In understanding Shakespeare’s lessons in Taming of the Shrew and Richard III, it’s necessary to first recognize what a morality play is, and then make the connection to Shakespeare’s use of the genre in the Renaissance era. Merriam- Webster defines the morality play as “an allegorical play popular especially in the 15th and 16th centuries in which the characters personify abstract qualities or concepts (as virtues, vices, or death)”. In early morality plays the depictions were rather clear-cut, the “villain” was rather one-dimensional and the moral message was simplistic. The Dutch play The Summoning of Everyman is a reasonable representation of this, God sends “Death” to someone named “Everyman” to bring him to Heaven because God feels that he has lost his way. When Death arrives, Everyman begs for more time, and looks for someone to help him, turning to characters such as “Kindred”, “Cousin”,
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It’s almost impossible to determine what Shakespeare’s lesson was intended to be. This was an early Shakespeare effort, his third to be exact. This play wasn’t listed as a “problem play” as described by Frederick Boas, but over time it has certainly evolved in that direction. The problematic part is whether Shakespeare intended the play to be farcical, or for it to be a commentary on the relationship of men and women, and more precisely, how society viewed that relationship versus how men and women viewed each other. Understanding Shakespeare, we would be ill-advised to consider the play as a simple farce, and although the ambiguity in morality is more clear to a modern reader, this interpretation would be more correct than assuming Shakespeare was confined to unidimensional writing even in his earliest efforts. Therefore, the central lesson in TOS is one of how men and women should treat each other - regardless of societal view and pressure - and that society and the view of others isn’t necessarily
It’s almost impossible to determine what Shakespeare’s lesson was intended to be. This was an early Shakespeare effort, his third to be exact. This play wasn’t listed as a “problem play” as described by Frederick Boas, but over time it has certainly evolved in that direction. The problematic part is whether Shakespeare intended the play to be farcical, or for it to be a commentary on the relationship of men and women, and more precisely, how society viewed that relationship versus how men and women viewed each other. Understanding Shakespeare, we would be ill-advised to consider the play as a simple farce, and although the ambiguity in morality is more clear to a modern reader, this interpretation would be more correct than assuming Shakespeare was confined to unidimensional writing even in his earliest efforts. Therefore, the central lesson in TOS is one of how men and women should treat each other - regardless of societal view and pressure - and that society and the view of others isn’t necessarily