ABSTRACT
To ask whether the Heuterus-Sly setting came first into the mind of the author of A Shrew and the taming-story later is perhaps an idle question; but there is a fitness in bringing together Sly and the antics ofFerando-Petruchio; for these are eminently suited to the humour of the Tudor plebeian; they make a tale for a tinker. The material is fabliau-stuff, a mocking lesson for a henpecked drunkard who at the end calls his experience 'the bravest dreamc' and goes off home to try his prowess: 'I know now how to tame a shrew.' This aspect of the piece is stressed by the player: 'Tis a good lesson for us, my lord, for us that are married men.'
