This is a famous comedy, maybe the most famous comedy by Shakespeare. It was made famous by Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton but it stands apart in Shakespeare's comedies. In most comedies we have four couples getting married or re-united at the end. In this one we have only three women who get married to three men of course. Three in Shakespeare's style is the incongruous and disorderly rhythm that breaks the perfect iambic harmony of two or four. In his language anything coming by three is a sign of some disruption, some tempest coming, some imbalance that menaces the normal peaceful course of events. So there is an element of disorder in this ending. And there is another in the number of ternary elements the final speech of Katharina at the end, a speech to her sister for her to understand she has to submit to her husband for the good of the couple and for her own comfort. The number of ternary elements is dense. Let me give a few examples: "thy lord, thy king, thy governor", "it blots
, confounds
and in no sense is
", "thy husband is thy lord, thy life, thy keeper, / Thy head, thy sovereign." (1 + 3 + 2 = 6), "warm at home, secure and safe", "but love, fair looks and true obedience". But the acme of this imbalance is brought by a pentacle, a group of five elements, the devil in the story: "
froward, peevish, sullen, sour, and not obedient", "but a foul contending rebel, and graceless traitor" (3 + 2 =5, or Adjective + adjective + noun + adjective + noun = 3 adjectives + 2 nouns = 5). This is clear enough and it is the absolute meaning of the speech to the sister: submit for your benefit, and of course you can think as much as you want, as long as you have peace you can. This spirit of women in fact getting the best out of their husbands for their own sake and not for their husbands' sake, is the central meaning in this play. Women are no hypocrites or liars or simulators in any way. They are just taking care of their best interest and what the husbands may see as submission is the guarantee for women to have their independence and freedom. Apart from this general meaning, which is ahead of its time as for women in society in the 16th century, the play is such an accumulation of disguises and servants playing masters and masters playing servants, and sons and fathers, and fathers and daughters, without counting all the suitors, that we are literally made slightly dizzy. The language, the puns, the innuendo, the playing on words and all the wit, some of it openly gross, some insinuating some grossness, make this comedy real fireworks of fun and pleasure: water music one century early. This BBC production is fair enough and the setting is wider than a stage which enables the angle of vision to change which gives to our perception of the public or private space a dimension it probably does not have, in between a natural setting and a sound stage. The dynamism of the actors is just fun, including the final song of the banquet which is just amateurish enough to sound plain true.
Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne, University Paris 8 Saint Denis, University Paris 12 Créteil, CEGID
Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne, University Paris 8 Saint Denis, University Paris 12 Créteil, CEGID