal achieved through the manipulation of gender. By threatening to beat the women if they disobey him, he is taking advantage of the fear his dominant persona instills. He has usurped and intensified Kate’s former role to the nth degree– the only thing left to do is abuse it. Petruccio is a truly disturbing character because he of how seamlessly he becomes someone else for personal gain, and how he had even deceived the reader up until the fourth act. He performs both self-feminization and self-masculinisation as a means to end in comparison to how other characters approach identity as a neutral feature of the self. Petruccio’s mastery of illusion and gender fluidity is an integral facet of making sense of his character and of making sense of The Taming of the Shrew as an early work of Shakespeare.