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Petruchio and Baptista, Lines 111-138
Performance Videos
Act 2,
Scene 1
Lines 111-138

Petruchio and Baptista perform lines 111-138 of Act 2, Scene 1 of myShakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew. 

myShakespeare | Taming of the Shrew 2.1 Performance: Petruchio and Baptista, Lines 111-138

Petruchio

Signor Baptista, my business asketh haste,    
And every day I cannot come to woo.    
You knew my father well, and in him me,    
Left solely heir to all his lands and goods,    
Which I have bettered rather than decreased.
Then tell me, if I get your daughter's love,
What dowry shall I have with her to wife?

Baptista

After my death the one half of my lands,
And in possession twenty thousand crowns.    

Petruchio

And for that dowry I'll assureof    
Her widowhood — be it that she survive me —
In all my lands and leases whatsoever.
Let specialties be therefore drawn between us,    
That covenants may be kept on either hand.    

Baptista

Ay, when the special thing is well obtained,
That is, her love — for that is all in all.    

Petruchio

Why, that is nothing. For I tell you, father,    
I am as peremptory as she proud-minded, 
And where two raging fires meet together
They do consume the thing that feeds their fury.
Though little fire grows great with little wind,
Yet extreme gusts will blow out fire and all.
So I to her, and so she yields to me,
For I am rough and woo not like a babe.

Baptista

Well mayst thou woo, and happy be thy speed!    
But be thou armed for some unhappy words.

Petruchio

Ay, to the proof, as mountains are for winds,    
That shake not, though they blow perpetually.