Todd and "find the love"

Katherine and Bianca Find the Love (Todd Douglas)

Katherina’s relationship with her family is one of the most complicated and important relationships in the entire play. The violence she shows towards her sister and father is shown in this scene (Act 2 Scene 1). The scene begins with Katherina dragging her sister, Bianca, in with her arms bound. Her sister pleads with her to let her go. Bianca offers her anything, even one of her suitors. This rather angers Katherina when Bianca implies that Katherina is envious of her. While, of course, this may be true, Katherina would never admit it. It’s implied that her father’s favorite is Bianca. Baptista, Bianca and Katherina father, comes in and breaks up the fight. Instantly he takes the side of Bianca, without even asking what happen. (It also seems that isn’t the first altercation like this between the sisters) He lashes out at Katherina without a second thought, saying things like “For shame, thou hilding of a devilish spirit!” Katherina, not one to hold her tongue, responds with this:

What, will you not suffer me? Nay, now I see

She is your treasure, she must have a husband,

I must dance barefoot on her wedding day

And, for your love to her, lead apes in hell.

Talk not to me. I will go sit and weep

Till I can find occasion of revenge. (2.1.lines?)

This speech is important not only because it shows how Katherina feels about Baptista obvious favoritism of Bianca, but it also shows that Katherina cares. She loves her father and acts out (some of the time) to get his attention. This, in turn, pushes him away, sadly. She cares because she wants him to hear her side, to understand her. Up to this point, when other people called her horrible names and said very mean things about her she shrugged them off or responded to them with an insult of her own. Here she actually responds to him, not with an insult but with her raw emotion. She’s in pain. She actually says “I will go sit and weep.” This is interesting because it showed a new layer to Katherina character that hadn’t been explored up to this point. It actually gave a more rounded view of the character that wasn’t seen in the first act.