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Acknowledgements
I would like to thank my supervisor Dr. Paul Franssen for his professional eye, for his endless patience and superb guidance which has helped me forward in many ways. Next, I never could have finished any work on this thesis without the support of my dear husband Omar Sourani and
2 my wonderful and very supportive children Adam, Abdulrahman, Zacharia and Abdulkariem who all helped out with the baby so I could have more time to work and do research.
In addition I would like to thank Mrs. Dorothée Luykx-Duijnand and Dr. Brigit Kaiser for their understanding of my pregnant situation and the delay that it caused on my thesis. Last but not least, I would like to thank my sisters Sabrina and Marwa and my friends Fatiha and Suzan for their support and help.

Table of Contents
Introduction………………………………………………………………………………....4
Chapter I: The History of Humours’ Theory…………………………………………….....7
Humours before the Renaissance…………………………………………………...7
Humours in the Renaissance……………………………………………………….11
Chapter II: Humours in Shakespeare’s: The Taming of the Shrew ………...………………14
Choler in The Taming of the Shrew
………………………………………………..17
Yellow Bile in Modern Theory...….…………………………….…………………28
Melancholy in The Taming of the Shrew
….…………………….…………………30
Black Bile in Modern Theory…...…………………………………………………35
Phlegm with a hint of Sanguine in The Taming of The Shrew ……………….…....38
Phlegm in Modern Theory..….………………………………………………...…..43
Blood in Modern Theory...……………………………………….……………..…45
Chapter III: Modern Adaptation of Shakespeare in view of the Humours…..…..…….…..47
Humours in a Modern Guise.……………………………………………….…..….47
The Taming of the Shrew : A Renaissance Play according to Modern Theory.….....48
The Taming of the Shrew:
“ShakespeaRe-Told” (2005)……………………….…..51
Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………....….77
Bibliography…………………………………………………………………………...…....80
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Introduction
Beginning from the ancient Greeks, to Galen then to Renaissance Europe, by way of the
Arab Middle Ages, up until the mid-19 th
century, medical science accepted the humours’ theory.
The humours’ theory concerns the four bodily fluids which make up a temperament: their excess
4 or lack upset the balance of neutrality or well-temperedness. We may obtain this knowledge about the Elizabethan era, through a reading of medical textbooks from the period. This knowledge will help us understand the literature of the time.
How different was the conception of characters’ behaviour in terms of the humours’ theory in
Shakespeare’s
The Taming of the Shrew in the Renaissance compared to the characters’ motivation in the 2005 BBC-television adaptation of that play? It is generally known that William
Shakespeare reflects the thinking of his age through his plots and characters. Not only do we get to see how these characters unfold their behaviour and thinking, we also get to see how these characters analyse their own behaviour in terms derived from the humours’ theory.
Therefore I will begin with an analysis of the main characters of the play The Taming of the
Shrew
— linking their behaviour, their complexion, eating habits and other signs available from the play to whichever humours might be involved. Then a close analysis of the same humour will follow in the light of the modern conception of this fluid: its cellular pathology inside the body and its physiological effects, as they are known now, will be discussed briefly. Lastly, I will analyse the main characters of the BBC 2005 adaptation of The Taming of the Shrew in the “ShakespeaRe-Told” series, and compare them briefly with the main characters of the ‘original’ play.
My background in pharmacy, my very deep interest in medicine and human health, alongside my love for English literature, poetry in particular, have led me to choose this topic. This hybrid

and very broad relation between the cradle of physiology and Shakespeare, triggers the imagina-
5 tion very much. The humours’ theory of Western physiology held a significant place in Renaissance literature and was believed to determine someone’s temperament and complexion — as can be seen in Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew . However, in our modern times, the behaviour and mood of these characters are no longer linked to the aforementioned humours, as can be seen in the modern TV adaptation of 2005, but rather to modern social theories. I will support my argument by a close reading of these works, and by discussing some scholars’ theories which support my claim and others which do not.
Today, neuroscientists recognize a connection between Shakespeare’s age and our own in the common understanding that the emotions are based in biochemistry and that drugs can be used to alleviate mental suffering. I wish to use my knowledge of pharmacy and medical science to shed light on Shakespeare and the humours’ theory from a different angle and look at it through contemporary eyes.
In order to create a motivating and interesting Literature class about Shakespearean plays,
I have thought of building the bridge from Literature to Science. Consequently, the main focus of this study is not just a comparison between the play and its modern adaptation, but also an attempt to exploit to the full the link between these characters and the four humours and to evaluate the effectiveness of bringing in medical science in English literature teaching. Fortunately, after some decades of mainly Freudian ideas about human behaviour being rooted in the experiences of our youth, we are now beginning to rediscover the influence of material factors, such as food, on human behaviour. Markedly, the reason behind conducting this research is to investigate the contemporary aspect of the behaviour of stage characters in Shakespeare’s The Taming of the

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Shrew in the 2005 adaptation, as we will see that modern cultural products tend to ignore the new insights in modern science when filming an adaptation of such classic literary plays.

Chapter I: The History of Humours’ Theory
Humours before the Renaissance
In the fifth century BC, medicine and philosophy became “twin disciplines, born at the same time” in which events were explained without blaming the gods. Natural elements were used to
7 account for the “vagaries of mind and body” (Arikha, 6). Accordingly, Greek physicians came up with many theories that constituted the foundation of medicine which led — through time — to a constant expansion, materializing through many trials. This formed the early beginnings of the formation of biochemical and medical methodology based on the humours’ theory. From
Hippocrates to Plato to Aristotle to Galen, these humours were based on careful observation, diagnosis and treatment in case one of the humours was excessively present. This excessive presence would lead to an imbalance of the body’s health and harmony.
Hippocrates, one of the most well-known Greek physicians and the “father of medicine”
(Arikha, 6), began a “detailed biomedical observation” (Boylan) and drew up certain concepts that offered a “theoretical framework for diagnosis and treatment” (Boylan, “Hippocrates: c.
450—c. 380 BCE”). Hippocrates believed that the human body consists of the four elements: earth, water, air and fire, as Johan van Beverwijck explains in his Schat der Gezondheid (12).
The human’s flesh and bones were accordingly thought to be made out of earth, the blood made of water, spirits and vapours of air and lastly the natural warmth coming from fire. Following this further, it was suggested that a person’s temperament depended on which element would be dominant over the other elements. In addition, external factors would affect the equilibrium or proportional relationship between mixed temperaments. As van Beverwijck continues, the four elements correspond with the four humours: air with blood, fire with yellow bile, water with phlegm and earth with black bile. According to Arikha, a temperament ( krasis ) is influenced by

the imbalance of humours leading to a difference of the physiological state of the body (121).
Continuing, Arikha explains that the four humours are produced inside the body: blood is supposedly made in the liver, yellow bile in the gall bladder, phlegm was seen as a by-product of blood and thus found anywhere in the blood, and lastly melancholy which was stored in the spleen (10). There are however some sources which state that phlegm comes from the lungs (see table 1).
Another theory concerning the interrelatedness between internal and external factors affecting the elements and humours is that about the relation between the universe and the individual. It suggests that the state of the humours can be affected by external factors such as stress,
8 food, temperature and even the alignments of stars and planets. Additionally, internal factors might be illnesses inside the body or fiery emotions ruling or clouding the mind. Ruth Leila Anderson discusses this relationship in terms of soul, body and spirits:
The soul […] depends for its operations upon the body and the spirits. The microcosm is subject in many ways to influences from the macrocosm. Unless one indeed has strength of will, any variation in the humours or in temperament produces a corresponding variation in thought and action. (174)
In other words, elements may be harmonized with a temperament mixing the realm of the physical universe (macrocosm) with that of the individual (microcosm) producing hereby one of the four humours (See fig. 1 and table 1)
1
. In the Renaissance, it was thought that the macrocosm resembled
1
The content comes from Johan van Beverwijck’s De Schat der Gezondheid page 12, but the figure is my own construction.
Originally van Beverwijck wrote this book in 1636 with a slightly different title Schat der Gesontheyt which was written in early modern Dutch. For this thesis a more modern version is used to be able to read it easier. This version was published in 1992 and edited by Lia van Gemert.

9 the microcosm. Just as the macrocosm consists of the earth, the outer space and the heavens, mankind was a little universe unto himself, consisting of the earth (his lower limbs, his feet), his thorax corresponds to the air whereas his head was an epitome for the heaven (Anderson, 61). Unless an individual has a strong will with which he could alter the destined formation of a physiological and psychological state by changing the balance of humours inside his body.
On the whole, there are four core elements; earth, water, air and fire. These elements are thought to contribute to the formation of four pure and four hybrid temperaments: warm, humid, cold and dry versus warm and humid, warm and dry, cold and humid, cold and dry. Then external influences such as food, the manner how an individual would live his life (active or passive), and the phase of life (youth, adolescence, maturity and old age) this individual is in would determine the extent of domination of a certain temperament (also see table 1). Following this further and as can be seen in figure 1, every hybrid pair of temperaments coincides with a bodily fluid making up a set of personality traits specific for that fluid/humour.
Figure 1 The four humours: blood, phlegm, black bile and yellow bile in relation with the temperaments and external influences according to van Beverwijck

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After Hippocrates and Plato, Aristotle and Galen worked out a theory that added the psychological impacts of these four humours to their physiological effects. For example, in Aristotle’s
Problemata XXX, a case of a distorted balance of humours or elements is mentioned: a melancholic constitution could be seen as a mean or a temporary state or as a lasting intellectual tendency leaning towards “intellectual outstandingness” (Northwood, n.p.). Thus from a theory about physiological observation (in this case black bile and its excess), a psychological theory formed that explained one’s behaviour and achievements (excess of certain traits whether negatively or positively also known as outstandingness, par.14). Galen extended this theory and proposed that mental disorders could be the result of a physiological imbalance.
Granted, Galen related the four bodily fluids “to the three principal points of the body: head-phlegm, heart-blood, black bile-liver and yellow bile — the liver’s complement, the gall bladder” (Boylan). That is to say, the liver and its complement are seen as one organ. These principal points seem to form a bond with the “Platonic tripartite soul: head (reason), heart (emotion/spiritedness) and liver (desire)” (Boylan). Hence, this could be the link between medicine and philosophy, between body and mind, between physical health and mental health which seems to have led philosophers to relate the humours to the temperaments and finally to the notion of psychology. This development will be discussed later on.
In her very extensive chronicle Passions and Tempers, covering a period of 2500 years,
Arikha points out that — before the Renaissance – the concept of the humours’ theory consisted of a constant synergetic relationship between the humours and the temperaments. For it was said that a continuum exists “between passions and cognition, physiology and psychology, individual and environment” (xviii). All in all, humours were considered by physicians as a guide for both diagnosis and treatment during the time of the ancient Greeks.

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In a way, Galen revived the ancient Greek scriptures and teachings by expanding this theory and acknowledging that human behavior is not only a product of bodily actions, but also of the rational soul or a mixture of the two (Arikha, 36). In other words, Galen incorporated the field of psychology into the humoural theory. This paved a way for the Renaissance understanding and implementation of the humours’ theory.
Humours in the Renaissance
By the time the Renaissance started, it became customary to classify a person’s traits or temperament by the state of his humours. If it had not been for Avicenna and other great Arab philosophers and physicians, much of Galen’s work would have been lost in the Middle Ages. As the
Renaissance is the re-birth of the Classics, the classical learning of the humours luckily survived and even prospered.
Moreover, the homogeneity of both techniques of diagnosis and cure in the Renaissance was declining in comparison with the Middle Ages (Arikha, 38). The introduction of astrology and alchemy into the humours’ theory during this period were used by among others the French physician Jean Fernel (Hirai, 47-8) and “The professor of medicine […] Daniel Sennert” (Hirai,
151). The exact relationship between humours and alchemy will be discussed later on in the second chapter in the form of the humours in modern views.
Renaissance literature and drama made a plethoric use of the humours, but not only the four basic classical ancient humours. Due to the influences of adjacent fields of science such as astrology and alchemy, the concept of humours expanded into complexion and body type, personalities, age, seasons and planets (see table 1). In this way, dramatic characters could represent a variety of traits that were reciprocally interrelated physically, mentally and spiritually.

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Table 1 . A thorough representation of the humours’ theory with relation to the physical and the psychological traits 2 :
Humour Body fluid produced by
Element Qualities Complexion and Body type
Personality Age Season
-
Planet
Sanguine blood liver air hot and humid redcheeked, corpulent amorous, happy, generous, optimistic, irresponsible adolescence spring
-
Jupiter
Choleric
Phlegmatic yellow bile phlegm gallbladder lungs fire hot and dry red-haired, thin violent, vengeful, short-tempered, ambitious childhood summer
-
Mars water cold and humid corpulent sluggish, pallid, cowardly maturity autumn
-
Moon
Melancholic black bile spleen Earth cold and dry sallow, thin introspective, sentimental, gluttonous old age winter
-
Saturn
What mostly seems to be typical of the Renaissance is the changing attitude towards melancholy. What began as a negative attitude towards it in the Middle Ages – due to it being
2 Retrieved from The Four Humours: http://www.kheper.net/topics/typology/four_humours.html
and partially from https://www.nlm.nih.gov/exhibition/shakespeare/fourhumors.html

“aeritudo amoris, illness of love or erotic malady” in a strict religious sense — became a more
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“powerful factor… called love-melancholy in the Renaissance” (Arikha, 159-69). Robert Burton even created an extensive treatise with a 1500 page-span about melancholy. This will be discussed in chapter 2. As Elizabethan dramatists plunge into portraying either an excessive presence of the humours in their characters or a more temperate one, Shakespeare appears to experiment with the humours’ theory by depicting these humours, elements and temperaments in all his plays in some way or another. Sometimes one can notice a direct association with a humour or temperament, and at other times the link is rather indirect. Thus in order to interpret Renaissance drama, in this case Shakespeare’s drama, it is essential to understand the importance of the humours’ theory. Due to the space-restrictions in this thesis, only one play will be discussed in light of the humours’ theory. In essence, a person’s moral and mental state could be influenced by his humours, temperaments and the elements leading to four personality types that coincide with their corresponding humour: melancholic with black bile, phlegmatic with phlegm, sanguine with blood and choleric with yellow bile.
All in all, the Renaissance developed an active interest in the classical learning of the ancient humours, combining them with passion and anxiety of the mind. At the onset of the seventeenth century, a swirling scientific revolution made its way through all the fields. A new scientific approach and methodology invaded the core concept of the humours’ theory. It became just name, no longer linking balances of fluids with behaviour, mood or personality.

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Chapter II: Humours in Shakespeare’s original: The Taming of the Shrew
Literature can partly be seen as a mirror, as Aristotle put it in his theory of mimesis.
Through time, a population’s belief changes, and influences certain theories. In this case, humoural theory influenced the Renaissance population, and literary characters mirrored the actions or diseases of real people. Among the canon of Renaissance literature, Shakespeare represented his era in his work and showed the humours on all different kind of levels, from word association to allusion, from direct linking to indirect linking as Edgar Irving notes that “[Shakespeare’s] plays really give us a better composite of medical practice in [the sixteenth] century than all the authorities quoted” (109). Yet literature, as Stephen Greenblatt so famously says, also triggers a circulation of social energy, for literature is a two-way street. Greenblatt believes that literature
(such as drama) also influences the intellectual climate of its own time, for example when Uncle
Tom’s Cabin reflected one way of thinking about slavery, but also became the starting point for a debate in its own period. We as readers or as spectators absorb literature’s messages or views, because literature constitutes a framework that is different from our own (present) framework.
Speaking of Shakespeare, Greenblatt states that “[p]lays are made up of multiple exchanges, and the exchanges are multiplied over time, since to the transactions through which the work first acquired social energy are added supplementary transactions through which the work renews its power in changed circumstances” (20). Pearcy adds an interesting theory which places literature in the same line as medical practice during the second century: “among men of letters […] interest in medicine was strong, and medicine was available to them as allusion, as metaphor, or as a context for a sententia or a joke” (455). In his article about melancholy and its role in rhetoric with rhetoricians, Pearcy showed how in the second century a dichotomy developed “between

15 the men of letters and the men of medicine” (447). However, literature appeared to have adapted the medical jargon that was most common in those days.
Medical practices in the Renaissance, which we can find in many of Shakespeare’s plays, are “in accord with the views taught in the medical schools of Europe for 1,400 years, the views of Claudius Galen, that great dictator in all matters physiological” (Fraser-Harris, 56). Fraser-
Harris argues that Shakespeare must have known about these theories, as Galen and Hippocrates appear in some of his plays:
Sir Hugh Evans in the Merry Wives says of Dr. Caius (iii, 1) — “He has no more knowledge in Hibbocrates and Galen-and he is a knave besides.” Galen is mentioned again along with Hippocrates, in the same play. “What says my Hippocrates? My Galen?” “And once more in Coriolanus we have the phrase” — “The most sovereign prescription in Galen” (ii, 1). Lastly Galen is mentioned along with Paracelsus in
All’s Well
(ii, 3) where Parolles refers to “Galen and Paracelsus” as “all the learned and authentic fellows” (56-7) [sic]
A few highlights in the Galenical theory that were upheld in the Renaissance – which Shakespeare spoke of in his plays — concern, sleep, the vascular system that consists of the heart, arteries, veins and blood), digestion (including the role of the liver and the effect of alcohol), the brain, the development of the body, the humours and the senses such as the vision. Many scholars (including Fraser-Harris) state that Shakespeare couldn’t have known about the circulatory system as Harvey was the one who “discovered” this system after Shakespeare’s death (56).

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Returning to the occurrence of the word “humour” in Shakespeare’s plays, Fraser-Harris mentions the play in which the humour is mentioned which is being linked to sleep: “The phrase,
‘To purge him of that humor that presses him from sleep,’ which occurs in
A Winter’s Tale (ii,
3), is probably an allusion to what in modern language we should call a toxic source of insomnia.
But of course it refers to the very old view of the four ‘humors’ which from the time of Hippocrates were assumed to be the sources of disease-blood, phlegm, yellow bile and black bile” (55)
[sic]. Since this thesis only analyses The Taming of the Shrew, I will adopt some of the biological phenomena which Fraser-Harris links with many of Shakespeare’s plays to discuss only those phenomena in relation with this play. In the play The Taming of the Shrew, the word “humour” is mentioned seven times, referring once to a spirit. At the beginning of the play, the lord disguises as a servant and acts as if Christopher Sly – who in fact is a poor tinker — is a wealthy lord. The lord speaks to the poor tinker who is lying comatosely and drunk in sleep. Then after waking up,
Sly discovers that he is clothed as a lord and lying in the bedchamber. When the servants address
Sly as lord, he replies to them to not speak of such nonsense and that he is but a poor tinker. The
Lord answers:
Heaven cease this idle humour in your honour!
O, that a mighty man of such descent,
Of such possessions and so high esteem,
Should be infused with so foul a spirit! (Induction 2.12-15)
“Idle” here refers to the type of humour, or in other words the type of spirit. As the humours could be a fluid, or a vapor. Arikha explains that “up until the seventeenth century, nerves were

believed to be hollow and to contain pneuma : the air, breath, spirit, or vital principle” that Aris-
17 totle thought it to be “the instrument – organon – of the heart-based soul” (23). With these assumptions, Galen theorised that pneuma is the breath of life which flowed alongside humours through the arteries (Arikha, 8).
The word “humour” refers four times to Katherina’s abundant choleric humour before she is “tamed”. Firstly, in search of a rich bride for Petruccio, Hortensio mentions Katherina with her “scolding tongue”. However, Grumio (who is Petruccio’s groom) insists that Petruccio should go and see her in person so that he will believe that Katherina is “curst” and a “shrew” by saying to Hortensio: “Let him go while the humour lasts” so that Petruccio will believe how intolerable Katherina is (1.2.87-88, 99, 106). Katherina’s father Baptista highlights her shrewishness by stating that her humour indicates impatience: “Much more a shrew of thy impatient humour” (3.2.29). Next, the word humour refers twice to Petruccio; when Biondello describes
Petruccio’s wrong and hideous attire for his wedding day showing thus an extreme humorous state: “and ‘the humour of forty” (3.2.66), only for Tranio to reply upon this description: “ ’Tis some odd humour pricks him to this fashion” (3.2.69). Afterwards, it refers back again to
Katherina when Peter (Petruccio’s servant) is astonished and remarks that Petruccio is going too far with his methods to change Katherina: “He kills her in her own humour” (4.1.169). Finally
Petruccio claims his intentions towards Katherina’s humour: “And thus I’ll curb her mad and headstrong humour” (4.1.198).
Choler in The Taming of the Shrew
Markedly, choleric humour is not only limited to tragic characters, for Shakespeare’s comedy
The Taming of the Shrew shows a strong choleric character: Katherina. The etymological source

18 of the word choler stems from Late Latin use of cholera or the Greek kolera which referred to a sort of disease distinguished by diarrhea (Harper, n.p.). Aristophanes’s use of chole was primarily defined as “ bitter anger” (Pearcy, 451). Pearcy explains furthermore that “chole” is the synonym for “bile” and that it “is in fact almost confined to the poets” (451) as its use became prevalent in the “vocabulary of Attic poets and Old Comedy” (452). As the humoural theory was prevalent during the Renaissance, it made Shakespeare aware of these humours and he used choler for one of his star characters in one of his first comedies: Katherina.
Katherina
In this play, one can find the recurrence of all humours albeit some more direct than others. The most profound humour that is mentioned and discussed directly is the choleric one which
Katherina is known to harbour, hence the words ‘curst’ and ‘shrew’ throughout the play: “Is she so hot a shrew as she’s reported?” (4.1.18) In general, when the choler is more dominantly present in an individual, one is said to be rather violent, vengeful, short-tempered and ambitious (see table 1) and the yellow bile is said to be hot and dry. Katherina shows all the traits mentioned above as she violently hits Hortensio with the lute on his head until he bleeds: “for she hath broke the lute to me” (2.1.147). She is vengeful as she hits Bianca in frustration because of
Bianca’s silence and the fact that she has many admirers while Katherina finds herself with none at all:
KATHERINA
Of all thy suitors, here I charge thee, tell
Whom thou lov’st best. See thou dissemble not (2.1.8-9)

19
[…]
BIANCA
Is it for him you do envy me so?
Nay then, you jest, and now I well perceive
You have but jested with me all this while.
I prithee, sister Kate, untie my hands.
KATHERINA
If that be jest, then all the rest was so.
Strikes her (2.1.18-22)
The word “him” refers here to Gremio (a rich old man who is a suitor to Bianca, Hodgdon, 134) whom Bianca most certainly is not interested in. Furthermore she stands up for herself using her wit of tongue and with her attitude. Arikha explains further that Galen defined a hot temperament to be “characterized by a powerful voice, rapid speech, anger, vehement gestures…” (67).
Katherina shows these traits in many instances in the play. For example, when she treats Bianca unjustly and violently hits her, we can see her “devilish spirit”. Here Katherina lashes out at
Bianca for having many suitors while she has none at all, when Baptista reprimands her:
BAPTISTA
For shame, thou hilding of a devilish spirit,
Why dost thou wrong her that did ne’er wrong thee?
When did she cross thee with a bitter word?
KATHERINA

Her silence flouts me, and I’ll be revenged. (2.1.26-29)
Katherina is inflamed by Bianca’s silence, as this provokes Katherina even more and enforces the rage she is in. Katherina is thus shown to talk too much and Bianca’s attitude towards
20
Katherina shows disrespect.
A perfect example of how the choleric humour was believed to be affected by external factors — such as in this case food — can be seen in the measures that Petruccio takes on their bridal night. At this point, he forbids Katherina to eat the meat as he connects its negative and synergetic effect to the choleric humour. Furthermore, he reveals that he too is choleric:
PETRUCCIO
I tell thee, Kate, ‘twas burnt and dried away;
And I expressly am forbid to touch it,
For it engenders choler, planteth anger;
And better ‘twere that both of us did fast,
Since, of ourselves, ourselves are choleric, (4.1.159-63)
Even his groom and steward, Grumio and Curtis, come to the conclusion that Petruccio is also a shrewish, if not more than her, as Petruccio is shown to have a very short temper cursing upon his servants infinitely:
CURTIS

By this reckoning he is more shrew than she.
GRUMIO
Ay, and that thou and the proudest of you all shall find when he comes home … (4.1.76-78)
PETRUCCIO
You peasant swain! You whoreson malthorse drudge! (4.1.115)
Food is known to nourish the body, if not the soul too. It is therefore not surprising that food also affects the humours in the body according to the type of food; be it meat, fats, sugars,
21 or any other kind, for every type has a different effect. Arikha mentions at least a hundred types of food and beverages which affect the humours (361). A remedy she mentions for those individuals who had an excess of yellow bile is an intake of “laxatives and emetics” (91). Laxatives and emetics cause the body to be emptied of food, either by vomiting or by diarrhea. Another approach to curing choleric excess as van Beverwijck mentions, is the intake of types of food that are refreshing and cool (61). Granted that the qualities of yellow bile are hot and dry, physicians insisted on treating it with its opposites. In this play, meat is said to strengthen the choleric humour and feed the anger: “For it engenders choler, planteth anger” (4.1.161), as meat generates warmth and is dry of nature thus strengthening the effect of choler (Arikha, 126). In addition there is a difference in the degree of how the meat is cooked; In Arikha’s Passions and Tempers , there are several instances where the word “meat” is mentioned in relation to the humours in the
Renaissance period, for example: “in the liver lodged the vegetative soul, which ‘desires meats and drinks’” (37). Particularly, an “overly hot and humid stomach” would lead to a doctor’s recommendation to “the stomach’s cooling and drying” (Arikha, 14). So feeding a choleric person

22 hot and dry food will not be helpful at all. Yet there seems to be some linking between the choleric humour and the melancholic humour as Arikha notes that: “All sufferers of melancholy, regardless of its source, should seek out […] a diet of lamb […] They should avoid acidic foods like vinegar and mustard, as well as […] red meat” (58-59) which extraordinarily enough also is mentioned in the play:
GRUMIO
What say you to a neat’s foot?
KATHERINA
’Tis passing good; I prithee, let me have it.
GRUMIO
I fear it is too choleric a meat.
How say you to a fat tripe finely broiled?
KATHERINA
I like it well; good Grumio, fetch it me.
GRUMIO
I cannot tell; I fear ’tis choleric.
What say you to a piece of beef and mustard?
KATHERINA
A dish that I do love to feed upon.
GRUMIO
Ay, but the mustard is too hot a little. (4.3.17-25)

23
So here, the meat is said to be choleric, and the mustard “too hot”. As mustard consists of acidic components, the logical decision would be to prohibit it for choleric people as Grumio does. Yet it is unclear whether he himself has the medical knowledge about which food is proper and which not, or if he does so only under the command of his master.
The linking of melancholy and choler could lie in the cause that the spleen is believed to produce black bile
3
while the liver produces yellow bile: both organs act as the body cleanser.
Arikha reveals that “Galen had thought that the melancholic humours were produced by the liver
— which was itself connected to the heart, the source of innate heat — and were attracted to the spleen ‘by means of a billions vessel like a canal’” (120). Another source talking about the function of the spleen in Renaissance period is Aubrey C. Kail’s The Medical Mind of Shakespeare :
“The spleen also had a complicated psychological role. It was supposed to filter off the black choler and melancholic humour and to purify the body of these unwanted elements, thereby determining a person’s disposition and temperament” (210), whereas the liver was believed to be the most important organ of the body, as it “was the source of blood formation and ‘heat generation’” (Kail, 191). So in fact, both the meat and the mustard, mentioned in the play, are considered choleric food (or food that strengthens the choleric humour) as they both are considered
“hot”. According to previous sources, both foods are advised to be avoided in case one of these two organs — spleen and liver — was overproducing the two humours respectively: melancholy and choleric. If a type of food is cold, then this would be appropriate for a choleric person to digest, but not for a melancholic one.
3
Modern views have discovered that the spleen filters the blood by breaking down old red blood cells and restores new ones in preparation of a hemorrhagic shock.

24
Pursuing this further, Fraser-Harris links the digestive system with the nervous system by stating that the body’s emotions are intertwined with the digestive function, for the state of starvation affects the heart and central nervous system directly and drastically as it leads to the situation that the body will feed upon itself in the absence of receiving the proper nutrients (61). Returning to the play, Katharina who is being starved on her bridal night:
The more my wrong, the more his spite appears.
What, did he marry me to famish me? (4.3.2-3)
Here, Petruccio’s “spite” might be an indication to his humorous state; in between the two humours: choleric as he claims to be and a more melancholic one as she herself suggests (see page
27). Subsequently Katherina is shown to be ‘giddy’ as a result of both sleep deprivation and fasting:
[I] am starved for meat, giddy for lack of sleep,
With oaths kept waking and with brawling fed;
And that which spites me more than all these wants,
He does it under name of perfect love,
As who should say, if I should sleep or eat,
’Twere deadly sickness or else present death.
I prithee, go and get me some repast —
I care not what, so it be wholesome food. (4.3.9-16)

In the last two lines she is speaking to Grumio to fetch her some food, which he alas fails to do
25 as his master Petruccio has ordered him. Corresponding to the fasting method of Katherina, Kail reveals the typical medical treatment for insanity in the Middle Ages and Renaissance England:
“the ‘hunger method’, in which hungry patients were suspended over the dining table” (45). So it was common practice in those days to revert to the fasting of mad people in order to cure them, just as it is Petruccio’s intention here in this play.
It is remarkable how the word “choler” does not appear in the play before Petruccio marries Katherina and that he names it so bluntly, while in the pre-marriage verses she is called
‘curst’ (twelve times), ‘shrew’ (fourteen times),’ intolerable’ (twice), ‘impatient’ (twice), ‘mad and headstrong humour’ and is said by Baptista to have a ‘spirit to be a devilish one’ for her being so bad tempered for no reason, or as it so seems… When Petruccio diagnoses Katherina as a choleric, he takes it upon himself to be her physician and treat her “ailment”. This way he can turn her choleric temperament into a more phlegmatic one. Katherina in turn refers to Petruccio as “a mad-brain rudesby full of spleen” (3.2.10). She refers here to his madness which he displays by wooing her in haste and keeping them all waiting on the wedding day. She reads him in terms of the humours as having an excess of black bile as Galen considered the spleen to produce black bile (see table 1). In his article, Andrew Wear explains about the history of the spleen. He argues that: “The orthodox account of the spleen in the sixteenth century was based on Galen and it was Galen who first linked black bile with the absorbing and cleansing function of the spleen”
(44). Thus, if there is a malfunction of the spleen, the body will be unable to purge the black bile out of the body causing an excess of black bile. Returning to Katherina and Petruccio, she names him a “frantic fool” (3.2.12). The word “frantic” refers here to a state of being distraught, hence the state of melancholy. Another connection between the spleen (blood) and melancholy is seen

26 in the beginning of the play: “Seeing too much sadness hath congeal’d your blood, melancholy is the nurse of frenzy” (Induction 2.128-29), it seems these two situations correspond with each other. Where the induction shows a conversation between the messenger and Sly, who is being persuaded to come and watch this play, Katherina in the second situation claims that Petruccio’s erratic behaviour is leading to his lunacy and is taking control of him. So when a person is melancholic (so sad that his blood is thick), his melancholy will lead to a state of lunacy, hence the frenzy. More about melancholy will follow in the next section.
Striking evidence of Katherina’s transformation from a choleric person into a phlegmatic one in the play is the occurrence of the word “winter” when the steward and the groom, Curtis and Grumio respectively, converse about their mistress’ humorous state:
CURTIS
Is she so hot a shrew as she’s reported?
GRUMIO
She was, good Curtis, before this frost; but thou knowst, winter tames man, woman and beast, for it hath tamed my old master and my new mistress… (4.1.18-21)
This theory, that the winter can curb a choleric humour as its cold counteracts the heat of the choleric, stems from what Hippocrates had dictated in his A Regimen for Health talking about winter: “as this is the phlegmatic time of the year [when] diseases are centered around the head

27 and the chest” [sic] (in Arikha, 100)
4
. More evidence is presented in the next chapter concerning a modern view of the body’s biological function in relation to sleep, the brain’s perception and
Katherina’s state of giddiness.
All in all, it seems to be Petruccio’s intention to curb Katherina’s choleric humour to a more phlegmatic one. One who will be so slow to react as if all energy has been drained out
(which in fact it is by the sleep deprivation) thereby satisfying his need for an obedient wife. For instance, in one of many incidents in the play, Petruccio makes Katherina say something which is entirely untrue: on a bright sunny day he makes her say: “it is the moon that shines its light”, then changes his mind and says: “it is the sun”, which it originally was before he spoke of the moon:
KATHERINA
Then, God be blest, it is the blessed sun,
But sun it is not, when you say it is not,
And the moon changes even as your mind.
What you will have it named, even that it is,
And so it shall be so for Katherine. (4.5.19-23)
This seems further proof that Katherina’s choleric nature has been subdued to a more phlegmatic one, by reacting as desired.
4
In table 1, winter was appointed the season for melancholy. Yet in Arikha, winter is appointed to the choleric humour. This can be explained as winter was considered to be a duration of six months. Maybe later on the season autumn was being separated from this elongated winter period.

28
Yellow Bile in Modern Theory
At present, yellow bile is also known as gall. According to PubMed, which is an initiative of the National Center for Biotechnology Information, it is defined as “an emulsifying agent produced in the liver and secreted into the duodenum. Its composition includes bile acids and salts, cholesterol and electrolytes. It aids the digestion of fats in the duodenum”. Emulsifying means that this natural agent acts to disperse the particles which by itself are immiscible in a colloid mixture (see fig. 2).
Figure 2 The addition of an emulsifier which aims to blend the particles homogenously in a colloid mixture
Bile is formed in the liver and stored and concentrated in the gall bladder (see fig. 3). Also bile aids the process of excretion of bilirubin which is a byproduct of the red blood cells that are recycled by the liver. Normally, bile has a high pH which means it is an alkali, yet it can turn into acidic when being starved. As an alkali, it can neutralize the acid coming from the stomach on its way to the small intestine (duodenum). Furthermore the salts in bile can act to kill bacteria (bactericides), destroying harmful microorganisms that food might bring along.

29
Figure 3 The biliary system where the yellow bile is formed in the gallbladder
Any malfunction in the liver’s excretion of bile results in a change of balance between the bile salts and acids and the neutralizing of pH. This could lead to a change in the balance of the digestive system which in turn can lead generally to an imbalance in health. In comparison, yellow bile in modern views has not altered in function, except that nowadays medical science reveals far more details about the overall functions, physiology, anatomy and cell-signaling; which is no more than expected. To be specific, bile acids are responsible for changes and regulations of the body’s metabolism, insulin concentration, micelles formation which absorbs any dietary fat as Fiorucci et al. explain: “Their amphipathic nature is essential for the solubilization of dietary lipids and promotion of their absorption in the digestive tract” (570). Also bile acids are now known to affect some hormonal actions of the body as can be seen in fig. 4. Furthermore, bile acids stimulate the nuclear FXR receptors — that are excessively present in the liver, intestine, kidneys and adrenal glands — which are responsible for the regulation of some hormonal secretions. So a high bile concentration is responsible for affecting changes in many pathways as can be seen in fig. 4 (Fiorucci et al., 573). Taking this into consideration, it can be concluded that a choleric humour may be the result of an increase in bile acid concentration, as these acids affect hormonal balance, which in turn affects behaviour, which may include aggression.

30
Recent studies indicate that the “contribution of […] hormones may act on specific anger-associated brain circuits” (Rosell & Siever, 17). Brain circuits “such as psychopathy” are a result of the effects of certain hormones “on amygdala–frontal connectivity” in the brain (Rosell & Siever,
19).
Figure 4 The many cellular pathways and pharmacological effects of bile acids (Fiorucci et al.)
Melancholy in The Taming of the Shrew
Markedly, melancholy appears to be a broader subject to ponder upon than the other humours, but the characters in The Taming of the Shrew do not cover all of melancholy’s variations and manifestations. That is why there will be a restriction concerning only what is relevant to these plays in this section. The etymology of melancholy originates from the Greek word “melaina chole” (Arikha, 10) which means black bile, also a synonym for atra bilis (Heffernan, 5) .
Aristotle points out that all those who suffer from melancholy are gifted with a talent, calling it

thereby the “Mother of Wisdom”. In his Problems XXX.I
, Aristotle believes that “the tempera-
31 ment of black bile was pneumatike and that persons affected by an excess of hot black bile were mad, clever, and amorous [sic]” (Pearcy, 453). In Galen’s theory, melancholy as a mood or disease stems from black bile as a humour (van Beverwijck, 111). Galen even linked the “state of health” with “mental powers […] in terms of humoral physiology […] An excess of yellow bile in the brain induces delirium, or of black bile, melancholia, or … phlegm and chilling agents in general help to cause lethargus, whereby memory and intelligence become impaired” (Pearcy,
448) [sic]. Pearcy continues with stating that Galen believed that “an excess of the two humors, phlegm and black bile, impaired memory and quickness of wit” (449). Arikha communicates that melancholy is stored in the spleen, being “the most ineffable and most illustrious of all humours”
(10). As table 1 indicates, the melancholy humour is cold and dry, and corresponds with the age of maturity, and coincides with autumn as its season. Its personal traits were thought to be that of introspectivity, sentimentality and gluttony (see table 1). On the other hand, Heffernan links melancholy to old age instead of Galen’s proposed maturity and likewise with the winter season instead of autumn. For evidence, she refers to Sears and Dove; two Renaissance experts. The reason of linking melancholy to old age which is given here, is man’s accumulated concerns and anxieties. Shakespeare shows an example in this play: Baptista in The Taming of the Shrew struggles with his major anxiety in his old age: the burden of an unmarried ‘old’ daughter who is a shrew.
Melancholy can be “a mood, emotion, expression of disappointment over some loss, and even […] a disease” (Heffernan, 2). Although Heffernan makes the same observation as Pearcy concerning the great possibility that poets and men of letters in general could be easily affected by the views of physicians of that time, Heffernan still holds a critical view as she states that “it

32 will be hard to know whether the source [of the immersion of medical knowledge in their literary work] is poetic genius, personal knowledge of the fact of melancholy itself, a deeper understanding of the medical issues, or some subtle mix of all three possibilities” (4).
Admittedly, Robert Burton wrote an impressive treatise that included literature with this medical condition in his Anatomy of Melancholy. He covered an extensive range of melancholic types; from “a mild eccentric disorder to an established neurosis and even the wildest psychotic derangement” (Kail, 39). Where Burton treats many types in his treatise as he says “[the] Tower of
Babel never yielded such confusion of tongues, as the chaos of melancholy doth variety of symptoms” (Arikha, 161), van Beverwijck only mentions four types of melancholy in a decreasing order of severity: firstly, the most serious and severe melancholy which is caused in the brains, then the second type which is caused in the heart but is milder, then the third type is the melancholy which originates in the organs called hypochondriac. And finally the mildest kind is the melancholy which is caused by the uterus (Beverwijck, 114-5) which in modern terms indicates the “blues” that accompanies some menstruation cycles. The types of melancholy which are relevant for the characters of The Taming of the Shrew are sadness, depression and love.
Besides the four mentioned types of melancholy, van Beverwijck also mentions lovesickness as a type of melancholy affecting the wisest of men (118), which Arikha also mentions in her book: “Lovers pine away, and look ill with waking, cares, and sighs” (161), for love “is defined to be a desire” which together with hatred, “is the first and most common passion, from which all the rest arise, and are attendant” (Burton, vol. 3, 11).
Another interesting variety of melancholy is the blending of melancholy with other humours, which we also find in some instances in these two plays. It was Avicenna who placed melancholy in a blend with the other three remaining humours: “phlegmatic melancholy is

33 slower to do harm and of less intrinsic badness. It is choleric melancholy that is worse and speedier in causing corruption. But it is more susceptible of a cure than the former” (Quoted in Heffernan, 20). That could be the reason why Katherina in The Taming of the Shrew was cured so quickly. A good explanation that Thomas Ots contributes is that “rage takes place only after a longer period of repressing one’s anger, which will travel from the liver to the spleen” (41). This means that Katherina’s anger which was already present at the beginning of the play eventually traveled to the spleen to come out as pure rage (see quotes p. 20 in this thesis). Heffernan describes the symptoms of those who are affected by a choleric-melancholic humour: “if [melancholy] is mixed with bile or results from bile, it is accompanied by agitation and a kind of demonic behavior and is comparable to mania” (20), which we can see so apparently in Katherina’s behaviour. A sanguine cast on a melancholic person on the other hand, could indicate one is gifted and eminent in a certain field (Heffernan, 8, 20).
In The Taming of the Shrew, we find melancholy embodied in some characters and their views. For example, in the induction, one of the messengers meticulously describes melancholy and its “depressive” and “sad” traits with its corresponding cure to Sly who is dressed up as a lord
5
:
Your honour’s players, hearing your amendment,
Are come to play a pleasant comedy;
For so your doctors hold it very meet,
5 Several allusions appear in the lord’s speech that indicate Sly’s melancholic state, for example:
Hence comes it that your kindred shuns your house,
As beaten hence by your strange lunacy (induction 2.26-27)
“Strange lunacy” indicates the melancholic state.

34
Seeing too much sadness hath congealed your blood —
And melancholy is the nurse of frenzy —
Therefore they thought it good you hear a play
And frame your mind to mirth and merriment,
Which bars a thousand harms and lengthens life. (Induction 2.125-32)
Just as Galen described the thickening of the blood as a result of too much sadness, melancholy also can be seen as the catalyst of the state of frenzy, or in other words a state of madness, depression and ultimate despair. Therefore, a comedy would help to convert the tired sad mind into a happier one preventing thus a thousand harmful conditions resulting in a longer lifespan. These last two lines also show the direct connection between the state of mind and the state of physical health; how the mental state can affect the body in its physique.
Baptista
Another example, a character in this play displaying a (mild) state of melancholy is Baptista, the father of Katherina and Bianca. As a result of his headstrong daughter Katherina and her shrewishness, he finds himself intensely grieved: “Was ever gentleman thus grieved as I?” (2.1.37) as he discovers her beating up his other younger daughter Bianca. Upon the arrival of Petruccio coming to ask for Kate’s hand, Baptista welcomes him with a flicker of hope, yet to find himself again in a pool of sadness:
You’re welcome, sir; and he, for your good sake.
But for my daughter Katharine, this I know:

35
She is not for your turn — the more my grief. (2.1.61-63)
As Baptista could not believe that anyone could put up with his daughter, Petruccio surprises him when he really is seriously courting Katherina and putting a final date for their marriage. Baptista still finds himself facing a risky business (Hodgdon, 214), in case the match does not go forth:
“Faith, gentlemen, now I play a merchant’s part, and venture madly on a desperate mart”
(2.1.330-1). At the end of the play, when Petruccio is gathered with his friends and father-in-law,
Baptista finds himself in a merry state and good-humouredly admits to Petruccio about his poor destiny to have married the most shrewish of all: “Now, in good sadness, son Petruccio, I think thou hast the veriest shrew of all” (5.2.64-65). All in all, an assumed reason for Baptista’s melancholy can be found in his worries as an overprotective father who has a shrew for a daughter. He feels this as a heavy burden saddening his mood to the core.
“Black Bile” in Modern Theory
According to Galen and Renaissance medical knowledge, black bile was thought to be secreted from the spleen. However, modern day science has found that the fluid which the spleens secretes is not black at all. The spleen is considered a filter for the blood and therefore it is densely vascular. Mark Cesta describes the function, anatomy and histology of the spleen in details and explains that:
The spleen is the largest secondary immune organ in the body and is responsible for initiating immune reactions to blood-borne antigens and for filtering the blood of foreign material and old or damaged red blood cells. These functions are

36 carried out by the 2 main compartments of the spleen, the white pulp […] and the red pulp, which are vastly different in their architecture, vascular organization, and cellular composition. (n.p.)
Cesta continues furthermore with elaborating about the constitutions of the two types of pulps: red and white (see fig. 5). Firstly, the red pulp contains simplistically said macrophages
6
, venous sinuses 7 and a “meshwork of splenic cords” (n.p.). Secondly, white pulp is composed of PALS, follicles and a marginal zone which all contain “lymphocytes, macrophages, dendritic cells,
Figure 6 The location of the spleen inside a human body with respect to the lymphatic system and bone marrow
6
Macrophages are large phagocytic cells found in stationary form in the tissues or as a mobile white blood cell, especially at sites of infection. Retrieved from Oxford dictionary: < http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/macrophage >
7
Blood from the cords collects in the sinuses. The venous sinuses consist of a lining of endothelial cells that are positioned in parallel and connected by stress fibres to annular fibres, which are composed of extracellular-matrix components. The stress fibres run along the long axis of the endothelial cells and are most prominent where the endothelial cells are in contact. Contractility of the stress fibres allows the formation of slits between the endothelial cells, thereby regulating the passage of blood and blood cells from the red-pulp cords into the sinuses and back into the venous system. Retrieved from Nature: http://www.nature.com/nri/journal/v5/n8/fig_tab/nri1669_F2.html#figure-title

plasma cells, arterioles, and capillaries” (Cesta, n.p.)(See fig. 6). In other words, the spleen pro-
37 duces antibodies and takes care of bacteria or blood cells which are antibody-coated. This happens through the blood and lymph node circulation (see fig. 6). Furthermore, the spleen cleanses the blood in our body.
Back in the Renaissance, George Cheyne wrote a famous book about the mental disorders in which he mentioned the symptoms and disorders of a “splenetick person”. A normally functioning spleen produces black bile which is perfectly tuned with the other humours, while in case of an overproducing spleen, the person’s “perfect health, free spirits, ease and cheerfulness […] in a full circulation, free perspiration, and regular secretions” will be “forced, labored, and uneasy” (193). Conversely in modern day conception, the spleen rhetorically refers to anger as a proverb is known to say: “to vent one’s spleen”. Similarly, when an individual is in a foul mood, he is known to be “splenetic”. This modern proverbial and metaphorical way of linking the
Figuur 1 spleen to anger has no common ground with the Renaissance conception of the spleen’s black bile which was linked to the melancholic humour and consequently mental disorders, rather it seems to apply to the yellow bile and its effects.
In the beginning of the twentieth century some scientists such as A.F. Rasmussen Jr. linked emotions with immunity, and later on in the beginning of the twentieth-first century
Karpuzoglu-Sahin et. al proved in laboratory experiments that a specific kind of hormone (estrogen) “significantly increased the level of expression” of antibodies (212) and other studies “have shown that estrogen administration […] induces hyperactivity of splenic B lymphocytes, characterized by increased production of autoantibodies […] erythrocytes, dsDNA, phospholipids and an increased output of autoantibodies from plasma cells” (213). So in other words, estrogen affects the spleen’s production. Pursuing this further, there are many articles that give evidence of

38 the functional effects of estrogens on the moods and behaviour of women. Therefore we can conclude that modern-day view of the spleen has shown that its production of antibodies is affected with an increase in hormonal concentration in the body. Yet it needs to be proven if the spleen in turn can affect the hormonal concentration – in this case estrogen – which in turn could be linked with the emotion of anger.
Phlegm with a hint of Sanguine in The Taming of The Shrew
Phlegm is one of the four humours and stands opposite to the choleric humour. Its etymological source comes from the Greek name “phlegmos” (Arikha, 10) and means a
“viscid mucus” (Harper, n.p.). Harper continues: “modern form is attested from c. 1660. The ‘cold, moist’ humor of the body, in medieval physiology, it was believed to cause apathy” (Harper, n.p.). Its characteristics lean towards a sluggish, apathetic, unswayed, impassive attitude that is unresponsive to emotion, as the fluid is said to be a “by-product of the secretion of the blood” and most likely to be present in the brains and lungs (Arikha, 10). Arikha continues with stating that phlegm is created by “phlegmatic foods” which are: first ‘cooked’ in the stomach, where it [turns] into blood. That [is] why ‘there exists no specific organ for the purge of phlegm’; whereas the [gall] bladder flushe[s] out yellow bile [into the body, as it transforms the food into bile], and the spleen, black bile, both of which [will generate] in the liver. But the environment mattered: warm foods [generate] more bile; cold foods [generate] more phlegm (27).

Just as food could affect the humour, so can seasons, localities and occupations as we can see
39 later on in Shakespeare’s play. Phlegm corresponds with many illnesses that were a result of a
“humid brain, full of phlegm” (Arikha, 10) such as headaches, common colds, “dysentery, diarrhea, intermittent fevers, haemorrhoids” and many other diseases. These diseases even vary with age, as babies were believed to have other symptoms than old men (Arikha, 13). Nevertheless, as this thesis only analyses The Taming of the Shrew which does not have characters who are ill, there is no relevance to elaborate on these diseases. There is however Bianca who shows some phlegmatic traits, aside from turning into sanguine and then choleric.
Bianca
Bianca is the younger sister of Katherina, who is very popular amongst Lucentio and his rivals to seek her hand in marriage. They praise her beauty and sensibility, but most of all they praise her silence and moderate temper. In the beginning of the play Lucentio makes a remark to Tranio standing next to Baptista, Katherina, Bianca, Hortensio, and Gremio about Bianca’s behaviour:
“But in the other’s silence do I see, Maid’s mild behavior and sobriety” (1.1.70-71). From these verses we can see how Bianca is being described as a silent person, with a mild behaviour and an air of moderation: which rather do look like traits belonging to a phlegmatic character. After that, we can see the great contrast in which the men see Bianca and how she sees herself. She addresses her father as a response to the speech Gremio and Hortensio gave in proposing to seek her hand in marriage with:
Sir, to your pleasure humbly I subscribe:
My books and instruments shall be my company,

40
On them to look and practise by myself [sic].
LUCENTIO
Hark, Tranio! Thou may’st hear Minerva speak. (1.1.81-84)
When Lucentio hears her humble words and submission he names her “Minerva” which
Hodgdon explains as “the goddess of wisdom” (165). This seems a strong evidence in the context of Renaissance culture that women were supposed to be submissive and “cold”, rather than
“hot”, which in turn is seen as a quality of chaste. Therefore, Lucentio finds her submission a total act of wisdom. Furthermore, Bianca is described several times as “sweet Bianca” (1.1.109) and “fair Bianca” (1.2.165) by Gremio, and again as “sweet Bianca” (1.1.138) and “fair Bianca”
(1.2.174) by Hortensio, as a “young modest girl” (1.1.155) by Lucentio. Where “sweet” refers to her personality or act of behaviour, the word “fair” refers to her skin colour. We know that phlegmatic people tend to be very pale (see table 1). Later on, Baptista calls his daughter “good
Bianca” (1.1.76). Lucentio even claims that:
Sacred and sweet was all I saw in her. (1.1.173-75)
Here the word “sacred” implies the idea of submissiveness and enormous patience which all indicate a phlegmatic trait. We can see this serenity and optimism in the following verses when
Bianca is held chained or bonded by her sister, and still she patiently and good-humoredly speaks to her sister:
Good sister, wrong me not, nor wrong yourself

41
To make a bondmaid and a slave of me —
That I disdain; but for these other goods,
Unbind my hands, I’ll pull them off myself,
Yea, all my raiment to my petticoat,
Or what you will command me will I do,
So well I know my duty to my elders. (2.1.1-7)
Here she does not keep from calling her older sister a “good sister”, even though Katherina is engaged in an unjust act of terror over her younger sister. Moreover, she then shows her resistance even more by demanding to be unbound. This shows she still has some fire in her, but ultimately concludes her speech with a fully submissive note that she believes she must obey her elders without a second thought. So until now, she seems to be a phlegmatic character hiding her other unleashed inner humours. As women in Shakespeare’s time were praised for being colder than men, clearly this could be an act of playing to be good while hiding other personal features, which will eventually unfold themselves towards the end of the play.
In the following scene, we can see some assertive traits of Bianca. We can see that she knows what she wants while handling a quarrel between Hortensio and Lucentio very well:
Why, gentlemen, you do me double wrong
To strive for that which resteth in my choice.
I am no breeching scholar in the schools:
I’ll not be tied to hours nor ’pointed times,
But learn my lessons as I please myself.

And to cut off all strife, here sit we down.
— Take you your instrument, play you the whiles;
His lecture will be done ere you have tuned. (3.1.16-23)
Here she echoes the words of her sister and declines “to be ruled by either of her rival masters”
(Hodgdon, 220). She strongly shows that she is well capable to determine what she wants to learn and in what order; as she is no small child in school anymore nor is she anyone’s “property” to be handled that way. She has her own choice and takes the final word. A sanguine character is balanced enough to know what (s)he wants and can act decisively in times of dispute;
42 just as we see Bianca do in the former verses. On the other hand, this is a preview of the events that will occur later on where we see her acting bossy and not letting herself to be ruled by anybody. We are thus expecting what she will do when she is out of her father’s hands, and we will be able to see her true colors which certainly are not balanced.
As a maiden, Bianca seems submissive, modest, silent, and fair. Submissive, modest and silent stand for slightly phlegmatic qualities, whereas the more sanguine qualities are evident when Bianca elopes with Lucentio and chooses her lust above her modesty and chastity. Lucentio is the one who explains their “mishap” to Baptista in the presence of his own father Vincentio
[sic]:
Here’s Lucentio, right son to the right Vincentio,
That have by marriage made thy daughter mine
While counterfeit supposes bleared thine eyne. (5.1.106-8)

Here Lucentio reveals his masquerade to Baptista in marrying Bianca without Baptista’s knowledge as Baptista names this act a “depth of […] knavery” (5.1.127). From a sanguine side
43 of humours, Bianca shows later on as a wife a different side of her when she refuses to obey Lucentio after he had sent Biondello to fetch her. She says to her husband:
Fie, what a foolish duty call you this?
LUCENTIO
I would your duty were as foolish too:
The wisdom of your duty, fair Bianca,
Hath cost me five hundred crowns since supper-time.
BIANCA
The more fool you, for laying on my duty. (5.2.131-5)
Here we see that Bianca calls her husband a fool; gone is her modesty, submission and silence.
Bianca was acting the part of being modest when she appears to be sanguine and then choleric as this post-marriage scene favours the choleric humour. She is scolding him in the eyes of the public and being disrespectful. Her sharp reply contributes to the hot temperament the choleric humour initiates.
Phlegm in Modern Theory
Imperturbability means coolness and presence of mind under all circumstances, calmness amid storm, clearness of judgment in moments of grave peril, immobility, impassiveness, or, to use an old and expressive word, phlegm (William, Osler, 4).

William Osler describes phlegm very beautifully in terms of character traits rather than its bio-
44 logical ones. Some of these descriptions of the word phlegm may easily apply to Bianca in The
Taming of the Shrew, even if it is a modern-day description as the Oxford Dictionary defines phlegm as: “The thick viscous substance secreted by the mucous membranes of the respiratory passages, especially when produced in excessive quantities during a cold” (n.p.). There is, however, a difference between mucus and phlegm, for mucus is a type of gel or elastic liquid which is viscous and serves as an adhesive to the membranes of the respiratory passages so the mucus can intercept bacteria or any foreign micro-organisms in these passages before they can intrude the body and affect the internal organs, while phlegm is secreted in a state of disease or inflammation. Phlegm consists mainly of immunoglobulins, mucus, glycoprotein, in combination with pathogens such as bacteria, “dead cells and other dust and debris” (David King, n.p.) and lipids.
And once it is expectorated it is called sputum (King, n.p.).

In terms of modern views, there is no connection any more between phlegm and behav-
45 iour except the fluids that come from the brain which is no phlegm any longer. As Renaissance humoural theory thought phlegm came from the lungs and brains, we now know that phlegm from the lungs is partly mucus, and mucus has no consequence whatsoever on the moods or behaviour of mankind. Nevertheless, the substances which must come from the brain — specifically known as the hypothalamus and pituitary glands (see fig. 7) — are now known as a scale and variety of hormones which regulate the whole body’s organs’ mechanism. This in fact affects a person’s mood and behaviour.
Blood in Modern Theory
Blood is now known for its three function: transportation, regulation and protection. As the body’s transportation system of oxygen, carbon dioxide, white blood cells, platelets and a yellow clear liquid named plasma (see fig. 8), blood makes metabolism in the organs possible.
Pubmed Health states that “[b]lood also provides the cells with nutrients, transports hormones and removes waste products, which the liver, the kidneys or the intestine, for example, then get rid of” (n.p.). In terms of the humoural view of blood, the modern-day conception shows that in
Figuur 2
Figure 8 A dissection of a blood vessel with the anatomy of its constituents

46 case of transportation, a balanced sanguine humour is a balanced health in the body, as all mechanisms work as they should.
The second function of blood, which is regulation, is accredited to the role that plasma plays: “it makes sure that the right body temperature is maintained. This is done both through blood plasma, which can absorb or give off heat, as well as through the speed at which the blood is flowing. When the blood vessels expand, the blood flows more slowly and this causes heat to be lost” (Pubmed Health, n.p.). The third function of blood is protection, which makes it possible for wounds to be healed by the formation of blood clots in addition to the presence of the white blood cells that make up the immune system.
All in all, blood is indeed the most vital fluid inside the body. Humoural theory was right to have named and linked the sanguine humour to the most balanced of people and “happy” ones, because blood is from its origin balanced with the right concentration of white and red blood cells, with the right proportion of plasma, platelets and with the right volume of flow, speed, pressure and temperature. Any imbalance or the tiniest of deviations will cause a great impact on an individual’s health as well as behaviour.

Chapter III: Modern Adaptations of Shakespeare in view of the Humours
Views of the humours have changed considerably over the centuries, as we saw in the previous
47 chapter. Consequently, our view of Shakespeare’s use of the humours in his play has also changed in this present time as producers of Shakespeare adaptations fill in a modern-day interpretation of the characters in terms of modern social science such as Freudian theories which leads to a rupture between nature and nurture. This is most evident in The Taming of The Shrew in the 2005 series of modern-day television adaptations: ShakespeaRe-Told. The play is told in terms of relationships and the view of the so-called nurture.
To approach Shakespeare’s plays from an entirely different angle — that of the humours in combination with modern-day biological science — would be revolutionary.
Humours in a Modern Guise
Markedly, the internet is presently full of sites which describe the humoural system in a modern guise. Humours are perceived as personalities instead of medical cases resulting from a humour as a medical condition. The word humour has changed considerably: it now means the quality of being “funny, comical and amusing” ( Oxford Dictionary ). Similarly, the aetiology of every “Renaissance” humour has changed. With the specification and elaboration of scientific discoveries, one condition has been divided into many specific conditions; for example melancholy, which was used to describe a very broad variety of mental conditions is now only related to the milder forms of melancholy. As black bile has now been replaced by an immense range of “neurotransmitters, enzymes, and hormones”, Arikha states that “[t]he contemporary equivalents of melancholy, from its natural to its adult forms, range from those we are usually able (at least partially) to control and steer, such as ordinary blues, unhappy romantic passion, passing depression, or the

48 mild existential pain […] to the pathologised conditions” (272-3). The more extreme conditions have their own names such as schizophrenia and the like. Temperaments are now more complicated, assessing more traits in the division between the former four humours as can be seen in
Arikha’s figure 9 reproduced here.
Figure 9 A contemporary version of the division of the four humours in relation to some personality types as appeared in Arikha p. 289
The Taming of the Shrew: A Renaissance Play according to Modern Theory
Modern critics seek to interpret Katherina’s behaviour in psychological terms; the result of pressures from her upbringing and the way she is treated by her surroundings. In combination with the biological explanation that we now have, another picture of these characters arises. As an illustration, we now know that when the brain is put into a fatigued state, the sensory perception is slow. This can result in a state of giddiness as Katherina reveals in what we see according to a

modern conception of the play. Fraser-Harris defines giddiness as “a disturbance in the sensory
49 apparatus for the appreciation of one’s orientation in space; it is the perceptual aspect of impending or actual overthrow of the equilibrium” (66). It seems as if the brain is in a phase of mindblindness resulting in a kind of dizzy experience just like Katherina’s (4.3.9).
Sleep, as the modern Oxford Dictionary defines it is “a condition of body and mind such as that which typically recurs for several hours every night, in which the nervous system is relatively inactive, the eyes closed, the postural muscles relaxed, and consciousness practically suspended”. The consciousness is greatly altered due to an inhibition of both the senses and the voluntary muscles, thus reducing any reaction to the body’s surroundings or stimuli. This condition causes a restoration of energy to the body as the nervous system is put to rest (Fraser-Harris, 54).
Accordingly, sleep deprivation can cause much damage to the state of mind and the body. Hence, the state of the brain which controls the nerve’s state ends up affecting the sensory state. Petruccio reinforces that by his treatment of Katherina to balance her excess of choler and force her to be more phlegmatic. As I see it, she does not have the energy any longer to resist upon hearing a ridiculous untruth and state otherwise. She just goes along with whatever Petruccio wants to hear. Shakespeare embodies the state of sleep deprivation in this play as Petruccio keeps depriving Katherina of her sleep in order to “tame” her:
Last night she slept not, nor to-night she shall not;
Ay, and amid this hurly I intend
That all is done in reverend care of her;
And in conclusion she shall watch all night:
And if she chance to nod I’ll rail and brawl

50
And with the clamour keep her still awake.
This is a way to kill a wife with kindness;
And thus I’ll curb her mad and headstrong humour. (4.1.192-9)
All things considered, becoming angry requires an attentive state of alertness and direct response. However, in the state of sleep deprivation, this alertness will make place for a much slower responsive attitude in which we see Katherina behaving. This attitude leans towards the phlegmatic humoural characteristics that the Renaissance believed in.
From the psychological view, scholars tend to argue that Katherina is reacting in her own right and self-defense towards her surrounding, as she is not treated as an individual but rather as an object or wild animal which needs to be tamed. We can see evidence of her inner feelings which appear to be just as normal as any other girl’s: when Petruccio almost does not make it to the altar leaving Katherina thinking he was only acting the part of intending to get married to her, she says
[Petruccio] wooed in haste and means to wed at leisure.
I told you, I, he was a frantic fool,
Hiding his bitter jests in blunt behaviour,
And to be noted for a merry man,
He’ll woo a thousand, ‘point the day of marriage,
Make feast, invite friends, and proclaim the banns,
Yet never means to wed where he hath wooed.
Now must the world point at poor Katherine

51
And say, ‘Lo, there is mad Petruccio’s wife,
If it would please him come and marry her,’ (3.2.11-20)
[Katherina exits weeping with Bianca following her] (Hodgdon, 226).
The fact that she weeps shows that she is just as sensitive as any other maiden. Hereby,
Katherina is forced to change from a fiery character who had any blunt truth so sharply ready on her tongue to whoever was in her way, to a sluggish, obedient wife without an identity of her own. She is made to be a property and nothing more, as Petruccio puts it:
I will be master of what is mine own.
She is my goods, my chattels; she is my house,
My household-stuff, my field, my barn,
My horse, my ox, my ass, my anything, (3.2.230-3).
In short, all the scenes which have been discussed so far appear again in The Taming of The
Shrew in the 2005 series of modern-day television adaptations ShakespeaRe-Told, but bear a modern twentieth-first-century perspective that differs from what the play would mean in the Renaissance, focusing more on gender and political roles than on humours’ theory.
The Taming of the Shrew: “ShakespeaRe-Told” (TTOTSSR) 2005
In ShakespeaRe-Told, the BBC has aired TV-episodes featuring modern interpretations of some of Shakespeare’s plays. The Taming of the Shrew has been modernized in some aspects, for ex-

ample in language, characters’ appearance and mindset and also events. The language is not ar-
52 chaic, except some lines Petruchio 8 says. One major difference between the original play and this film is the omission of some characters and the changing of some characters’ professions in order to fit the modern public and make them more interested. First of all, Baptista has been replaced with a mother: Mrs. Minola who plays an exorbitant rich and fashion-obsessed widow.
Bianca has a career, is rich and a famous model. Additionally, Hortensio has been replaced by
Bianca’s manager Harry. Furthermore, numerous minor characters such as servants and Gremio have also been omitted. In this version, we see something like the choleric behaviour we know from the play embedded in Katherine, but this is as we can see not caused by the humours anymore like the Renaissance did believe. Traces of Katherina’s choleric humour are still clearly present, but rather seen as a result of her upbringing and her surroundings. Similarly we can see
Bianca’s phlegmatic behaviour towards her fans, her sanguine behaviour towards her mother and lovers, and finally her choleric behaviour towards her sister and in the end of the film towards
Lucentio too. Although we recognize the character types, the motivation has been updated: from humours’ theory to social setting and conditioned behaviour. However, instead of the melancholic Baptista, we see a melancholic Harry. The actors who play the characters are Shirley Henderson as Katherina, Rufus Sewell as Petruchio, Stephen Tompkinson as Harry (Bianca’s manager and Petruchio’s friend), David Mitchell as Tim Agnew (Katherina’s secretary), Santiago
Cabrera as Lucentio and finally Twiggy Lawson as Mrs. Minola. Sally Wainwright wrote the
8
In the modern film adaptation, Petruccio’s name is spelled out Petruchio. This is visible on the official BBC website: http://www.bbc.co.uk/drama/shakespeare/tamingoftheshrew/characters_actors.shml
while in the Hodgkin’s Arden edition of Taming of the Shrew, Petruchio is spelled with a double “C”.

53 film-script, which was directed by David Richards. Diederick Santer was the producer. The Taming of the Shrew is set in modern-day England in a quite political atmosphere and begins without an induction as Shakespeare’s original play did.
Where Shakespeare used the humoural theory while creating his characters as was usual in the Renaissance, we find this 2005 adaptation of Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew portrays its characters from a social point of view. Modern-day stage plays have outgrown the humoural theory with the introduction of more recent theories such as Sigmund Freud’s theories.
Freud was mostly known for his contribution to psychoanalysis amongst others, but also applied his views of psychology to literature, and especially Shakespeare. Norman Holland summarized
Freud’s remarks in his article “Freud on Shakespeare” where he points out that Freud “had some insights into Shakespeare’s works that later scholarship has had to deal with (either pro or con)
[and that] his treatment of Shakespeare — much greater in bulk than his comments on any other writer — established the basic methods of applying depth psychology to literature” (172). Freud is seen to comment and analyse mainly Hamlet , but continues for other plays as well, but not The
Taming of the Shrew . However, Holly Crocker links “Freud’s criteria for distinguishing genders by their social and sexual functions” (142) with Katharine as her obedience provides empirical evidence of Petruchio’s ability to reaffirm a cultural ideal, in that her final speech performs the rhetorical figuration of desirable femininity current in early modern discourse. Her passive affect, however, also satisfies twentieth-century standards for “normal” femininity [with Freud stating that] ‘One might consider characterizing femininity psychologically as giving

54 preference to passive aims. This is not, of course, the same thing as passivity; to achieve a passive aim may call for a large amount of activity’ (142).
Crocker goes on to elaborate more on Katherine’s female passivity which the masculine
Petruchio needs to enforce upon her to establish his domination. In contrast, I argue that
Petruchio is using a feminine approach to mirror her performed masculine aggressiveness so that she will see the absurdity of her burlesque and choleric behaviour. Nevertheless, the passive femininity which Freud is talking about, is clearly seen in Bianca, even though she is just acting the part to gain social popularity.
Katherine
From the cover of the screen adaptation (see fig. 10), towards the first opening scene we can see the choleric nature of Katherina who by the way in the film and on the BBC website is named Katherine instead.
Katherine’s facial expression shows her aggressive and angry attitude, which she does not reserve towards anyone in particular. Instead of just being a simple daughter, she is given the political profession of leading a party in parliament. She curses vehemently to anyone who is in her way and her fast angry movements also show her mood. The scenes which have been discussed and ana-
Figure 10 The Film cover of The
Taming of the Shrew from the series ShakespeaRe-Told lysed in the previous chapter and in the earlier paragraphs of this chapter also occur in the film in one way or another.
Firstly, the scene that shows Katherine and Bianca with their father in the streets is replaced with the scene in parliament where Katherine terrifies everyone who comes in a range of

55 one meter as she stomps very hard through the corridor. She harasses her secretary in a very psychotic and abrasive way:
[first lines]
Katherine: Fathead!
[she starts snarling and at the height of her bellowing she slaps Tim in his face]
Tim Agnew: You hit me!
Katherine: You gave me that information. You made me look like a political pygmy, on News-night. Your job, unless you weren’t concentrating, is to make me look like I know what I’m pigging well talking about!
Tim Agnew: You’re out of order, Katherine. I’m sorry, but good grief!
Katherine: And you’re sacked! No wonder this party has been the opposition for the last ten million light years!
Tim Agnew: You can’t sack me, and, frankly, I’d appreciate an apology. Otherwise...
Katherine: Otherwise?
Tim Agnew: If we’re to maintain a mature, grown-up working relationship, then...
Katherine:
Oh…
[she gives him the finger]
Katherine: Swivel! (00:00:48 — 00:1:41, TTOTSSR)
We see an ambitious career-driven female who is leading a campaign aiming to become the prime minister and who does not shrink back from telling her male secretary where things stand.

56
This is ultimately a parallel to modern-day behaviour which we would expect naturally from women owning the situation and being tough when they have to. Yet there also are some extreme streaks that can be explained as choleric attributes: pseudo-aggressive and rage-filled comments, shrieks, gestures and all-in-all behaviour such as the slapping, the snarling, the cursing, and giving the finger are all acts not strange to Katherine Minola, but they are in common social etiquette. In fact, for most of the screenplay, Katherine behaves exactly as seen in this opening scene. Even at the end we see her engaging in an aggressive manner towards her fellow politicians but she is very peaceful with the people who are close to her such as her husband, mother, sister and her secretary. Pursuing this further, there are moments where we can see a sensible
Katherine who knows she is behaving extremely out of the ordinary when her mother is trying to persuade her to attend Bianca’s party:
Mrs. Minola: Five minutes, just show your face for five minutes. You can’t lose your temper and make a fool of yourself in five minutes!
[Katherine looks helplessly and sighs]
Katherine: I can… (00:21:25 — 00:21:40)
Here a vulnerable Katherine is shown. It seems as if she is not choleric because she wants to, but rather because she has no control over herself. She does not want to attend Bianca’s party because she is afraid she will make a fool out of herself. She would rather stay in her office and work than submit herself to humiliation.
Still, we can see in the next scene that Katherine in fact did attend the party and behaved very aggressively as she hit a guest with a guitar:

57
[Music from the party on the background while Petruchio and Harry are standing at the door knocking and Petruchio shouting]
Petruchio: COME ON!
[The door unexpectedly opens from which Katherine is storming out]
Katherine: Excuse me
[Bianca is running after her]
Bianca: Katherine! Get back in here now and apologise!
[Katherine grumblingly cursing unclearly making Bianca gasp out of
Harry:
Mrs. Minola: Oh hello Harry.
Bianca:
Mrs. Minola: Robbie just offered to show her a few chords and she smashed the
Bianca: horror]
What has happened?
You will not do this to my guests! guitar over his head.
This is the trouble you see, anytime anyone is nice to her she just starts
[…]
Katherine: Oh go to hell. ALL OF YOU! AND STAY THERE! (00:22:57 —
00:23:20)
This scene is another proof of Katherine’s choleric outbursts. It is somewhat similar to the scene where Katherina broke the lute on Hortensio’s head in the original play. Both scenes imply her

58 inability to tolerate any social interaction without bursting out in flames. This inability could be linked with her view of people as she tells her mother in an earlier scene:
Mrs. Minola: Katherine! Bianca is very keen for you to come to her party.
Katherine: Why.
Mrs. Minola: She worries about you, so do I.
Katherine: And forcing me to live it up with a bunch of overpaid coke-snorting anorexics is going to make me feel better, is it? (00:20:19 — 00:20:31)
Katherine actually does have a point here. Since the lunch she shared with her mother and sister, many things have become clear to the spectator. Katherine’s choleric behaviour is motivated by the lack of affection and genuine interest she has suffered from — on the side of her mother and sister — not as something that she was born with or that is caused by her diet as in humours’ theory. Additionally, Katherine’s mother and sister care more for the opinion of strangers than for
Katherine’s feelings or what she says. This is shown by many scenes in which neither Mrs. Minola nor Bianca actually pay attention to what Katherine says. For example at 00:20:32 when
Katherine fails to see how she is going to feel better among those “overpaid coke-snorting anorexics”, her mother just goes on switching the subject to the plan of getting married and asks her if she “shops around the corner” (00:21:06). Mrs. Minola implies to ask if Katherine is gay, but
Katherine replies in a tired tone: “No”, after which her mother replies: “because some people think you do, and you see, if you got married they wouldn’t” (00:21:09 — 00:21:13). So all Mrs.
Minola cares for, is what people think of Katherine. She does not even consider Katherine’s career in the light of what she just had said. Similarly, we see Bianca ridiculing Katherine on many

59 occasions. For example when they have lunch at the beginning of the film and Katherine tells her sister about the marriage plan that her fellow party member John Naps urged her to think about if she wants to be the leader of the party, her sister exclaims first to her mother and then to her sister very mockingly and offensively:
Bianca:
Bianca:
[talking to Mrs. Minola] Katherine is getting married!
Mrs. Minola: Really?! Good Lord! Who to?
We haven’t decided yet (00:06:04-07)
The words and meaning that Bianca uses are humiliating as she states that Katherine has decided on marriage — which was not the case yet — and that the matter is so lightly taken that any groom would fit the profile. And just before her mother’s entry, Bianca laughingly pointed out to
Katherine: “Who the hell is going to want to get shackled to a gawk like you?” (00:05:46-50).
The Online Urban Dictionary
9
provides the readers with a definition for “shackled”: “Get
Schackled’ is a slur used by the schackler/s to the shackled victim/s. So Bianca here is referring to the unknown groom who will be so dominated by Katherine that he cannot be free, as the word shackle means get married and it is seen as something that takes away your freedom. Then this same website
10
defines the word “gawk” as “a simpleton, someone without much sense or brains” (n.p.). Afterwards, Mrs. Minola is shown to react rather absently when it comes to Katherine’s news whereas she reacts very enthusiastically to Bianca’s news:
9 http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Get+Shackled
10 http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=gowk . However, gowk has the same meaning as gowk, as
Bianca clearly pronounces gawk in the film and not gowk.

Katherine: Did you see me on News-night last night?
Mrs. Minola: Oh no, you should have told me!
Katherine: I did, I left you a message.
Mrs. Minola: Oh… [Looking at her mobile phone] (00:06:29-36)
This could very well be the reason why Katherine does seem to tolerate Petruchio even though they get in a verbal war of intense name-calling as he starts addressing her with a familiar
“Kate”. He is genuinely interested in her, which cannot be said as much of her mother or sister.
She seems to find him somewhat intriguing, even though she is snarling at him for his straight-
60 forwardness and his wish to marry her just because “they click”. Despite this, he really likes everything about her (00:25:43 — 00:26:14). He grasps that she needs her independence and that her bad temper is alienating her from society. What also helps, is their mutual attraction to each other which is many times so evident from his speech and his behaviour towards her as we can see in this scene in the park where he replies to her question:
Katherine: Are you stalking me?
Petruchio: No, but I like to.
Katherine: What do you want?
Petruchio: I want you to have all my babies… (00:29:23-31)
Here she is very surprised and almost speechless and points out to him that he does not know anything about her nor she about him. He is very honest with her that he has a large sum of debt de-

spite having a title, thus being an earl who would be relieved if he married wealthy. Still he ex-
61 plicitly says that he is not a fraud (00:30:03). He invites her over for the weekend to show her his mansion where he and his ancestors for sixteen generations grew up. He tells her that he cannot afford to keep it in a good shape, but nevertheless he will not sell it. He definitely is very honest with her about his condition, which in a way attracts Katherine’s attention.
Markedly, there are a few times when Katherine smiles, which actually are signs as to what kind of person she will be at the end of the film. It also helps that Petruchio himself pretends to have some choleric attributes — just like in the play — to show her that he can match her temper. He is behaving fairly aggressively towards the people he meets except for Katherine, as he is loving and considerate towards her, for example in the scene when Petruchio meets up with Katherine in the park and verbally assaults a cyclist passing by and another man whose ball comes in his way (00:29:12). This behaviour seems to please Katherine very well, as she definitely can relate to these outbursts Petruchio shows.
In addition, he vexes her enough to shock her on their wedding-day and during their honeymoon as he comes dressed up like a lady in high heels with makeup and nail polish on. He seems to ridicule her both as a woman and as a politician as we can see in the following scene:
[Drunk, dressed in woman’s clothes, wearing make-up Petruchio forcedly takes Katherine’s arm to get it on and get married as they walk up the aisle]
Katherine: You turn up late, drunk, dressed like a DOG!
[Katherine puts the blame on Harry and mumbles along, while Petruchio denies Harry’s involvement]

62
Katherine: It is to humiliate me, to embarrass me. (00:41:05- 00:42:05)
The irony is that as she is struggling to free herself from his tight grip, Petruchio tersely asks her not to embarrass him. He continues with manipulating her, making her grasp that if she is going to walk out, the country will see a woman who cannot make decisions. So basically he is coercing her into going along when all she wants is to bolt and flee.
Petruchio is then screaming at the vicar viciously urging him also to proceed. From this moment until they arrive in Italy for their honeymoon, we can see that on the one hand Petruchio is acting cholerically towards everyone but Katherine, while on the other hand he is acting very lovingly to Katherine in a very eccentric manner. At the airport he phones Harry to join them in
Italy and screams that he cannot spend the week with her as “she will drive him nuts”, and that
“if she wants a bad marriage, I am going to give her one! And then I will tame the bitch”
(00:52:03 — 00:52:23). All the while, in her tirade, Katherine reveals her affection for Petruchio as her downfall for which people always will remember her, as she is talking to herself in the third person:
Katherine: She only married him because she was stupid enough to be flattered by his pathetic half arse declaration of love.
[…]
Katherine: The only reason I am going to Italy is because I have paid for it
(00:48:21 — 00:49:05)

63
Arriving in Italy, Petruchio lets Katherine singlehandedly (in her wedding dress) change the tire of their car. Then he makes sure she is without her luggage and mobile phone. Next he makes sure all the tires of the car are flat upon their settling into their accommodation, upon which Katherine screams: “You do realize we haven’t got any FOOD, don’t you!” (00:57:50) thereby putting her in a position of a sort of fasting. Moreover, Petruchio deprives Katherine of her sleep as he plays loud opera music with all the lights on (00:59:35). Finally he agitates her extremely by first trying to consummate their marriage and then suddenly in the height of her desire just leaving Katherine wanting and yearning. He states clearly:
Petruchio: No you’re right.
Katherine: What?!
Petruchio: It’s not good, I can’t do it.
Katherine: Can’t you?
Petruchio: Oh you can beg, you can get down on your hands and knees and you can grovel, but it’s not good. Forget it. I’m not going to have sex with you unless you start being nice to me.
[Katherine looks pleading, and very vulnerable]
Petruchio: You’re going to start being nice to me?
[Katherine sobs but remains silent]
Petruchio: All right fine, forget it.
[and he walks out of the bedroom and Katherine growls and curls up in her bed attempting once more to sleep, albeit very agitatedly] (01:02:01 —
01:02:36)

So up until now, Petruchio leaves Katherine in a wanting state, starved, sleep-deprived
64 and aroused but unsatisfied; all in an attempt to tame her. In a nutshell, this scene shows how
Petruchio is reversing his gender role to make Katherine see her behaviour more clearly. This has been going on since the moment Petruchio had laid his eyes on Katherine. It seems to propose the following: since Katherine is behaving like a man with her growling, grunting, cursing, ranting and scowling, Petruchio is behaving like a woman in an erratic way: he comes dressed up as a woman to the wedding, then he forces her to change the tire of the car in Italy and finally he refuses to have sex with her because she is not acting “nice” to him. Normally, women tend to behave like that rather than men, so it seems as if Petruchio is holding up a mirror for Katherine to see how she is behaving to other people and at the same time giving her the message: if you insist on behaving like the worst kind of man, I will behave like a woman and show you how ridiculous this is.
Meanwhile, Harry has arrived and he and Petruchio are on the parterre having dinner which Harry brought them. She wakes up again and finds her husband and his friend eating while she was unaware there was any food. Petruchio also says that Harry brought her suitcase all the way from Pisa, upon which Harry reacts surprised: “what?” (01:04:57). We see her eating finally to her heart’s content. This might deviate a bit from the play where Katherine was prohibited to eat altogether, but denying a 38-year-old virgin what she also seems to crave for is a powerful addition towards the taming part of Petruchio. Following this further, Petruchio is teasing
Katherine by swinging her suitcase above the swimming pool and does not give it back. He is even preparing to toss her clothes in the swimming pool, “unless she [will] be nice to [him], unreservedly, without sarcasm” (01:08:54 — 01:09:02). After Harry reveals Petruchio’s real inner vulnerability and the true feelings beneath his choleric act, her tough impenetrable outer shell

65 that usually served to protect her heart from hurt finally crumbles and she submits herself to him.
She dares him by telling him after he throws all her clothes in the pool: “I don’t wear knickers anyway. Not when I’m on holiday” [and then she kisses him and walks away] (01:10:03 —
01:10:08). That seems to be the turning point of all further events. Afterwards, he follows her and the next morning we see them in an embrace under rays of sun peacefully lying down, when he again attempts to test her. He says
Petruchio: How brightly shines the moon.
Katherine:
That’s the sun, you bollock.
Petruchio: Oh, is it? You shouldn’t contradict me.
Katherine: You shouldn’t talk bollocks.
Petruchio: Ah, shall we have an argument?
Katherine:
I’d like an apology for all the nonsense you subjected me to since we got here.
Petruchio: Me apologise?! Only, if I say that’s the moon, it’s the moon. Got it?
Katherine: How do you work that out then?
Petruchio: Well, you’re my wife. You agree with everything I say.
Katherine: Do I? What, even when you’re wrong?
Petruchio: Especially then. I never am wrong, so it’s not really an issue.
Katherine: All right. (01:11:30 — 01:12:32)

66
In addition, they both agree that divorce is out of the question. From this moment on, Petruchio and Katherine are totally in sync together and it appears she is tamed. In the final scene she delivers a modern version of the speech that appeared in the original play in reply to her sister and mother’s statement of letting their fiancés sign a prenuptial agreement to protect themselves and their fortunes. Katherine is shown as a happy and subdued woman who trusts her husband as he trusts her. This baffles the rest who cannot believe she is actually serious. She clearly says that she was just like that: “I’ve been like you: argumentative, obnoxious, bad-tempered, and what good did it do me? Hey… I think you should do whatever he tells you to do, WHENEVER he tells you to do it. I mean Good Lord, how could we ever be equal to THEM” (01:21:24 —
01:21:36). The words in capital letters indicate an emphasis which Katherine puts in order to mark a certain irony considering the twenty-first century she is in. As she goes on with her speech about how women are weak, noisy and opinionated, she certainly is aware of what she speaks. It seems there is here a slight irony and contradiction between what she is and will be doing and what she is claiming. As an illustration, she is practically saying that women are below the standards of men, yet we see her in the following scenes being elected as the prime minister and running the country while her husband stays at home taking care of their triplets. All the while she is happy in her stable, loving relationship with her husband. So she has learned to behave with consideration to her partner and make allowances for him and tolerate him. She also has learned that she does not need to turn into a totally submissive person who believes she is her husband’s inferior. She phrases this last famous speech in the form of verbal irony, not just situational or dramatic. In essence, Katherine’s behaviour is seen in terms of her upbringing by a mother who, it appears, has never given her the attention and love she deserved. This has made her aggressive, and also made her into a rather masculine career woman. Petruchio on the other

hand, shows her how her behaviour can be mended, by parodying her aggression, but also by playing the feminine role — showing her what she should do.
As for Petruchio, the modern spectator can relate much more to his childhood experiences — which are shown to be turbulent with the upbringing by his feckless parents — than to
67 the former portrayal in the original play. This is shown in the scene when he takes Katherine to show her his mansion and gives her a tour inside:
Petruchio: I grew up here
[Petruchio is struggling with opening the door as it is stuck and very rusty]
So did my ancestors. God bless them. There have been Cricks
11
at
Hazlington for three hundred years: fifteen, sixteen generations. Each one more feckless than the last (00:31:22-39).
The BBC’s website explains in more details what Petruchio’s history consists of
12
. In combination with what we hear Petruchio say in the film, we can deduce that he and his ancestors were irresponsible with how they handled money by investing poorly. Petruchio even owes the Inland
Revenue 54000 pound plus interest (00:29:52), hence the ruined state of their mansion. With
Petruchio facing failure and calamity while trying to establish himself, his erratic and peremptory
11 Cricks is the family name. Petruchio is the 16th Earl of Charlbury from which the BBC (see the URL link in the next footnote) narrates that this line comes from the peerage conf. Queen Anne 1703. Petruchio’s parents were late
Rupert Peter Isambard Crick, 15th Earl of Charlbury and late Amelia Sadler-Petts (div. 1975) .
12 With no financial support behind him, the Charlbury fortune having been long since dwindled to nothing through a mixture of ill-management and disastrous investments, the 16th Earl was compelled to seek his fortune where he could find it. A truncated education proved to be ill preparation for this, and was followed by involvement in a number of business ventures which met with varying degrees of failure and calamity. On the social scene, he became a well-known figure, distinguished by his often unusual style of dress for a gentleman. In recent years pressing debts, not least to the Inland Revenue, have led to the 16th Earl living largely abroad. However, the recent death of his father has brought him back to his native land, to the delight no doubt both of polite society and his creditors alike. http://www.bbc.co.uk/drama/shakespeare/tamingoftheshrew/society.shtml

manners of behaving especially with Katherine might hint to his usual way of dealing with peo-
68 ple as he has learned from his upbringing.
We can conclude that we don’t think in the humoural terms now any longer. The main focus in this screen adaptation lies on the gender roles; feminine and masculine. This is a different balance than was used in the Renaissance: that of humours. Behaviour is no longer determined by our diet, sleep and physical complexion, but rather by our environment (such as TV and the internet) and what behaviour we end up copying from our peers. Similarly, our behaviour will also be determined by how we are treated by other people. Conditioned behaviour therefore plays a more important role in modern-day dramatic plays than the behaviour which was deemed to stem from biological imbalances between fluids (or in other words the humoural theory).
Shakespeare’s emphasis over one’s humoural balance has been thus replaced by an emphasis on social roles, social positions, upbringing and role-playing. Yet the essential idea, of an ill-adjusted woman who is socialized, remains more or less intact. Shakespeare offers a fitting equivalent in modern terms to the early modern comedy.
Bianca
Bianca is Katherine’s younger sister and a famous super model. From the beginning of the film we see her as someone who only has an eye for her own needs. She mocks the people who she thinks are less than her or just regards them as objects she can use to achieve what she wants. We can see this in the way she treats Harry, her manager, her sister, and finally in Lucentio. She puts up an act of being very sweet and fabulous, while in fact she is very egocentric. As an illustration, during her lunch with her sister and mother she acts in a very depreciatory manner towards her sister who is spilling her heart out about the “preposterous” plan her fellow party member

69 told her. Bianca calls Katherine a “gawk” (see page 62 of this thesis). She then continues to brag about her wealth and about the number of proposals she has had this week:
Mrs. Minola: I have spent so much money!
Bianca: Good! That’s what it’s for! Rich people have a duty to throw it around. It keeps the economy moving (00:06:09 — 00:06:13)
[…]
Bianca: I’ve had 6 proposals this week
Mrs. Minola: Oh, is that all? [Making a mocking face]
Katherine: Slipping, aren’t we? (00:06:37-40)
Here Katherine ironically says “slipping” at the number six, as Bianca acts all high-and-mighty as she knows that Katherine got no proposals at all. Then two fans ask for Bianca’s autograph via a waiter, which Bianca readily and sweetly accepts to give as if she had not said those awful things before. Another scene where we see Bianca “misbehaving” is when her manager is asking her to marry him. The scene in itself is somewhat awkward, as Bianca is taking a bath while her manager sits next to her. They are talking about Katherine. Their conversation shows how little respect Bianca has for Harry:
Harry:
Bianca:
Do you want to know what I think?
Not really. [She is looking very bored and acts a bit dramatically, she sighs when she is speaking] (00:09:21-23)
[…]

Bianca:
Harry:
Bianca:
Harry:
Bianca:
Harry:
Bianca:
Harry:
Bianca:
Harry:
Bianca:
Harry:
70
Have I asked you to marry me recently? [Looking very desperate and very much pleading with her]
No, not since breakfast time. [Eyes rolling, and putting her champagne down]
What do you say eh? Look come on [He then goes on about how money cannot buy personality, and in his opinion he has a great personality]
I don’t want to see you anymore.
[The intercom is ringing]
You’re expecting someone?
Lucentio
Well, who the f… Who is Lucentio?
That boy I met on the plane.
[Harry walks away to open the door while Bianca hurries from the tub to put on a kimono]
Sorry, I must get my ears tested, ‘cause I could have sworn that you just said…
I don’t need a manager like you anymore. […] I have outgrown you. And
I think it is time for you to stop following me around.
Why have you got an eleven-year-old to come in and see you?
He is nineteen, and he is going to teach me to speak Italian. Can you let him in if you pl… Leave. (00:09:36-00:11:20)

Harry has been the manager of Bianca for twelve years, and in his opinion they are practically
71 engaged. Even though Bianca thinks otherwise and is fed up with him, she should act differently with him. For example, when she knows he is in love with her, she should not let him in while she is taking a bath and then throwing him out when Lucentio comes in — and especially not in the way she said that she had outgrown him. Next, we see Harry saying to Bianca that he will not give her up so easily, which makes Bianca reply that she has no intention to get married. This turn of events is different from the original play, where Bianca takes her chance as soon as she can to get married — as she thinks it to be her ticket to freedom. However, in this film, Bianca knows Katherine has hardly a chance of finding a groom, which is why she says that she will not get married before Katherine does. In the last scene we can see Bianca turning very angry and verbally aggressive as Lucentio is arguing with her about the prenuptial agreement she wants him to sign before they get married. She screams at him:
This is the twenty-first century pal, and it’s time you got on board if you want to hang around with ME.
[That translator is translating her words in Italian to Lucentio]
Lucentio: [in Italian he says that she is insulting him]
[Bianca is ranting on and on while inside the house where Petruchio,
Katherine, Harry and Mrs. Minola are gathered the latter says]
Mrs. Minola: It is a wise precaution signing a prenuptial agreement
[In the meanwhile, Harry does not agree it is a good idea and Bianca comes inside giving her opinion on the whole matter angrily]

Bianca: Uh, but of course it is not wrong. That’s the whole point! Isn’t it
Katherine? It’s perfectly REASONABLE, and OBVIOUS [while rolling
72 her eyes] and sensible and FAIR. Isn’t it?
Katherine: I think you should frown less to begin with, otherwise you’ll put him
Bianca: off. [Saying it rather dryly]
Ah, Well that is priceless coming from you [scoffing]
Katherine: I think that your husband is your lord, and your life, and your keeper.
Bianca: Excuse me??
Katherine: He is your boss. Day in day out he submits his body to painful labour.
Bianca:
Katherine:
No, he doesn’t.
And all that we do is sitting in front of the telly all day eating chocolates. I know I do when I’m not running the country.
Mrs. Minola exclaiming: What is she talking about?! What are you talking about?!
Katherine: I’ve been like you: argumentative, obnoxious, bad-tempered. And what good did it do me? Hey? I think you should do WHATEVER he tells you to do, WHENEVER he tells you to do it. (01:18:52 — 01:21:36)
While Katherine goes on saying how women are weak and such, Bianca scoffs and afterwards rants in a terrible rage. In brief, Bianca’s behaviour has two sides: in front of her fans and mother she is patient and loving, while in front of her sister and Harry she can be mean and vicious. One reason for this behaviour could be that she has been spoilt by her mother for being the youngest on one hand, and being a super model with a high celebrity status on the other hand. This could

have led her to act in an almost childish way every time she does not get what she wants. Com-
73 paring this film to the original play where we see Bianca’s character from a humoural point of view as being phlegmatic then sanguine and then choleric, we can see the sanguine and the choleric attributes coming back in the form of living extravagantly, going primarily after her needs and desires and finally raging on in a wild fury. The phlegmatic qualities might be derived from
Bianca’s act of easy going sweetness that she reserves only for her fans.
Harry
Harry is Petruchio’s friend (aside from being Bianca’s manager) and very desperate to marry
Bianca. When that plan fails, he sets off to find a rich widow, which he finds eventually in Mrs.
Minola. Between Bianca’s harsh refusal and this last scene we see some sides of Harry’s personality and behaviour. From the beginning he is seen as a desperate man who, after Petruchio’s wedding to Katherine, lost hope to marry Bianca — as she states that she is engaged to Lucentio.
While Petruchio and Katherine are on their way to Italy to spend their honeymoon, Harry gets a phone call from Petruchio asking him what he is doing. He replies: “Oh just weighing up the pros and cons of slitting me wrists” (00:51:57 — 00:52:00). This shows how depressed he is from the blow of being refused after he thought for twelve years long that he is in love with
Bianca. Yet again we see him in another light when he arrives in Italy and explains Petruchio’s behaviour to Katherine. He really cares for Petruchio and knows he is a good guy from the heart, but explains the circumstances that made Petruchio behave like that. He clearly feels sorry for
Katherine and tries to oblige her with what she asks of him: cigarettes. He explains that
Petruchio is frightened by not being accepted and that “underneath it all, he’s just an unstable, imbalanced exhibitionist, who needs someone to think the world of him” (01:05:54 — 01:06:18).

Here we see a very sensible Harry who loyally stands by his friend and kindly helps Katherine
74 see Petruchio in the way he really is. However, in the last scene when Harry and Mrs. Minola reveal their engagement to everyone and Mrs. Minola also presses him to sign a prenuptial agreement, we see him cringing back from shock and acting again in a desperate manner. So after all,
Harry too is influenced by his surroundings in how he behaves and in what way his personality develops.
Compared to the original play, Harry who there is named Hortensio is briefly seen as rather melancholic from a humoural point of view. The only similarity between Harry and Hortensio is their friendship to Petruchio and how they introduced the idea of marrying Katherine to him. In the previous chapter, we have analysed Baptista in the light of melancholy as his concerns to marry off his daughters well engulf him in a deep state of sadness. This concern is by now very much outdated, which would not be understood by the public. That is why his character has been deleted altogether from the film. Nevertheless, nowadays melancholy is more considered an attribute for love-sickness which the filmmaker attributed to Harry. As he pines away for Bianca, Harry is shown to be melancholic. Pursuing this further, Mrs. Minola represents the single or widowed rich mother of these days, but still has a very shallow personality in the film.
Therefore, the choice to analyse Harry instead of Mrs. Minola was easily made.
Of course in modern times, viewing something from a humoural point of view is not done any longer— as modern-day screenplay writers tend to view characters from a more social perspective. A perspective that is related to nurture instead of nature and states that an individual’s behaviour is the outcome of the effects of his upbringing as a child and of external factors from the environment, which is a rather common perspective in our modern day. However, a recent article suggests just the opposite: McCrae et. Al show by evidence that “Personality traits, like

75 temperaments are endogenous dispositions that follow intrinsic paths of development essentially independent of environmental influences” (173). In other words, personality traits and temperaments originate from within the body just like endogenous processes originate from within an organism. The idea behind this endogeneity is that external factors no longer are the sole cause for an intrinsic development that could lead to a change in personality or temperament. This seems to contradict the former views — that the environment mainly affects the personality — in the sense that according to the five-factor theory 13 (FFT) of personality that McCrae and Costa came up with, personality is affected rather internally (McCrae et. Al, ). In the figure below, the possible dynamic processes between the basic tendencies and the external influences with relation to
13
Further reading about the FFT can be done in McCrae and Costa’s articles dated from 1999:
McCrae, R. R., & Costa, P. T., Jr. (1999). “A five-factor theory of personality”. In L. Pervin & O. P. John (Eds.),
Handbook of personality (2nd ed., pp. 139-153). New York: Guilford Press.
The five factors have been defined as openness to experience, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism.

76 characteristic adaptations show a circular pattern of interactive effects. The basic tendencies are known as the FFT and we can see that external influences are in no position to influence the biological bases. McCrae et. Al proved that these “basic tendencies follow a pattern of intrinsic maturation, whereas characteristic adaptations respond to the opportunities and incentives of the social environment” (184). This means that external factors such as peers, parents or educators could little affect “the long-term development of personality traits, but they can have an influence on characteristic adaptations [as] traits can be channeled even if they cannot be changed”
(184). Channeling this theory and evidence back to the modern adaptation of Shakespeare’s The
Taming of the Shrew , we can see how through Petruchio Katherine has adopted the right way to behave, in the sense of being a complement to her husband and tolerating him.

Chapter IV: Conclusion
The humours’ theory before the Renaissance period consisted mainly of what Hippocrates and
77 then Galen proposed: four bodily fluids that indicated whether a person was healthy or not. If they are imbalanced, then an illness plagued the body or that person in question would be guilty of an excessive intake of food, drink, sleep or any other external factor which would cause this imbalance. These four fluids, blood, phlegm, black bile, and yellow bile, are produced in the liver, brain and lungs, spleen and gallbladder (liver) respectively. These four fluids correspond with the four humours: blood with sanguine, phlegm with phlegm, black bile with melancholy and yellow bile with choler. During the Renaissance period, humours were ascribed to personalities, mood, and behaviour which could be balanced by the right intake of opposites. For example a choleric person should avoid hot food as choler has this same hot quality, so a choleric person needs cold food. In essence, as Arikha states, sanguine people were believed to have a mental balance, and to be lustful, optimistic, joyous, outgoing and sensuous. A melancholic person was said to be very sad, mad or depressed, while a phlegmatic person was believed to be sluggish in reaction, lazy, apathetic, calm, cold and stoic. A choleric person was on the other hand said to be aggressive, angry, resentful, envious, argumentative, and short tempered.
Shakespeare adhered to the humours’ theory by portraying his stage characters mostly in terms of humours. We can see this quite evidently in the early comedy The Taming of the Shrew , where its heroine Katherina Minola shows choleric qualities in a very profound manner which
Petruchio sets out to tame, converting her to a more phlegmatic person. In the same way, Baptista represents the melancholic person while Bianca shows three humours in consecutive order.
She starts by acting as a phlegmatic person, then she shows her sanguine qualities, and finally she bursts into a choleric behaviour.

78
In BBC’s 2005 adaptation of The Taming of the Shrew in the ShakespeaRe-Told series, a modern version of the play is shown in the form of a TV-film. The characters are mostly the same, but have modern lives, for example Katherine and Bianca both have careers, Baptista is dead but there is a Mrs. Minola who later falls for Bianca’s manager Harry, based on Hortensio.
These characters no longer act in terms of humours, but in terms of modern social theories and conditioned behaviour. We can notice some attributes that fit a type of humour, but know that the causation no longer lies in the imbalance of the fluid itself. For example, Katherine shows choleric attributes with her anger and aggressiveness which is caused by a neglect in attention and love by her mother and sister. Petruchio clearly loves her and “tames” her by mirroring her male dominant and aggressive behaviour with his own feminine behaviour to the point of ridiculing her. She then sees her own behaviour and changes it to a more phlegmatic one. Bianca on the other hand is very egocentric as a supermodel and acts all sweet to her fans and mother, but is very nasty with her sister and Harry, lustful with Lucentio and later on also nasty to Lucentio. So the shift we see is marked with a change of attitude that depends on which person she is dealing with and what she could get out of it. Finally Harry is lovesick and melancholic but eventually hooks up with Mrs. Minola. We also see Harry’s sensible side when he helps Katherine to understand Petruchio’s behaviour. Modern social and psycho-analytic theories explain conditioned behaviour and the influences of factors external to intrinsic personalities. So all in all, we see how both social and gender roles influence the characters’ behaviour instead of the humours.
Originally this thesis was set up to examine two plays by Shakespeare: The Merchant of
Venice and The Taming of the Shrew , but that proved to be more extensive than a normal Master’s thesis should be. So had there been no limitations of word count and time, then a thorough comparison between these two comedies would have been very interesting and fitting. Another

limitation I came across — also caused by lack of space and time — is the elaboration of animated technology used in films to show how different hormones, neurotransmitters and other
79 substances inside the body can cause an imbalance of homeostasis, allostasis or an illness. Then a person’s “humour” could be proven to affect his behaviour and mood. This technique is already shown in detective and medical TV-series such as House, The Mentalist and Bones , but has not been applied to literary classics just yet. As modern-day drama focuses more on past trauma as a cause for a character’s behaviour, which eventually in the producer’s eyes would make for a better story, animation of the modern humours could prove to be revolutionary. All in all, my research concluded that there is still room to renew a literary classic such as The Taming of the
Shrew in a modern way past the overused social theories and gender roles. It would be interesting to also look at the humoural way a character is motivated to behave as affected by internal as external factors which we as spectators could see through animation.

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