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The Taming of the Shrew: Act V, Scene 2

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The Taming of the Shrew
Act V, Scene 2

Padua. Lucentio’s house.

What is your will, sir, that you send for me?

John Masey Wright, circa 1900

  1. Enter Baptista, Vincentio, Gremio, the Pedant, Lucentio, and
  2. Bianca; Petruchio, Katherina, Hortensio, Tranio, Biondello,
  3. Grumio, and Widow: the servingmen with Tranio bringing in a
  4. banquet.

Lucentio

1 - 11
  1. At last, though long, our jarring notes agree,
  2. And time it is, when raging war is done,
  3. To smile at scapes and perils overblown.
  4. My fair Bianca, bid my father welcome,
  5. While I with self-same kindness welcome thine.
  6. Brother Petruchio, sister Katherina,
  7. And thou, Hortensio, with thy loving widow,
  8. Feast with the best, and welcome to my house.
  9. My banquet is to close our stomachs up
  10. After our great good cheer. Pray you sit down,
  11. For now we sit to chat as well as eat.

Petruchio

12
  1. Nothing but sit and sit, and eat and eat!

Baptista

13
  1. Padua affords this kindness, son Petruchio.

Petruchio

14
  1. Padua affords nothing but what is kind.

Hortensio

15
  1. For both our sakes, I would that word were true.

Petruchio

16
  1. Now, for my life, Hortensio fears his widow.

Widow

17
  1. Then never trust me if I be afeard.

Petruchio

18 - 19
  1. You are very sensible, and yet you miss my sense:
  2. I mean Hortensio is afeard of you.

Widow

20
  1. He that is giddy thinks the world turns round.

Petruchio

21
  1. Roundly replied.

Katherina

22
  1.                  Mistress, how mean you that?

Widow

23
  1. Thus I conceive by him.

Petruchio

24
  1. Conceives by me! How likes Hortensio that?

Hortensio

25
  1. My widow says, thus she conceives her tale.

Petruchio

26
  1. Very well mended. Kiss him for that, good widow.

Katherina

27 - 28
  1. “He that is giddy thinks the world turns round”:
  2. I pray you tell me what you meant by that.

Widow

29 - 31
  1. Your husband, being troubled with a shrew,
  2. Measures my husband’s sorrow by his woe:
  3. And now you know my meaning.

Katherina

32
  1. A very mean meaning.

Widow

33
  1.                      Right, I mean you.

Katherina

34
  1. And I am mean indeed, respecting you.

Petruchio

35
  1. To her, Kate!

Hortensio

36
  1. To her, widow!

Petruchio

37
  1. A hundred marks, my Kate does put her down.

Hortensio

38
  1. That’s my office.

Petruchio

39
  1. Spoke like an officer. Ha’ to thee, lad!
  1. Drinks to Hortensio.

Baptista

40
  1. How likes Gremio these quick-witted folks?

Gremio

41
  1. Believe me, sir, they butt together well.

Bianca

42 - 43
  1. Head, and butt! An hasty-witted body
  2. Would say your head and butt were head and horn.

Vincentio

44
  1. Ay, mistress bride, hath that awakened you?

Bianca

45
  1. Ay, but not frighted me, therefore I’ll sleep again.

Petruchio

46 - 47
  1. Nay, that you shall not, since you have begun;
  2. Have at you for a bitter jest or two!

Bianca

48 - 50
  1. Am I your bird? I mean to shift my bush,
  2. And then pursue me as you draw your bow.
  3. You are welcome all.
  1. Exit Bianca with Katherina and Widow.

Petruchio

51 - 53
  1. She hath prevented me. Here, Signior Tranio,
  2. This bird you aim’d at, though you hit her not;
  3. Therefore a health to all that shot and miss’d.

Tranio

54 - 55
  1. O, sir, Lucentio slipp’d me like his greyhound,
  2. Which runs himself, and catches for his master.
Anne Hartley Gilbert as the widow

Anne Hartley Gilbert as the widow

From Augustin Daly's production of Taming of the Shrew, Daly's Theatre, New York

Napoleon Sarony, 1887

Petruchio

56
  1. A good swift simile, but something currish.

Tranio

57 - 58
  1. ’Tis well, sir, that you hunted for yourself;
  2. ’Tis thought your deer does hold you at a bay.

Baptista

59
  1. O, O, Petruchio, Tranio hits you now.

Lucentio

60
  1. I thank thee for that gird, good Tranio.

Hortensio

61
  1. Confess, confess, hath he not hit you here?

Petruchio

62 - 64
  1. ’A has a little gall’d me, I confess;
  2. And as the jest did glance away from me,
  3. ’Tis ten to one it maim’d you two outright.

Baptista

65 - 66
  1. Now in good sadness, son Petruchio,
  2. I think thou hast the veriest shrew of all.

Petruchio

67 - 71
  1. Well, I say no; and therefore for assurance
  2. Let’s each one send unto his wife,
  3. And he whose wife is most obedient,
  4. To come at first when he doth send for her,
  5. Shall win the wager which we will propose.

Hortensio

72
  1. Content. What’s the wager?

Lucentio

73
  1.                            Twenty crowns.

Petruchio

74 - 76
  1. Twenty crowns!
  2. I’ll venture so much of my hawk or hound,
  3. But twenty times so much upon my wife.

Lucentio

77
  1. A hundred then.

Hortensio

78
  1.                 Content.

Petruchio

79
  1.          A match! ’Tis done.

Hortensio

80
  1. Who shall begin?

Lucentio

81 - 82
  1.                  That will I.
  2. Go, Biondello, bid your mistress come to me.

Biondello

83
  1. I go.
  1. Exit.

Baptista

84
  1. Son, I’ll be your half, Bianca comes.

Lucentio

85 - 86
  1. I’ll have no halves; I’ll bear it all myself.
  2. Enter Biondello.
  3. How now, what news?

Biondello

87 - 88
  1.                     Sir, my mistress sends you word
  2. That she is busy, and she cannot come.

Petruchio

89 - 90
  1. How? She is busy, and she cannot come!
  2. Is that an answer?

Gremio

91 - 92
  1.                    Ay, and a kind one too.
  2. Pray God, sir, your wife send you not a worse.

Petruchio

93
  1. I hope better.

Hortensio

94 - 95
  1. Sirrah Biondello, go and entreat my wife
  2. To come to me forthwith.
  1. Exit Biondello.

Petruchio

96 - 97
  1.                          O ho, entreat her!
  2. Nay then she must needs come.

Hortensio

98 - 100
  1.                               I am afraid, sir,
  2. Do what you can, yours will not be entreated.
  3. Enter Biondello.
  4. Now, where’s my wife?

Biondello

101 - 102
  1. She says you have some goodly jest in hand.
  2. She will not come; she bids you come to her.

Petruchio

103 - 106
  1. Worse and worse; she will not come! O vile,
  2. Intolerable, not to be endur’d!
  3. Sirrah Grumio, go to your mistress,
  4. Say I command her come to me.
  1. Exit Grumio.

Hortensio

107
  1. I know her answer.

Petruchio

108
  1.                    What?

Hortensio

109
  1.       She will not.

Byam Shaw, 1901

Petruchio

110
  1. The fouler fortune mine, and there an end.
  1. Enter Katherina.

Baptista

111
  1. Now, by my holidam, here comes Katherina!

Katherina

112
  1. What is your will, sir, that you send for me?

Petruchio

113
  1. Where is your sister, and Hortensio’s wife?

Katherina

114
  1. They sit conferring by the parlor fire.

Petruchio

115 - 117
  1. Go fetch them hither. If they deny to come,
  2. Swinge me them soundly forth unto their husbands.
  3. Away, I say, and bring them hither straight.
  1. Exit Katherina.

Lucentio

118
  1. Here is a wonder, if you talk of a wonder.

Hortensio

119
  1. And so it is; I wonder what it bodes.

Petruchio

120 - 122
  1. Marry, peace it bodes, and love, and quiet life,
  2. An awe full rule, and right supremacy;
  3. And to be short, what not, that’s sweet and happy.

Baptista

123 - 127
  1. Now fair befall thee, good Petruchio!
  2. The wager thou hast won, and I will add
  3. Unto their losses twenty thousand crowns,
  4. Another dowry to another daughter,
  5. For she is chang’d, as she had never been.

Petruchio

128 - 134
  1. Nay, I will win my wager better yet,
  2. And show more sign of her obedience,
  3. Her new-built virtue and obedience.
  4. Enter Kate, Bianca, and Widow.
  5. See where she comes, and brings your froward wives
  6. As prisoners to her womanly persuasion.
  7. Katherine, that cap of yours becomes you not;
  8. Off with that bauble, throw it under-foot.
  1. Katherina throws down her cap.

Widow

135 - 136
  1. Lord, let me never have a cause to sigh,
  2. Till I be brought to such a silly pass!

Bianca

137
  1. Fie, what a foolish duty call you this?

Lucentio

138 - 140
  1. I would your duty were as foolish too.
  2. The wisdom of your duty, fair Bianca,
  3. Hath cost me a hundred crowns since supper-time.

Bianca

141
  1. The more fool you for laying on my duty.

Petruchio

142 - 143
  1. Katherine, I charge thee tell these headstrong women
  2. What duty they do owe their lords and husbands.

Widow

144
  1. Come, come, you’re mocking; we will have no telling.

Petruchio

145
  1. Come on, I say, and first begin with her.

Widow

146
  1. She shall not.

Petruchio

147
  1. I say she shall, and first begin with her.

Katherina

148 - 191
  1. Fie, fie, unknit that threat’ning unkind brow,
  2. And dart not scornful glances from those eyes,
  3. To wound thy lord, thy king, thy governor.
  4. It blots thy beauty, as frosts do bite the meads,
  5. Confounds thy fame, as whirlwinds shake fair buds,
  6. And in no sense is meet or amiable.
  7. A woman mov’d is like a fountain troubled,
  8. Muddy, ill-seeming, thick, bereft of beauty,
  9. And while it is so, none so dry or thirsty
  10. Will deign to sip, or touch one drop of it.
  11. Thy husband is thy lord, thy life, thy keeper,
  12. Thy head, thy sovereign; one that cares for thee,
  13. And for thy maintenance; commits his body
  14. To painful labor, both by sea and land;
  15. To watch the night in storms, the day in cold,
  16. Whilst thou li’st warm at home, secure and safe;
  17. And craves no other tribute at thy hands
  18. But love, fair looks, and true obedience—
  19. Too little payment for so great a debt.
  20. Such duty as the subject owes the prince,
  21. Even such a woman oweth to her husband;
  22. And when she is froward, peevish, sullen, sour,
  23. And not obedient to his honest will,
  24. What is she but a foul contending rebel,
  25. And graceless traitor to her loving lord?
  26. I am asham’d that women are so simple
  27. To offer war where they should kneel for peace,
  28. Or seek for rule, supremacy, and sway,
  29. When they are bound to serve, love, and obey.
  30. Why are our bodies soft, and weak, and smooth,
  31. Unapt to toil and trouble in the world,
  32. But that our soft conditions, and our hearts,
  33. Should well agree with our external parts?
  34. Come, come, you froward and unable worms!
  35. My mind hath been as big as one of yours,
  36. My heart as great, my reason haply more,
  37. To bandy word for word and frown for frown;
  38. But now I see our lances are but straws,
  39. Our strength as weak, our weakness past compare,
  40. That seeming to be most which we indeed least are.
  41. Then vail your stomachs, for it is no boot,
  42. And place your hands below your husband’s foot;
  43. In token of which duty, if he please,
  44. My hand is ready, may it do him ease.

Fie, fie, unknit that threat’ning unkind brow

John Masey Wright, circa 1800

Petruchio

192
  1. Why, there’s a wench! Come on, and kiss me, Kate.

Lucentio

193
  1. Well, go thy ways, old lad, for thou shalt ha’t.

Vincentio

194
  1. ’Tis a good hearing when children are toward.

Lucentio

195
  1. But a harsh hearing when women are froward.

Petruchio

196 - 199
  1. Come, Kate, we’ll to bed.
  2. We three are married, but you two are sped.
  3. To Lucentio.
  4. ’Twas I won the wager, though you hit the white,
  5. And being a winner, God give you good night!
  1. Exit Petruchio with Katherina.

Hortensio

200
  1. Now go thy ways, thou hast tam’d a curst shrew.

Lucentio

201
  1. ’Tis a wonder, by your leave, she will be tam’d so.
  1. Exeunt.
finis
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