ABSTRACT
The Taming of the Shrew is the third most frequently performed Shakespeare play on the Czech stage: with seventy-eight productions since 1945, it is surpassed only by A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Twelfth Night. In the 2000-1 theatre season, there were no fewer than six Tamings1 country-wide, three competing in Prague alone. These numbers raise an inevitable question: what fuels the cultural interest in one of the most problematic of Shakespeare plays? Diana Henderson has usefully established that the interest in The Taming of the Shrew in Western Europe and North America intensifies at times of growing backlash against feminism.2 The increasing Czech fixation on Katherina and Petruchio’s abusive relationship similarly suggests a deeply rooted reluctance to accept social changes inspired by feminist movements in the West.
