The Taming of the Shrew: Texts and Contexts / Edition 1

by William Shakespeare

Overview

This edition of the Shakespeare play, The Taming of the Shrew features an extenstive array of primary documents to help contextualize the plays treatment of assertive women, marital conflict, and domestic disorder and violence.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780312108366
Publisher:	Bedford/St. Martin's
Publication date:	03/15/1996
Series:	Bedford Shakespeare Series
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	368
Product dimensions:	5.55(w) x 8.15(h) x 0.85(d)

About the Author

Widely esteemed as the greatest writer in the English language, William Shakespeare (1564-1616) was an actor and theatrical producer in addition to writing plays and sonnets. Dubbed "The Bard of Avon," Shakespeare oversaw the building of the Globe Theatre in London, where a number of his plays were staged, the best-known of which include Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, and Macbeth. The First Folio, a printed book of 36 of his comedies, tragedies, and history plays, was published in 1623.

Date of Death:

2018

Place of Birth:

Stratford-upon-Avon, United Kingdom

Place of Death:

Stratford-upon-Avon, United Kingdom

Read an Excerpt

Renowned as Shakespeare's most boisterous comedy, The Taming of the Shrew is the tale of two young men -- the hopeful Lucentio and the worldly Petruchio -- and the two sisters they meet in Padua. Lucentio falls in love with Bianca, the apparently ideal younger daughter of the wealthy Baptista Minola. But before they can marry, Bianca's formidable elder sister, Katherine, must be wed. Petruchio, interested only in the huge dowry, arranges to marry Katherine -- against her will -- and enters into a battle of the sexes that has endured as one of Shakespeare's most enjoyable works.

Table of Contents

Preface
Introduction
Text and Contexts
The Induction
Shrews and Shrew Taming
Authority and Violence in the Household: Husbands and Wives; Masters, Mistresses, and Servants
The Feme Convert: Katherines Silences
Achieving the Marital Ideal: Sun and Moon
Endings and Alternatives

PART I: WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, THE TAMING OF THE SHREW (EDITED BY DAVID BEVINGTON)

PART II: EARLY MODERN DEBATES

1. Alternative Endings
From The Taming of a Shrew
David Garrick, From Catharine and Petruchio

2. Marriage
An Ideal and Its Contradictions
A Homily of the State of Matrimony
Robert Snawsel, From A Looking Glass for Married Folks
The Feme Covert: Married Womens Legal Status
T. E., From The Laws Resolutions of Womens Rights

3. The Household: Authority and Violence
The Household
John Dod and Robert Cleaver, From A Godly Form of Household Government
Womens Work: Gender and the Division of Labor
A Womans Work Is Never Done
The Woman to the Plow, And the Man to the Hen-Roost
Wife Beating
William Whately, From A Bride-Bush
Of the Parts and Ends of a Mans Authority
William Gouge, From Of Domestical Duties: Eight Treatises
Of Husbands Beating Their Wives
Servant Beating
Thomas Becon, From A New Catechism Set Forth Dialogue—Wise in Familiar Talk Between the Father and the Son
Of the Office of Masters or Householders Toward Their Servants
William Gouge, From Of Domestical Duties: Eight Treatises
Of Masters Maintaining Their Authority
Of Masters Making Their Authority to Be Despised
Of Masters Too Great Rigor
Of Masters Commanding Power, Restrained to Things Lawful
Of the Power of Masters to Correct Their Servants
Of the Restraint of Masters Power: That It Reacheth Not to Their Servants Life
Of Masters Excess in Correcting Servants
Of Masters Ordering That Correction They Give to Their Servants

4. Shrews, Taming, and Untamed Shrews
Shrews and Shrew Taming
The Cruel Shrew
A Merry Jest of a Shrewd and Curst Wife Lapped in Morels Skin, for Her Good Behavior
The Cucking of a Scold
From The Tragical Comedy or Comical Tragedy, of Punch and Judy
Analogues to Shrew-taming
Falconry
George Turberville, From The Book of Falconry or Hawking
Simon Latham, From Lathams Falconry
Watching A Witch
Matthew Hopkins, From The Discovery of Witches
John Stearne, From A Confirmation and Discovery of Witchcraft
Thomas Ady, From A Candle in the Dark
Untamed Shrews
Thomas Harman, From A Caveat for Common Cursitors, Vulgarly Called Vagabonds
Thomas Heywood, From A Curtain Lecture

Bibliography
Index