Vinegar Girl by Anne Tyler (Hogarth Shakespeare, 2016; Random House Audio, Kirsten Potter, reader)- In 40 words or less: A commissioned reimagining of Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew in novel form. Kate is a preschool teacher’s assistant “encouraged” to marry her scientist father’s research assistant before his visa expires.
- Genre: Fiction
- Locale: Baltimore
- Time: Contemporary
- Read this if you are interested reading each of the eight titles in the Hogarth modern retelling of Shakespeare’s classics.
Fair warning, I rarely opt to share my opinion on a title I can’t wholeheartedly recommend. I am making an exception having had multiple occasions in the last two weeks to consider different treatments of Shakespeare’s works. My post, ‘The fascination with Shylock’, gives a taste of my Shakespearian interactions.
Modernizing classic literature for contemporary audiences is far from new. West Side Story and Kiss Me Kate have engaged many who otherwise would have been put off by Shakespeare’s language. Film marathons could be devoted to treatments of Romeo and Juliet or Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. In the spirit of finding new audiences via modern retellings by acclaimed authors, Hogarth Press has created a new series, Hogarth Shakespeare.
A week ago, we saw The Shakespeare Theatre Company‘s all-male version of The Taming of the Shrew, the final production of the 2015-16 season. In brief, while
there were some wonderful acting performances, the shtick of the all-male casting often overtook the production. In another Shakespeare foray, prep for my book groups for next program year has made Howard Jacobson’s My Name is Shylock, his fresh look at The Merchant of Venice, courtesy of Hogarth, a preferred pick.
The third entry in the Hogarth series is Anne Tyler’s Vinegar Girl, released earlier this month. Tyler is renowned for her Baltimore-based novels of quirky family life. In theory, bringing Shakespeare’s tale of two daughters to a classic American city could give the story a different, yet spicy flavor. Anne Tyler ability to share the quirkiness of “regular” families makes her one of America’s beloved authors. In this novel, Tyler doesn’t take full advantage of the opportunity, creating a family most notable for its stultifying routine.
Thanks to Random House Audio, I had the chance to listen to Kirsten Potter’s reading of Vinegar Girl. To her credit, Potter aptly gave voice to the personality traits Anne Tyler imparted to her characters. Among the funniest characters are those least seen – Kate’s aunt and uncle that each have unique roles to play in the nuptials.
Kate and Bunny Battista are mere shadows of Kate and Bianca Minola. Kate Battista is rather aimless for a 29-year-old daughter of a widowed college professor – she’s dropped out of college and is barely hanging on to her job in a preschool with no real friends. Her off-hours are spent preparing the same one-pot meal to cover dinners for the entire week, doing her family’s laundry and criticizing her beautiful-but-empty-headed high school student sister.
Dr. Battista is in a quandary. He is concerned about continuing funding for transformative research involving rats. He seems on the cusp of a breakthrough but is faced with losing his assistant, Pyotr, whose three-year visa is about to expire. Battista’s solution is to have Kate marry him. Battista intends it be a marriage of convenience, creating pictures on his phone to convince ICE that it is a love match. Dad’s plan would have Pyotr moving into a (separate) bedroom in Battista household and Kate continuing with her domestic roles. Unlike Shakespeare’s Petruchio, Pytor is neither brash nor wealthy. In his somewhat awkward yet genuine way, he undertakes to woo Kate in furtherance of the scheme.
While Kate is hardly a warm, creative and altruistic figure, she is far from the obstinate and feisty character in Shakespeare’s play. The secondary characters at her preschool might make anyone a bit churlish. And Bunny’s high school infatuation with the boy next door hardly qualifies as the string of suitors set to marry Bianca as soon as Kate is married off.
For the modern reader or theatergoer, the treatment of Kate as little more than chattel is at best troublesome. Tyler hasn’t reached sufficiently beyond this in her novel. For its many failings as a modern comedy, the one aspect of the Shakespeare’s play that provides some relief is the comic changing/mistaken identities. While it may be an overused device across the body of Shakespeare’s work, having this twist might have added a comedic lift to Vinegar Girl.
To the good, it is genuine affection between Pyotr and Kate that carries the day in the end, rather than submission. Given such broad license with The Taming of the Shrew, I expected more.
by 