Lizz Nagle
“A servant and master strive to do each other credit,” (Ros 2). Ros writes this because the servant-master relationships in Elizabethan England were complex and the dynamics had to be in balance. During the Renaissance, masters employed servants to, “Ensure the efficiency and smooth operation of their households,” (Romano 676). Servants were not democrats; they were to approve of the same social orders as their masters, and, to do as they were told.
Servants were paid very little and bound more as slaves than actual employees of a household. In the year 1284, the Great Council passed the first Venetian law concerning domestic servants. According to Dennis Romano, author of The Regulation of Domestic Service in Renaissance Venice, the “Law provides a normative prospective on servants from that of humanist treatises on wifely duties and household management,” (Romano 661). Starting in the thirteenth century, various government councils began examining and legislating aspects of the master-servant relationship. According to Romano,
The first four clauses dealt with in one way or another, the contractual aspects of the master-servant bond. Chapter 1, citing a 1388 Senate law, stated that no servant, either male or female, in service on land or sea, could be bound by contract for more than ten years. (663)
The following chapters were designed to protect the masters’ interests, and also to prevent any person from hiring a servant who illegally left another master. “Taken together, the first four clauses reveal the elite’s concern with securing reliable domestic labor and their efforts to bind servants through contractual obligations,” (Romano 663). The clauses continue to be instated, in the interests of the employer by placing statues of limitations on servants’ salaries and by legally protecting the employer’s assets. The eighth and final clause was put into effect in order to protect servants from, “unscrupulous masters,” (Romano 666).
As shown above, the history of master-servant relationships leading up the Renaissance legally balance each other out. The dynamics instated keep masters in control, and give servants barely enough freedom have any other choice but to serve their employer for a living. Legislations created clause in the interest of masters, and servants lives were determined by their work and how they could prove themselves to the household in which they were employed.
In the sixteenth century, “A new, more aristocratic style of servant
keeping developed. Servants, especially male servants, became objects of display and the necessary accouterments of a noble-lifestyle. For instance, patrons now had artists include servants, particularly black pages, in their portraits; and among the wealthiest families the number of servants probably increased.” (Romano 676).
When Shakespeare wrote his comedy, The Taming of the Shrew, it was at the end of the sixteenth century, at the peak of these social attitudes towards servant-master relationships. In this play, Shakespeare examines the roles and relationships of both masters and servants. He raises question of social positions by inverting the master and servant roles.
As time went by, servants were treated better and better. As Ros wrote, “A servant in a fine house expects (if he is clever) to rise in the world, improve his fortunes, and create an even better place for his children. A stable groom might aspire to become butler or steward in the same greater house. The pot boy might one day hope to be chief cook,” (2). Shakespeare takes Tranio’s manservant status and raises him to something more. He also examines other servant to master relationships and dynamics as well.
In the introduction of The Taming of the Shrew, a Lord has his servants take home a drunken beggar, Christopher Sly, to have a bit of fun with him. The Lord orders his servants to “Take him to the buttery,/ And give them friendly welcome everyone. Let them want nothing that my house affords,” (101-103). Sly is taken back to the Lord’s house and treated as if her were himself a Lord. They put him in a bed, put rings on his fingers and prepare a banquet for him, all in jest, to entertain themselves and the Lord. The servants tell Sly that he is their master, despite his disagreeing. Here, Shakespeare uses the Lord’s servants as agents to entertain him, something beyond their normal duties. Also, for the servants to be entertained by fooling with a drunken beggar’s mind, they pull themselves up one rung higher on the social ladder.
With a complete inversion of roles, Shakespeare allows Tranio, a servant, to take on the disguise of his master, Lucentio. Lucentio is interested in marrying Bianca, Baptist’s daughter. However, she cannot be wed until her shrew sister, Katharina, is married. In order for Lucentio to court Bianca, he takes on the role of a schoolmaster to tutor Bianca. Lucentio then has his manservant Tranio, dress up as himself and continue for him his studies at the university. Here, Shakespeare is literally making the servant the master.
It is likely that the attention given to the servant’s (Traino’s) obedience in the play directly relates the taming of the wives in the play. As Natasha Korda pointed out in her article, “The housewife’s domestic responsibilities were broadly defined by a feudal economy based on household production, on the production of use-values for domestic consumption,” (Korda 111). At the same time Tranio’s role is elevated, the women’s roles are diminished. Shakespeare could be suggesting here that a household cannot be run by men, women and servants. That for order to be in place, someone needs to be in charge, be the head of the household. However, just because these ideas are examined, does not mean that all the characters are satisfied or feel complete within their roles. This is also supported by the fact that housewives and servants also shared many household responsibilities in the Renaissance.
How far was Shakespeare willing to push the servant to master boundaries? He creates Tranio, and transforms him into the disguised Lucentio. Because he now has status, and an acting servant of his own, Biondello, he is able to act as an agent for the real Lucentio’s plan to woo and marry Bianca. Only by transforming the servant into a master can Shakespeare allow a manservant to play such an active role in this scheme.
In Shakespeare’s
The Taming of the Shrew, master-servant dynamics are examined. These
roles are also inverted. He turns master into teacher and servant into master,
through his disguise convention. He flips the role of Tranio, a manservant,
dresses him and places him at a university. Tranio is an agent to his master’s
plans, and gets a chance to act on his own will. Shakespeare dissects these
social constructions in this play through the inversion of servant-master
roles.
Korda, Natasha. Household Kates: Domesticating Commodities in The Taming of the Shrew. Shakespeare Quarterly, Vol. 47, No. 2. Summer 1996.
Romano, Dennis. The Regulation of Domestic Service in the Renaissance Venice. Sixteenth Century Journal, Vol. 22, No. 4. Winter 1991.
Ros, Maggi. Life in Elizabethan England: Masters and Servants. 24 June 2005. http://elizabethan.org.
Shakespeare,
William. The Taming of the Shrew. 1592-1594.