Marriage in The Taming of the Shrew

Marriage is important to comedies of every era of literature, from well before Shakespeare's time to ours. Almost all of Shakespeare's comedies end with a marriage, and often with several marriages. Marriage is treated as the natural satisfactory resolution to a romance: the institution through which order is restored after the wild events of the preceding Acts.

In some ways, The Taming of the Shrew follows this model. It is the aim of Lucentio as soon as he lays eyes on Bianca to have her as his wife; likewise, Hortensio, Gremio, and Petruchio all seek to be married. Uniquely among Shakespeare's early comedies, however, The Taming of the Shrew does not end with marriage. Instead, it explicitly compares the "before" and "after" of marital union. Shakespeare uses multiple plot lines in order to have one couple - Kate and Petruchio - struggling with marriage while another - Bianca and Lucentio - are still in the courtship phase. Shakespeare shifts from one narrative to the other, hopping back and forth throughout Act IV, thus patterning the idealizations of Lucentio's language and actions against the harsh realities of Kate and Petruchio. Unlike almost all comedies, Shrew is cynical about marriage, a cynicism that comes through in its very structure.