Through its dramatic action “The Taming of the Shrew” reinforces ironic pleasure.

Discuss the extent to which you agree with this statement.

The taming of the shrew reinforces iron pleasure. This statement to me is of truth
because of the types of things that occurred in the play. The play is filled with humorous
aspects which serves as the foundation for commercials that use comedy to convey
social and intellectual advantages to affluent audiences.

This is a comedy about the silliness of courtly love ideals. The character Petruchio is
shown as an unrealistic model of a "decent" husband. Katherina is portrayed as the
shrewish wife with a nasty temper that no one wants to marry. Any guy would be insane
to pursue her, according to society. Before anybody marries Bianca's lovely sister Kate,
her sister Kate must be married. A guy named Petruchio is discovered, and he believes
he can tame Kate. Petruchio who is a misogynistic man thinks of this marriage more as
a task to be completed rather than an actual marriage. He is determined to tame Kate
from the unlovable shrew she is seen as into a wonderful young woman who is
obedient.

Irony begins to take place in this play from the beginning of the play when the lovers
meet. Petruchio chased Kate throughout the house. He kept telling her that he will
marry her and she will become his wife. They were fighting and running around each
other as it was a comedic reference. This however was a kind of foreshadowing to show
how it would be in their actual marriage. Kate was firm on the fact that she would not
marry Petruchio but nether less she did.

Another example of irony between Kate and Petruchio is their wedding day. On their
wedding day, Petruchio shows up intoxicated and behaves a fool .He was insulting the
courtly love standards in every way. He argued that if Kate was going to act crazy, so
would he. Kate was expected to be quiet and peaceful on her wedding day, in
accordance with courtly love standards. She was now known as Petruchio's property.
Instead, she feels entitled and speaks back to Petruchio. Because all the flowers and
linens surrounding her, Kate had forgotten what the wedding is all about. Petruchio
intended to depart after the wedding and will not remain for supper, but Kate insists on
him staying. They got into a fight and Petruchio explains that Kate must obey him and
they are to get along for they are married now and that is the way things work.
Petruchio’s entitlement continued when they arrived back to Padua. He would shout at
several servants all the time. He would not allow Kate to eat or bathe or even sleep until
she did exactly as she was told. An example of this is when Petruchio orders his staff to
prepare lunch for him and Kate. Petruchio is dissatisfied with the supper after the
servants have finished it and brought it out. He talks nonsense and mocks courtly love
ideals instead of offering a simple prayer before the meal. "Who made this chicken?" he
asks. "It's been burned!" Kate reacts by saying that the chicken was fine and that she
should be happy with it. Petruchio is exaggerating about the fantastic supper that was
made. If Petruchio followed the standards of courtly love, he would be grateful and
respectful. Instead, Petruchio is being impolite and embarrassing himself in front of Kate
and everyone else.

Finally, one last example that shows irony is when Petruchio says that the sun is the
moon and forces kate to agree with him. Kate then says “I know it is the sun that shines
so bright”. Now, by my mother's son, and that's myself, It shall be moon, or star, or
what I list, Or e'er I journey to your father's house.” This finalizes how Petruchio feels
Kate is his and she must obey. Kate realizes the only way she will be able to survive in
this relationship is to get along with Petruchio and do what he says.

This play is filled with ironic settings, foreshadowing, misogynistic manners and
manipulation. Kate and Petruchio were the main character of this essay and their lives in
the play revolve a lot around ironic pleasure, more so in ways that were not even
mentioned here. To concludes I do agree with the statement that ironic pleasure is
reinforced in the play through its dramatic action.