“Here is my hand, and here I firmly vow

Never to woo her more, but do forswear her

As one unworthy all the former favors

That I have fondly flattered her withal…”

The Taming of the Shrew is a first-rate entree to the Bard. His timeless view of men and women provide the ingredients for one of Shakespeare’s most provocative plays.

Misogyny is alive and well in Shakespeare and takes on a particularly vicious aspect in The Taming of the Shrew.

In the words of director Josie Rourke: “I think this play has many fascinating things to say about relationships, about control, about marriage, about gender. However, because of when it was written, The Taming of the Shrew is a play in which a series of unacceptably repressive acts are committed against a woman.”

The Taming of the Shrew strolls into some pretty dark forests, morally and spiritually, although the crookedness of the universe is righted gloriously in the end. The result is a marvelous mixture, all touched by Shakespeare’s inimitable vision of the war between the sexes.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE (1564-1616) was an English playwright poet, and actor, regarded as the world's pre-eminent dramatist, and the greatest writer in the English language. Author of such timeless works as Romeo and Juliet, Othello, Hamlet and King Lear, he is often called the “Bard of Avon,” England's national poet.