The Comedy of the Shrew

Molly McPherson

Katherine the Shrew is one of William Shakespeare’s greatest characters ever created, for the play the Taming of the Shrew and the basis of hundreds of women’s roles for playwrights in the future. However, this was not the first shrew Shakespeare has written into a play, just possibly the most well known. Earlier in his Herculean career, the Bard wrote a little play called Comedy of Errors- his shortest play, his first comedy, and also his first shrew.

Comedy of Errors is mainly based on Plautus’ the Brothers Menaechmi, embracing and expanding on the idea of twins separated at a young age, and then a comical journey to finding each other once again. However, the complications and hilarity of Plautus’ version are the mistakes of the title characters themselves, while Shakespeare’s Comedy is more intelligent and only slightly more plausible. The 1590 play consisted of two sets of twins separated during a tragic shipwreck, with each grouping of children being one boy and his servant. Throughout their lives, one pair becomes estranged from the family, and has no recollection of being related to anyone living. The other pair searches for many years, in vain, to find their other halves.

However, the most important relations between the Comedy of Errors and the Taming of the Shrew are the mistaken identity element, and the introduction of the shrew character. Comedy is based almost solely on the mistaken identity element, as the siblings are mistaken for each other in multiple incidents with one brother’s wife and her unmarried sister, as well as a shopkeeper and his golden chain. This aspect is carried over into Shrew when Bianca’s suitors all try and woo her while hiding their real intentions from her strict father. This hiding of real personalities, however, becomes the mishap of the losing suitors, when they realize that they have been caught in their own trap of trying to ensnare Bianca’s heart.

Secondly, and probably most important historically, the introduction of the malicious wench character is key in the influence of Comedy of Errors on Taming of the Shrew. Adriana, the wife of one of the Antipholus brothers in Comedy, is a jealous and almost spiteful woman, showing intense animosity when her “husband” does something to her discontent. Although she is already married, she shows almost a shrewish characteristic in dealing with all men, her husband in particular. Additionally, she lives with a sister, Luciana, whose personality is contradictory to Adriana’s; she presents a calm and likeable demeanor. This coupling of polar personalities in one household is repeated in Taming of the Shrew, with the fiery Katherine and her sweet-tempered sister, Bianca. The latter and her Comedy of Errors counterpart, Luciana, are both eager to be married, and will do what they need to, in the form of deception, to obtain their goals. Bianca falls in love with a man disguised to her father, and Luciana lusts after her sister’s “husband”.

However, both of the main female characters are chastened by the ends of each play. Adriana is scolded by the stereotypical wise older figure, the Abbess, when tricked into admitting how much she nags at her husband. They then believe that she has driven him into madness, another basic connection between the plays.

Abbess: “And thereof came it that the man was mad.
The venom clamors of a jealous woman
Poisons more deadly than a mad dog’s tooth.”
Adriana: “She did betray me to my own reproof.”
(C.O.E Act 5, scene 1, lines 68-70, 90)

Katherine also is rebuked into behaving as a wife should act, by Elizabethan standards. Petruchio’s harsh treatment of his wife is evidently a way to show Kate what her outlandish behavior appears like to outsiders. She later presents her newly found respect for men to her sister and their husbands.

Katherine: “They husband is thy lord, they life, thy keeper,
Thy head, they sovereign; one that cares for thee,
And for thy maintenance commits his body
To painful labor…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 her husband;
I am ashamed that women are so simple
To offer war where they should kneel for peace,
Or seek for rule, supremacy, and sway,
When they are bound to serve, love and obey.”
(T.O.S. Act 5, scene 2, lines 150-153, 155-160, 165-168)

The element of “madness” is also a subtle connection between the comedies. However, unlike in many of Shakespeare’s tragedies, the madness is not real, but a supposed insanity, when the most level-headed characters are accused of being “mad”. The twin brothers Antipholus are collectively branded as insane when they refuse to accept the mistaken stories of the other players. Katherine assumes Petruchio is a madman when he deprives her of food, sleep and sex in their first days of marriage, as well as his public antics on their wedding day. He is, however, merely playing a part, to prove that she will do his will, no matter how outrageous.

The lesser known relation between Shakespeare’s early comedic plays is a modern-day one. In 1938 opened the Boys From Syracuse, the first musical based on a Shakespearean play, the Comedy of Errors, followed in 1948 by Kiss Me, Kate, based on the Taming of the Shrew. These adaptations were immensely popular at the time, and fans today still enjoy performances of both. The Boys From Syracuse is “full of physical comedy and farcical mischief; a delightful evening of misunderstandings and pandemonium that end in the magical reconciliation of family and true love” (University of Michigan, par. 1). It is a modern retelling of the story, using relatable songs without wordy Shakespearean lyric. However, there is included one line from the original play, the “venom clamor” line previously mentioned, to which an offstage character leaps out and cries “Shakespeare!”

Kiss Me, Kate is a different story altogether, showing the backstage goings-on between the cast of a production of Taming of the Shrew. It was considered a perfect blend of Shakespeare’s writing and Cole Porter’s song style by critics of the day. “Placing the Petruchio-Kate relationship into a framework of play-within-a-play accomplishes the feat of equalizing the central relationship. By making the central relationship Lilli-Fred instead of Petruchio-Kate, the creators bent and broke the dynamic of abuse contained in The Taming of the Shrew. Fred and Lilli obviously adore each other, but the breakdown of their previous relationship has damaged their faith in love” much like Katherine is shown to feel in Taming of the Shrew (Jennifer Erin Book, par. 14-15). Lilli also understands some of the same frustration as her role Katherine, revealing many of her thoughts through song, and in the form of Katherine’s lines.

Lilli/Katherine: “Oh, I hate men.
From all I've read, alone in bed,
from A to Zed, about 'em.
Since love is blind, then from the mind,
all womankind should rout 'em,
But, ladies, you must answer too,
what would we do without 'em?
Still, I hate men!”
(K.M.K. Act 1, I Hate Men)

These common elements between two of Shakespeare’s better known comedies are not immediately recognized, but once learned, make a world of difference in interpreting each play. The growth of William Shakespeare throughout his career is obvious when examining the similar characteristics in his players. This evolution of Adriana to Katherine could have possibly even accounted for his depiction of the Lady Macbeth, in all her glory.

“The domineering wife has been a popular literary figure from Xantippe to Lichty’s battle-axes. She has a male counterpart in the tyrannous husband, unreasonable masculine brutality being as much disapproved, at least in Christian civilizations, as feminine willfulness; but the shrew is a more familiar character than the tyrannous husband, possibly because she not only behaves abnormally, as he does, but also violates our sense of order. … But Shakespeare’s shrews, Adriana in The Comedy of Errors and Kate in The Taming of the Shrew, are not merely fools or monsters. They are, like other Shakespearean characters, including the tender heroines who appear by their sides in these two plays, persons unsure of their own hearts, and their spirited conduct is akin to the spirited conduct of Shakespeare’s best-loved heroines.”
(C. Brooks, Shakespeare Quarterly)

Works Cited

Bevington, David. The Necessary Shakespeare. New York: Pearson, 2005.

Lamb, Charles and Mary. Tales From Shakespeare. New York: Pearson, 1994.

Plautus. The Brothers Menaechmus. Trans. Erich Segal. New York: Oxford. 1996.

“Don’t Dismiss as only a Farce.” Utah Shakespeare Festival. Oct. 22 2007. http://www.bard.org/education/resources/shakespeare/comedyfarce.html

“The Taming of the Shrew: Male Chauvanism?” Utah Shakespeare Festival. Oct. 22 2007. http://www.bard.org/Education/resources/shakespeare/shrewmale.html

Brooks, Charles. Rev. of Comedy of Errors, The Shakespeare Theatre Company Online. Nov. 2005. http://www.shakespearetheatre.org/plays/articles.aspx?&id=430

“How do you solve a problem like Petruchio?” American Popular Culture Online. Book, Jennifer E. October 28 2007 http://www.americanpopularculture.com/archive/music/kiss_me_kate.htm