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Taming Of The Shrew Renaissance Women

Good Essays

Women of the Renaissance were known, to be submissive and willing in all walks of life, “ Women were expected to be quiet, chaste, modest, patient, obedient” (Dreher 20). In The Taming of the Shrew by William Shakespeare we see someone who appears to be a shining example of that, Bianca, Baptista’s most treasured daughter. Bianca looks to be the perfect Renaissance woman; beautiful, silent, and loyal. However, as the play progresses the audience must question if that is all an elaborate performance. In Act Three, we start to see more of what looks to be Bianca’s true character. The scene itself is unconventional, a young woman being educated beyond remedial means was no commodity. However, it seemed an ordinary thing to take place around the Minola household. Her father even went so far as to call upon Hortensio and …show more content…

This quote illustrates that Bianca did in fact break convention, however, because her trespasses are kept secret people still believe she remained unmarred by whatever made her sister such an unconventional shrew. Starting off the scene, Bianca even dared to order her tutors around herself, “ I am no breeching scholar in the schools. I’ll not be tied to hours nor ‘pointed times”(3-1-18-19). She blatantly instructs men to bend to her own will, which was highly reproached and uncommon in this time period. We see Bianca display more shrewish traits in this scene alone than Katherine had in total before the men had begun calling her explicit names. However, unlike Katherine, Bianca keeps her shrewish nature behind closed doors so as not to be reproached by society the way her sister so cruelly had been. Be this the case, her deceptive nature in hiding this side of her would make her all the more out of the ordinary for a Renaissance woman, and perhaps the most unconventional woman seen in The Taming of the

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