Monday, February 20, 2012

In Act I Scene 1 of The Taming of the Shrew, state what is being discussed in prose and why it is appropriate to be in prose.

Having made his declaration that no man can woo Bianca
until Katharina is married, Baptista and his daughters leave a frustrated and angry
Gremio and Hortensio. Without the audience of Baptista and his daughters, their language
becomes more coarse and idiomatic as they discuss their plight, compared to the polished
and refined blank verse they spoke before. We see these two characters for the old,
money-grasping men that they are as they make such comments as "Our cake's dough on both
sides." As they plot to find a husband for Katharina and determine to try and win favour
with Baptista by securing a tutor for Bianca, we see these men stripped of pretense and
united by Baptista's restrictions. Note Gremio's last lines in particular, which are
rather coarse and therefore appropriate for prose rather than blank
verse:



I am
agreed, and would I had given him the best horse in Padua to begin his wooing that would
thoroughly woo her, wed, her, and bed her and ride the house of her! Come
on.



Such sentiments and words
are appropriate for the medium of prose, and also point towards the artificiality of
these suitors as they try to present themselves as something they are not in blank
verse.

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