The Taming of the Shrew (Vol. 31) | Michael Shapiro (essay date 1993)
Michael Shapiro (essay date 1993)
SOURCE: "Framing the Taming: Metatheatrical Awareness of Female Impersonation in The Taming of the Shrew," in The Yearbook of English Studies, Vol. 23, 1993, pp. 143-66.
[In the following essay, Shapiro looks at how the Elizabethan use of boy actors in female roles might have affected audience perception of the play's female characters.]
Kate's speech of submission at the end of The Taming of the Shrew raises problems for producers and critics who want to dissociate Shakespeare from normative Elizabethan views about the subordination of married women to their husbands. Some modern directors have devised stage business for subverting Kate's declaration of submissiveness, occasionally using it to grant her subtle or not-so-subtle powers of manipulation and control. Although much of the critical debate over the play has centred on whether the ending subverts or reinforces patriarchal attitudes,...
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