English 432
Dr. Desmet
Winter 1997

Wordcruncher Exercise for Taming of the Shrew


1. To look at the play's clothing imagery, enter a word list that includes

cloth*
garment*
gown*
cloak*
hat*
Then browse through these passages and decide if the play suggests that clothing is or is not a useful index to rank, worth, or even identity.

2. One question that is open to debate is whether Kate is actually a shrew, in the specific cultural sense outline in Lynda Boose's essay on shrew-taming. Check the following terms:

shrew*
curst*
hilding*
devil*
Who uses the terms and on what evidence. In other words, are the characters responding to Kate behavior or anticipating it?

Look also at the animal images associated with horses and hawks, which are related to the question of Kate's identity as a shrew:

hors*
bridl*
jade
Hawks: Another image pattern is the one associated with hunting, especially hunting with birds of prey like
Hawk*
Haggard*
Falcon*
Using the F4 key (to check the frequency with which the terms are used) suggests that the image pattern is peculiar to Shrew. And using the shift key and the cursor to find out where the terms are used, one sees that they occur during the induction and in the last two acts. Why?

3. One critic claims that the word "father" appears more often in this play than in any other Shakespeare play, with the exception of the very long King Lear. Check occurrences of the word:

father*
Who refers to "fathers" and with what attitude? Check also the terms:
young
old
What is the play's attitude toward old and young persons? See if the words occur often within twenty words of one another? What would this repeated contrast suggest to you about the play?

Finally, check the occurrences of the word "pantaloon" Who is the play's pantaloon and how is the pantaloon, as a old character, related to the "father"?

4. At 2.1.132 Petruchio refers to himself as "two raging fires." Check uses of the word "fire*" in the play to determine the symbolic role of fire in the play.

5. Part of being a shrew is being a non-stop talker. Check the following words:

speak
tongue*
talk*
speech
chide
silence
Who is associated with speech and who with silence? What does that tell you about the symbolic importance of speech in the play?

6. Another central concern of Taming is the relationship between wives and husbands as cultural roles. Make two word lists. In the first word list, insert wife. In the second, insert the personal pronoun "my" and the articles "a" and "the"; press enter. Press the b key to tell the machine to show you "wife" after the adjectives, and press c and type 10 to ask to see the passages when the words occur within ten characters of each other. Now use enter to reach the passage list; pressing the ALT key and the B key will move you directly to Shrew. Who speaks most often of "my wife"? What do characters say about "a wife"? Next, try the same process for "husband" instead of wife. Any differences in use?

Christy Desmet

This exercise adapted and changed from one by Fran Teague.