Page:Taming of the Shrew (1921) Yale.djvu/144

132 was revived at the Metropolitan Opera House in New York on March 15, 1916. The music for this work was composed by Herman Goetz, and the libretto, Der Widerspänstigen Zähmung, was prepared by Joseph Victor Widmann. In the process Shakespeare's play naturally underwent great change in treatment, one important difference being in the psychology of the principal characters. Petruchio is represented as having seen and loved Katherine before he undertakes to marry her, his rough exterior is merely for the purpose of winning her love; Katherine, on the other hand, succumbs at once to Petruchio's masterful wooing and confesses to herself after the first scene with him that she has quite lost her heart. When the taming process ultimately breaks her pride and she admits her defeat, Petruchio throws off his mask and the lovers are ready to join in a conventional operatic love duet. Another and quite different interpretation of the leading characters in Shakespeare's play is that set forth in a 'travesty in one act,' called The Ladies' Shakespeare, 'being one woman's reading of a notorious work called The Taming of the Shrew, edited by J. M. Barrie.' In this work, not as yet published, but produced on the stage by Miss Maude Adams at Rochester, N. Y., in October, 1914, and subsequently during the season of 1914–1915 on tour, Barrie explains that Katherine was really the tamer, not the tamed, that she was hoodwinking Petruchio all the time, by pretending to want things she didn't care about and so getting what she really wanted. It is he who ultimately capitulates, not she, because her tact and finesse get the better of his blundering bluffness. It is astonishing how, with a prologue setting forth this view and stage business to back it up, Shakespeare's dialogue, practically without a change, lends itself to such a feminist interpretation of the play. Barrie finds that even in