Marriage in Elizabethan Times

to be considered a shrew? The play, Taming of the Shrew, by William Shakespeare explores the Elizabethan standards, in which Petruchio seeks to tame his wife, Kate, a labeled shrew. Although some believe that Katerina is not tamed from her shrew-like ways, the truth is that Katerina is tamed because she transforms throughout many of Petruchio’s trials, and proclaims the woman’s role in a traditional marriage. Tests and trials bring forward a new understanding and reasoning, allowing one to…

Elizabeth the I, Queen of England, faced extreme challenges upon her role on the throne. She faced day to day discrimination in the late 1500’s against her gender, and was pushed heavily into forging a marriage to not only bare an heir to the throne, but to force a marriage alliance into place. However, She rejected this lifestyle that she was nearly forced into following, and instead paved a path that nobody had expected and became known as the Virgin Queen. Elizabeth was known for…

and its destructive passions. This period produces many great tragedies like Hamlet, Othello, All’s well that Ends well, and the most famous is Macbeth.  Macbeth The movie Macbeth depicts the social, political, and religious controversies of the Elizabethan period. This finest tragedy by Shakespeare is staged by many people. From that period till now “Macbeth” is very famous because the one performance gives the deepest meaning of humanism. Man is the central figure of this world, the superior…

helped England to thrive. Born on September 7, 1533 in Greenwich England, she was the daughter of King Henry VIII and his second wife, Anne Boleyn. The role of women was very insignificant during the time of Elizabeth’s period. They were expected to be housewives and mothers. Women during this time frame were considered to be weak, and it was always thought to be that women needed someone to take care of them, such as their husband. Men were considered to be dominant over women. They were not…

His use of directive phrases in ‘fettle your fine joints ‘gainst Thursday next’ and the triplet ‘speak not, reply not, do not answer me’ indicate that he expects ultimate obedience as he is in an Elizabethan patriarchal society, and has no intention of listening to his daughter. He also threatens her when he says, ‘Or I will drag thee on a hurdle thither’ and ‘or never after look me in the face’. His comparison to Juliet of a common criminal and the…

The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice is a Shakespearean play first performed in 1604, during the Elizabethan era. Mabillard says that the story of Othello is known for its variety of themes such as hate, revenge, racism, love and repentance with betrayal and jealousy being the main themes of the plot. The Elizabethan era was a time when slavery was common and a time of religious tensions. The play is set in Venice, the city that was leading the conflict between Christianity and the…

No Gold Diggers Here When adapting The Taming of the Shrew into a movie to appeal to a modern audience, the director of Ten Things I Hate About You chose to emphasize the American ideals of love and respect instead of the commonly held Elizabethan belief that unions were akin to mutually benefitting business arrangements. Such an adaptation of the plot is demonstrated by the relationship between Patrick Verona and Kat Stratford—characters who respectively mirror Shakespeare’s Petruchio and…

order for Shakespeare to express his opinion that women of the Elizabethan period in which he lived in were required, without any choice, to be dependent on men, submissive, and not powerful as the era “treated women as objects” (Lopez, 1). To begin, Shakespeare shows the characterization of women through Gertrude as she remarried immediately after King Hamlet’s death. This was most likely to keep her status of Queen in the Elizabethan era as “all titles would pass from father to son or brother…

will do anything Othello demands of her. She clamps herself onto Othello and his life, in such a way that she can no longer control her own life, everything is devoted to her husband. In Shakespeare’s time, this was the norm and women were expected to remain content with their secondary status. Marriage is more like a purchase; a woman is bought by her husband and is expected to fulfil all of his desires. When Desdemona is travelling to Cyprus to be with Othello he implies that she is a…

Shakespeare shows that death, marriage and relationships all revolve around love. Regardless of the differences between the book and the play both authors portray similar views on marriage and love, for example arranged marriages, unrequited love and advantageous marriages. Jane Austen criticizes the status quo in her time while Shakespeare takes a more formal approach on how advantageous marriages helped women in their time. Although they both agree on how strong love can be…