Nuttall Trivia Question

"Who in the plays of Shakespeare binds a woman, strikes her and makes her cry? The chances are that you will get the answer, 'Petrucchio.' The correct answer is 'Katherina.' She does all this to Bianca in Act II, Scene i, lines 1-24... Petrucchio never strikes Katherina."

A.D. Nuttall, Shakespeare the Thinker, page 71.

Chris

On this day, when we remember the murder of Martin Luther King, I think of Christopher Marlowe, murdered at 29. By the time if his death, both Chris and Wills had written 7 plays each. The Shrew is one of them. We can only imagine how many more and better plays could Chris have written had he lived longer. On the other hand, would Shakespeare be celebrated universally had he only written the three Henry VI, the Two Gentleman of Verona, the Comedy of Errors, Richard III and the Shrew? Probably not. Perhaps Marlowe was not as preternaturaly gifted as Wills, and nobody would even mention him except as a character in Shakespeare in Love.

Taming (Day 1)

I was feeling a bit blasé about this Shrew business, but Shakespeare is like Christmas every day! I have read La Garber, Jonathan Bate (with whom I am now obsessed) and Nuttall. I skipped Bloom for now because I read him last Spring and I did not find anything of interest then.

It is amazing how these companion books enhance the reading experience. I am so grateful that I have them and hope to keep them by my side forever. Bate has such a beautiful mind, I love his finds. For example, he made me re-read the induction to find Wills in Christopher Sly's description of himself, with all the references to Warwickshire and the life path Shakespeare had trodden. (Pages 37-38) 

One Nuttall reference that excited me was that Petruchio uses falconry training methods to "tame" Katharina, an example of this is the sleep deprivation, which, however, requires that the tamer also does not sleep until his will prevails.