I believe that social roles and disguise are an important recurring theme throughout the entire play. The roles are defined by wealth, age, and gender. Each character has a specific social role, and that role determines how they should behave. Their behavior is enforced by their friends, family, and society as a whole. Bianca and Kat are young, upper-class, ladies in waiting. Baptista is their older, upper-class father, looking for someone to marry off his daughters to. Lucentio is a young, wealthy student, and Tranio is his servant. Hortensio is an older, upper-class, male looking for a potential bride. These characters are expected to act appropriately as whom they are, which leads to the introduction of disguise. Certain characters change classes by disguising who they are. Tranio puts on the clothes of a lord and pretends to be Lucentio. Lucentio and Hortensio dress up as working-class tutors to get closer to Bianca. This transformation shows the power of appearance. It only takes a change of clothing for these characters to be seen as members of a completely different social class. On the other hand, Kat tries to reject her social role and shows her frustration to everyone. Instead of disguising herself, she is open about how she feels with her position and what is expected of her. Unfortunately, this is what causes her to be known as the shrew throughout the entire play. People disapprove of her behavior because she does not live up to the expectations society places on her. However, by the end of the play, all of the characters must conform to their original expectations. Tranio must go back to being the servant of Lucentio. Lucentio has to announce who he truly is to Baptista before he can marry Bianca. The most important transformation in the play is that Kat must ultimately submit to Petruchio, whether she wants to be his wife or not. Order is reestablished by the end of play. This shows that in order to truly be happy, one must accept their role in society.
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