Mojo, The Bard, & Me

 

I cannot tell; but I had as lief take her dowry with this condition,-- to be whipt at the high-cross every morning.

 

-Gremio

The Taming of the Shrew                Act I, Scene i, Line 131

So now, this is the first scene (not including the induction) of the play. Baptista has presented his two daughters and declared that the young one, Bianca, will not be given away in marriage until the older one, Katharina, has been married. Now, Gremio and Hortensio are alone and discussing this. They both want Bianca and both consider Katharina to be a shrew (she is, of course, the titular shrew). However, they have also concluded that if they want to have any chance at Bianca, they’ve got to find a husband for Katharina. This is what Gremio is talking about in today’s line. The her he speaks of is Katharina, and this is how he feels about marrying her. It’s a good line, but I like the first line of Hortensio’s response to this even more: 

    Faith, as you say, there’s small choice in rotten apples.

Honestly, don’t you think you could find a use for that line? It’s akin to the less of two evils when you’re confronted with a situation that has no good alternative. Try it next time you're forced to accept something that you'd rather not.

Dad: Listen buddy, you're not getting the car; you can walk or take the bus. Got it?

Buddy: Well, there's small choice in rotten apples, isn't there Dad?

Oh, yeah. Dad will love you for that response.

 

Okay, I can hear you. You're saying, what the heck is that a picture of, and what could it possibly have to do with today's line. Well, nothing actually. This is a pic of me about thirty years ago playing the campsite game of picking up a paper bag with your teeth and having only one foot touching the ground. Again, no relevance whatsoever to the line. However (oh no, here we go) I was doing a balancing test at a new gym for seniors that I've signed up for, and the best I could do was about fifteen seconds of standing on one foot; that's right, just standing. Forget about bending over, and double-forget about picking up a paper bag with your teeth. So, I was telling the young fellow who was giving me the test (his name is Hunter) about how we used to play this game. I don't think, looking at me do fifteen seconds, that he believed me. Then, by chance, I ran into this photo this morning. 

So, I really had no choice about posting it. Did I?