The Taming of the Sonnet

For this Unit, Shrew, in our Humanities class Drama, we focused on gender equality through time. We read the play The Taming of the Shrew by Shakespeare and studied the difference between marriage today and marriage in the Elizabethan Era. For our AP this unit, we wrote a sonnet in the style of Shakespeare giving direct advice to one of the characters from The Taming of the Shrew. We had to include four vocabulary words from the play, which are in bold, and we also included one quote from the play. I decided to write my sonnet to Petruchio, Kate's husband. I feel that he was the worst character in the play. He was abusive, ignorant, and only in it for the money and sex. I wanted to convey to him how much his actions affected Kate and her family, and how he doesn't deserve her just because he is a man.


You think Kate oweth you beauty and wealth
Delivered, tied up and gagged, at your door;
Silenced by the fear of loss of her health
Fear of how she could be labeled a whore.

You think that you have the right to steal her
Away from her sister, her life, her might,
Her stubbornness to keep herself ordered;
To keep her kind absolute, strong and right.

She has the right to be a mighty wife,
To know she can find strength while she defends
That she has the ability to thrive
''Her silence flouts me, and I'll be revenged!”

She has power behind her mask of dread
which you lack under your curst mask of wed.

The Taming of the Shrew, Wikimedia Common, 1954.