I Swear Ill Cuff You if You Strike Again
-- Philip Weller, November thirteen, 1941 - Feb 1, 2021
Dr. Weller, an Eastern Washington University professor of English language and Shakespearean scholar for more than than 50 years.
The Motif of Beatings in The Taming of the Shrew
An annotated list of relevant passages.- Act 1, Scene i
- Baptista announces that sweet Bianca cannot be wooed until a husband is found for shrewish Katharina, and then tells Gremio and Hortensio, both of whom are panting after Bianca, that they should feel free to woo Katharina. But both men mock the idea of anyone marrying such a shrew, and Katharina chimes in with a threat of violence against Hortensio. She tells him that should he woo her, she would "rummage your noddle with a three-legg'd stool / And paint your face and use you similar a fool."
Subsequently in the aforementioned scene Hortensio is trying to convince Gremio that a husband
tin be found for the shrewish Katharina because there are men who would ally anyone for enough coin. Gremio replies that even if Hortensio is right, marrying her would exist as bad equally enduring a daily public whipping. His exact words are, "I cannot tell; but I had as lief accept her dowry with this status, to be whipped at the loftier cross every morning."
- Act i, Scene ii
- Coming to the firm of his friend, Hortensio, Petruchio asks his witty servant, Grumio, to knock at Hortensio'southward gate, saying, "Hither, sirrah Grumio; knock, I say." Instead of doing so, Grumio pretends to remember that his master is asking him to vanquish somebody up. When Petruchio answers this absurdity with "Villain, I say, knock me hither soundly," Grumio pretends to call up that Petruchio is asking to be beaten. And and so Grumio teases Petruchio into a bout of roughhousing in which Petruchio "wrings him by the ears."
- Act 2, Scene 1
- Jealous of her younger sister Bianca, Katharina demands that Bianca "tell / Whom grand lovest best." When Bianca insists that there is no suitor that she favors, Katherine beats her, and doesn't stop until their father rescues Bianca.
Later in the aforementioned scene Katharina strikes again. Hortensio has disguised himself equally a music main so that he tin can woo Bianca, but it does not plow out well for him. We come across him emerge from Baptista'south house "with his head broke." He explains that during a lesson on the lute he "bow'd her hand to teach her fingering," whereupon she bashed him over the head with the lute.
Still later in the scene Katharina strikes yet again, but this time she picks on someone who doesn't need to be rescued: Petruchio. His wooing of the terrible shrew has turned into a boxing of the wits, and when Katharina loses a round "She strikes him." His response is very uncomplicated: "I swear I'll gage you, if you strike once again," he says, and then the wit combat resumes.
- Act iii, Scene one
- Both Lucentio and Hortensio disguise themselves as schoolmasters in club to woo Bianca, but when it's fourth dimension for Bianca to learn her lessons, the two young men quarrel over who gets to teach the start lesson. Yet, Bianca has ideas of her ain, and she tells them she is the ane who gets to decide, because she is "no breeching scholar in the schools." A "breeching scholar" is a pupil who tin be whipped if he doesn't acquire his lessons properly. And so nosotros are reminded of how mutual, and degrading, beatings were in Shakespeare's time.
- Act 4, Scene ane
- Arriving at Petruchio'south business firm before Petruchio and Katharina do, Grumio, Petruchio's witty servant, exclaims to Curtis, another servant, "Fie, fie on all tired jades, on all mad masters, and all foul ways! Was ever man so beaten?" Afterward in the scene he explains how he came to be beaten, but at the moment he only wants a hot burn to warm the house.
While Curtis builds the fire he asks about the new mistress of the house, the notorious shrew, but Grumio warns him that if he doesn't get the burn built, he'll get beaten by that new mistress. He says to Curtis: "Only wilt yard brand a fire, or shall I complain on thee to our mistress, whose mitt, she being now at hand, thou shalt soon feel, to thy cold comfort, for existence slow in thy hot part?"
Once the fire is congenital, Grumio makes as though he is about to tell his tale of his journey and says to Curtis, "Lend thine ear." Only when Curtis harkens to him, Grumio boxes his ear and explains that "this cuff was but to knock at your ear, and beseech listening."
But later on all of this do we get the data that Katharina'southward horse brutal and she landed on the ground nether the horse, whereupon Petruchio leaped downwardly to beat Grumio because Katharina'south horse fell, so that "she waded through the dirt to pluck him off me."
Afterward in the aforementioned scene Petruchio puts on a brandish of his own shrewishness. He demands that his servants take off his boots, just then beats one as he exclaims, "you pluck my foot awry." And then he calls for water then that Katharina can wash up earlier eating, but when the retainer spills a lilliputian, Petruchio beats him, which makes Katharina the shrew speak up on behalf of the retainer, saying to her husband, "Patience, I pray you lot; 'twas a fault unwilling." Finally, to cap off his bad behavior, he claims that the mutton is burnt and throws everything at the servants, saying "There, take it to you, trenchers, cups, and all."
- Human action four, Scene 3
- Picking up where Petruchio left off in the previous scene, Grumio offers to fetch some food for the ravenous Katharina, but after much palaver, offers only mustard, whereupon Katharina "Beats him."
Later in the same scene Petruchio stages another charade of hot temper. He has a haberdasher prove Katherina a very fashionable cap, simply so declares that he's glad she doesn't like it, and abroad it goes. Next a tailor brings a lovely gown which Katharina deeply desires, but Petruchio pretends that it's fabricated all wrong. When the tailor tries to stand upwardly for himself and the gown he made, Petruchio threatens him, exclaiming that he will "exist-mete thee with thy yard" [thrash you with your yardstick]. It's all a show, and Petruchio quietly makes certain the tailor is paid for his trouble, just Katherina gets neither cap nor gown.
- Act five, Scene 1
- Vincentio, Lucentio's begetter, arrives in Padua to visit his son, simply to be denied entrance to his son's firm because he is already inside, looking out the window at himself. The impostor is the pedant, and, thinking that he is about to be found out, he goes on the offensive and accuses the existent Vincentio of being an imposter. Only then Biondello shows up, and is chosen upon past the real Vincentio to identify him, but Biondello does the opposite, proverb that the man looking out the window is Vincentio. This makes Vincentio crazy with anger, and "He beats Biondello."
- Act five, Scene 2
- In the concluding scene of the play everyone is having a good fourth dimension when a niggling quarrel breaks out about who might or might not be afraid of his wife. The women become a bit catty, simply soon get out to sit past the fire in a separate parlor. The men, nonetheless, continue the chat and decide to make a bet on whose wife is the most obedient. This is to be tested by seeing which wife will come out of the parlor when called by a servant speaking for her husband. Of grade the men (except for Petruchio) all think that Katharina is the one who volition refuse to come up, but of class they are incorrect. Bianca sends discussion that she'due south busy; Hortensio'south wife says that the men accept some "some goodly jest in manus" and says that Hortensio should come up to her. Just Katherine comes as soon as she is called for, and Petruchio asks her where the other two women are. Katharina answers that they chatting by the parlor fire, and Petruchio tells Katherina, "Go fetch them hither: if they deny to come, / Swinge me them soundly forth unto their husbands." If Katharina follows Petruchio'south orders exactly, she will drive the other two wives to their husbands with a switch or whip, chirapsia them all the while.
The Motif of Beatings in The Taming of the Shrew
The Taming of the Shrew Navigator Abode | Themes and MotifsSource: https://www.shakespeare-navigators.com/shrew/Theme_Beatings.html