Taming of the Shrew

Petruchio: Good morrow, Kate; for that’s your name, I hear.

Well have you heard, but something hard of hearing: They call me Katharina that do talk of me.

Petruchio: You lie, in faith: you are call’d plain Kate,

And bonny Kate and sometimes Kate the curst;

But Kate, the prettiest Kate in Christendom

Take this of me, Kate of my consolation;

Hearing thy mildness praised in every town,

Thy virtues spoke of, and thy beauty sounded,

Myself am moved to woo thee for my wife.

Moved! In good time: let him that moved you hither

Remove you hence: I knew you at the first

You were a moveable.

Petruchio: Why, what’s a moveable?

A join’d stool.

Petruchio: Thou hast hit it: come, sit on me.

Asses are made to bear, and so are you.

Petruchio: Women are made to bear, and so are you.

No such jade as you, if me you mean.

Petruchio: Alas! good Kate, I will not burden thee;

For, knowing thee to be but young and light—

Too light for such a Swain as you to catch;

And yet as heavy as my weight should be.

Petruchio: Should be! Should— buzz!

Well ta’en, and like a buzzard.

Petruchio: O slow-wing’d turtle! Shall a buzzard take thee?

Ay, for a turtle, as he takes a buzzard.

Petruchio: Come, come, you wasp; I’faith, you are too angry.

If I be waspish, best beware my sting.

Petruchio: My remedy is then, to pluck it out.

Ay, if the fool could find it where it lies,

Petruchio: Who knows not where a wasp does

wear his sting? In his tail.

In his tongue.

Petruchio: Whose tongue?

Yours, if you talk of tails: and so farewell.

Petruchio: What, with my tongue in your tail? nay, come again,

Good Kate; I am a gentleman.

That I’ll try.

Petruchio: I swear I’ll cuff you if you strike again.

So you may lose your arms:

If you strike me, you are no gentleman;

And if no gentleman, why then no arms.

Petruchio: Nay, come, Kate, come; you must not look so sour.

It is my fashion when I see a crab.

Petruchio:Why, here’s no crab; and therefore look not sour.

There is, there is.

Petruchio: Then show it to me.

Had I a glass, I would.

Petruchio: What, you mean my face?

Well aim’d of such a young one.

Petruchio: Now, by Saint George, I am too young for you.

Yet you are wither’d.

Petruchio: ‘Tis with cares.

I care not.

Petruchio: Nay, hear you, Kate: in sooth you scape not so.

I chafe you, if I tarry: let me go.