Amateur City

During the course of the entire play, all of the characters except Petruchio treat Kate with disrespect. Baptista, her father, is especially insensitive to his daughter's feelings. When Petruchio comes to inquire about Kate, he describes her as fair and virtuous woman. Her father neglects to acknowledge that it was possible that his daughter could have those fine qualities (II.i.42-63).

In addition, Kate’s final monologue, also in Act 5, scene 2, tells the audience a lot; about the play itself, as well as the society in Shakespeare’s era. On face value, Kate’s final monologue seems to be a long lecture about serving your husband, no questions asked. “Then vail your stomachs, for it is no boot, / And place your hands below your husband’s foot” (v, ii, lines 92-3, page 221). However, Shakespeare gave Kate the last word in the play, a sign of her consistent power and control. As well, her monologue can be perceived as quite ironic. Kate is aware of the beliefs about how women in the household should act and, as clearly portrayed throughout the entire play, the role Petruchio has been trying to get her to fill. By playing along fullheartedly with society’s expectations, in front of the large audience of guests, Kate becomes “truly tamed” - or just incredibly

And I will crawl in and make room for myself. My heart can be the one that beats. And hers has stopped” (Gibbons, 1988, p. 10). This scene is very revealing of many systems’ and subsystems’ transactions. On a physical and emotional microsystem level we see Ellen open her individual boundaries and allow an adult to nurture her in a sense as a child needs to be nurtured. Also the heart beating for her mother and then her mother passing away besides her is a traumatic event that Ellen struggles with; and goes on to carry that burden of guilt. Although she felt fear to seek help from the threats of her father, she felt an internal struggle to protect and save her mother as she had already assumed the role as her protector. When she failed to do so it had lasting impacts that would linger and resurface later on with the death of her grandmother.

This is evident when Kate had her second round of fits. Once Kate realized that her symptoms could incite talk in the close-knit town, she decided to have another fainting fit. Sarah Bates described Kate as a lifeless corpse when she arrived at the house. However, when Kate overhears that she is about to be bled, she jumps back to life almost immediately (Godbeer 18). This shows that Kate was truly conscious the entire time. She only let go of her act once she believed she was about to be harmed. However, after learning that the pain would be minimal, she agrees to be bled. After she is bled, Kate lets out a scream and her mistress, Abigail Wescot, declares that “She is bewitched” (Godbeer 19). This prompts Kate into a laughing outburst, astonishing Sarah Bates once again. The fact that Kate only laughed after her mistress professed that she was bewitched exposed her guiltiness. She laughed because her acting turned out to be believable. She had successfully fooled her mistress with her false symptoms. Furthermore, her deceiving symptoms of bewitchment are also evident in her accusations, specifically her accusation of Mercy Disborough. When Abigail Wescot believed Kate was “no longer in her right senses,” she proceeded to name Mercy Holbridge, later known as Mercy Disborough, as the woman who she thought was responsible for Kate’s torments (Godbeer 38-39). Before this statement, Kate was unable to name the woman

She trekked forward, valiantly, against the aloof, inhospitable environment. Around her, she witnessed as the rudimentary surroundings drove individuals away as if it never wished for accost. Despite this she continued to trudge forward, despondently, waiting for a sign-- anything to warn her if she ought to continue or if she ought to give up. Eventually, she persisted. Ann Petry, in her novel The Street, explores the dynamic relationship between Lutie Johnson and the unfriendly urban setting through the articulate use of dramatic personification and vivid imagery as a metaphor for the uncertainty that ensues when relocating in a new, diverse, and vastly dissimilar environment.

The next change seen in Kate is how obedient she has become when Petruchio and her are heading to Bianca’s wedding. Petruchio says that the moon is out, when in actuality it is daytime. Petruchio and Kate have a brief disagreement until she finally rolls over and says “Forward, I pray, since we have come so far, And be it moon, or sun, or what you please. An if you please to call it a rush candle, Henceforth I vow it shall be so for me”(IV.iv.206). This shows that she is obedient and even if what Petruchio is saying is completely false she will obey and agree.

When it comes to female characters, authors depict women with a sense of realism, that being that they are a common folk with a usually large but simple impact in the story. On the contrary, John Steinbeck’s female characters in his novel East of Eden do not have the sense of being normal women, and he goes to extremes when it comes to the women being good or bad. Faye, Olive, and Cathy are all women that have taken to extremes in their acts of kindness or evil. Faye is too good of a person, especially in the society that she is in. Olive helps an enormous amount in the military with work she has done that seemed unlikely for her to do by herself. Cathy, on the other hand, commits horrible acts that would immediately classify her as mental, but is ironically one of the smartest characters in the novel. These kinds of women are uncommon, especially in their society.

“Take me instead. Me, not him” (Cormier 183). Once again, the terrorists did not allow Kate what she wanted. When she heard the gunshot that killed Raymond, Kate did not cry. In fact, Kate did not cry once during captivity, although she wanted to.

Kate’s ending monologue seems to show the audience how much she has changed, however some critics think this monologue could be seen as sarcastic, which, arguably, would fit in much more with her character than the apparent sudden change in heart. When Katherine speaks about being a wife she says “when she is forward, peevish, sullen, sour, and not obedient to his honest will, what is she but a foul contending rebel and graceless traitor to her loving lord?” it could definitely be construed as sarcasm, as she is largely describing herself or how she acted before, and in calling Petruchio her “loving lord” she seems scornful as he has been anything but loving towards her and earlier in the text she thinks of him as a fool.

In the Novel, she is neither portrayed as flawless heroine nor as a fallen woman. Her rebellious nature seemed to have been a byproduct of her self-centred nature which manifests in the actualization of her whims and fancies (Kelly, 2001).

While Kelly does not think that all men are “at war” with women, she does fear them and cannot find justice because she is trapped thinking that she never will. Because Kelly ultimately dies at the hands of a man, her search for justice and revenge for the way men treat her is cut short and she ultimately never finds righteous

For instance, Kate makes the boy realize that stealing is not right. Hence, she

His persistence shows his willingness to assert his dominance, and Kate's resistance reveals her intellect. She refuses to submit to him and that really shows through the text. Katherine is a very strong woman and she see's right through the system that existed at the time. Because of her older age, she was more resilient in her independence and gave him a much harder

The humor of the situation would allow an audience or reader of the play to laugh at it, but also seriously consider the mental and emotional abuse that Kate is going through, in pretending that things are not what she knows them to be, just to avoid the wrath of her unstable

As the play continues, we learn even more about Kate. For example, when Kate and Petruchio go back to Baptista’s, Kate begins to see how Petruchio operates. She learns that if she does what Petruchio says, even if she knows it is not true, she will get something she wants out of it, like going back to her father’s house. Petruchio test Kate when they meet the real Vincentio on the road and he asks Kate if she has ever seen a finer young women. Knowing what he is up to, Kate shows her amazing wit and decides to play his game. She has figured out that Petruchio has a method to his madness and if she plays her cards right, their relationship can be a partnership with a series of actions and rewards.