Posted:
[09 Nov/14]
ok, this isn't a drabble...whatever XD
i love shakespeare's the taming of the shrew; it's misogynistic and hateful on the surface, but i will argue it's quite subversive, and kate actually kind of wins in the end. the only thing is, i don't think ol' shakey went far enough in showing kate's mastery of petruchio, so here's a parallel version of abhigya, with a more obviously bosstastic heroine ;)
i'm not a big fan of the purab-bulbul pairing and i have a soft spot for suresh, so i resisted this idea for a long time, but eventually i got over myself, because really, there is no more perfect parallel for lucentio/bianca than purab/bulbul! and suresh makes a picture perfect hortensio (let's all imagine someone breaking a lute over his head...!).
and according to the play's relations, in this parallel abhi should be suresh's friend, not purab's, but i've changed that because...i can :P
enjoy and let me know what you think!!
originally posted here at AbhiGya AT #40
THE TAMING OF THE ROCKSTAR!!!
dramatis personae
signior bautista -> sarla maa: a marriage-minded parent who will not consent to the younger daughter's betrothal until the older daughter is safely wedded
katharina -> pragya: the "unmarriageable" older daughter with a mind of her own and a sharp tongue
bianca -> bulbul: the beautiful and bratty younger daughter who has a bad habit of dangling men from her fingers, but you can't blame her, she's been bred for it, she's just too beautiful
hortensio -> suresh: the cloddish, scholarly middle-aged-ish next door neighbour who is foolishly in love with the beautiful younger daughter
lucentio -> purab: the gorgeous young visiting scholar who falls for bb, and she falls for him in return quite quickly
petruchio -> abhi: the brash, macho, larger-than-life older friend of purab who is muchly in need of a wife and willing to take on a challenge, especially when it comes with a handsome dowry like sarla maa's marriage hall! (not that he would misuse it, he has wealth of his own, but a driven man is always looking for new business acquisitions, and he'd love to have his name attached to such a thriving business)
THE PLOT
purab falls hard and fast for bulbul. to get close to her, he offers himself to sarla maa as a music tutor. meanwhile suresh has a similar idea, and in disguise he too acts as a tutor for bulbul.
when purab finds out that bb won't be able to marry until pragya does, he remember his bhai jaise dost abhi is on the hunt for a bride. he calls him to town and explains the situation. abhi likes the idea of being the one to win the unwinnable woman, and once he catches a glimpse of pragya's snapping eyes behind her dowdy glasses, he decides he definitely wants to marry her.
sarla maa is thrilled when abhi brings a formal proposal, and no one seems to care that pragya isn't into it. pragya and abhi get into battles of wit from their very first meeting, and abhi secretly finds it hard to keep up with her wicked tongue, while pragya is reluctantly impressed that he does a pretty good job of returning her sallies. also, she's a bit distracted because she responds to him on a physical level that she's never felt with anyone before.
even though she resents the idea of being married off, and even though she has huge doubts of mannerless abhi's suitability as a husband, pragya eventually decides that it can't be worse than continuing to live at home under sarla maa's tyrannical temper. she loves her mother, she really does, but they've never really understood each other, and maybe it really is time for her to fly the coop.
the abhigya marriage happens with saare dhoom dhaam that you would expect, except that abhi has an awful undergame. he likes pragya very much but he wants an obedient, well-handled wife, and he decides the way to achieve that is to make her put up with the worst of him from the very beginning. so he arrives late to the wedding, and acts drunk, and in general offends all and sundry with his bad behaviour. and pragya is embarrassed out of her mind but it's too late to back out of it, and eventually the deed is done.
abhi whisks her away from the reception as soon as the pheres are done - the others have fun partying without them, and the bb/purab/suresh antics continue with madcap hijinks in the background. he takes her on a long and arduous journey to his country mansion, during which he argues with her on nonsense points until she starts agreeing with him just to get him to shut up. and once he gets there he throws all kinds of fits and doesn't let her eat or sleep because "nothing here is good enough for my wife you lazy scoundrels ROBIN KAMCHOR KAMINEY DO A BETTER JOB RIGHT NOW."
pragya is frustrated beyond words and worries that she's married a madman and now there's no way out of it, but eventually she calms down enough to realize what he's trying to do, and then she comes up with an undergame of her own
THE TWIST
pragya is not the type to be controlled or handled or tamed by anyone, thank you very much, and she turns abhi's trick back on him by suddenly becoming the most docile and servile wife that ever was. when he finally concedes that his servants have done an adequate job, she intervenes and says no no no, no one could do a better job than she can, and then she makes him wait even more hours for dinner and freshly laundered clothes and a toasty bed to sleep in. also she very prettily tells him that she absolutely understands that he has his rights and she is very willing for him to assert them, only please can they wait a few more days because erm it's kind of the wrong time of the month :S (this is a lie, but pragya knows what she's doing, and it's a lie with purpose)
abhi is no match for a plotting pragya, and her sweet wife act soon overwhelms him. his outsize temper and his exaggerated overbearing act fade away, and he turns kind of goofy as he gets used to pragya taking care of him.
over the next week they slowly build an understanding of each other as equals, and the basis emerges for a truly successful marriage to last many decades to come...but she still finds excuses for why they can't be man-and-wife yet, because day by day she learns more clearly that the best way to control him is through his appetites...
in the second week after their marriage they have to return to town for bb's engagement to purab, which is almost a non-event fiasco due to purab's nonsensical hidden-identity-as-a-tutor scheme, but abhi saves the day at the last minute, because he's the hero and also sarla's perfect damaad. everyone is incredibly amazed at pragya's seeming transformation into the perfect wife. sarla cries histrionic tears of maternal pride that she really has no right to, but pragya is beyond arguing with her mother's hypocrisy and simply accepts the compliments and affection that had heretofore been reserved for perfect bb. meanwhile suresh is sad flop in a corner, thinking about how he didn't win bb after all, and how he could've had a chance with pragya but he'd never known she could be so appealing.
just when abhi is getting bored partying with the gaonwaalon, someone proposes a bet for a contest to see whose wife is most obedient. abhi knows pragya would win by a mile but he's not stupid enough to bet on her as if she were a horse or a dog, so he declines. the other men make fun of him but then pragya comes and whispers in his ear that they should go home, now, because it's the right time of the month, and it would be a safe bet that neither of them cared for many weeks what anyone had to say about them anymore...
and then they lived happily ever after! :D
EXEUNT & END SCENE!
ok, this isn't a drabble...whatever XD
i love shakespeare's the taming of the shrew; it's misogynistic and hateful on the surface, but i will argue it's quite subversive, and kate actually kind of wins in the end. the only thing is, i don't think ol' shakey went far enough in showing kate's mastery of petruchio, so here's a parallel version of abhigya, with a more obviously bosstastic heroine ;)
i'm not a big fan of the purab-bulbul pairing and i have a soft spot for suresh, so i resisted this idea for a long time, but eventually i got over myself, because really, there is no more perfect parallel for lucentio/bianca than purab/bulbul! and suresh makes a picture perfect hortensio (let's all imagine someone breaking a lute over his head...!).
and according to the play's relations, in this parallel abhi should be suresh's friend, not purab's, but i've changed that because...i can :P
enjoy and let me know what you think!!
originally posted here at AbhiGya AT #40
THE TAMING OF THE ROCKSTAR!!!
dramatis personae
signior bautista -> sarla maa: a marriage-minded parent who will not consent to the younger daughter's betrothal until the older daughter is safely wedded
katharina -> pragya: the "unmarriageable" older daughter with a mind of her own and a sharp tongue
bianca -> bulbul: the beautiful and bratty younger daughter who has a bad habit of dangling men from her fingers, but you can't blame her, she's been bred for it, she's just too beautiful
hortensio -> suresh: the cloddish, scholarly middle-aged-ish next door neighbour who is foolishly in love with the beautiful younger daughter
lucentio -> purab: the gorgeous young visiting scholar who falls for bb, and she falls for him in return quite quickly
petruchio -> abhi: the brash, macho, larger-than-life older friend of purab who is muchly in need of a wife and willing to take on a challenge, especially when it comes with a handsome dowry like sarla maa's marriage hall! (not that he would misuse it, he has wealth of his own, but a driven man is always looking for new business acquisitions, and he'd love to have his name attached to such a thriving business)
THE PLOT
purab falls hard and fast for bulbul. to get close to her, he offers himself to sarla maa as a music tutor. meanwhile suresh has a similar idea, and in disguise he too acts as a tutor for bulbul.
when purab finds out that bb won't be able to marry until pragya does, he remember his bhai jaise dost abhi is on the hunt for a bride. he calls him to town and explains the situation. abhi likes the idea of being the one to win the unwinnable woman, and once he catches a glimpse of pragya's snapping eyes behind her dowdy glasses, he decides he definitely wants to marry her.
sarla maa is thrilled when abhi brings a formal proposal, and no one seems to care that pragya isn't into it. pragya and abhi get into battles of wit from their very first meeting, and abhi secretly finds it hard to keep up with her wicked tongue, while pragya is reluctantly impressed that he does a pretty good job of returning her sallies. also, she's a bit distracted because she responds to him on a physical level that she's never felt with anyone before.
even though she resents the idea of being married off, and even though she has huge doubts of mannerless abhi's suitability as a husband, pragya eventually decides that it can't be worse than continuing to live at home under sarla maa's tyrannical temper. she loves her mother, she really does, but they've never really understood each other, and maybe it really is time for her to fly the coop.
the abhigya marriage happens with saare dhoom dhaam that you would expect, except that abhi has an awful undergame. he likes pragya very much but he wants an obedient, well-handled wife, and he decides the way to achieve that is to make her put up with the worst of him from the very beginning. so he arrives late to the wedding, and acts drunk, and in general offends all and sundry with his bad behaviour. and pragya is embarrassed out of her mind but it's too late to back out of it, and eventually the deed is done.
abhi whisks her away from the reception as soon as the pheres are done - the others have fun partying without them, and the bb/purab/suresh antics continue with madcap hijinks in the background. he takes her on a long and arduous journey to his country mansion, during which he argues with her on nonsense points until she starts agreeing with him just to get him to shut up. and once he gets there he throws all kinds of fits and doesn't let her eat or sleep because "nothing here is good enough for my wife you lazy scoundrels ROBIN KAMCHOR KAMINEY DO A BETTER JOB RIGHT NOW."
pragya is frustrated beyond words and worries that she's married a madman and now there's no way out of it, but eventually she calms down enough to realize what he's trying to do, and then she comes up with an undergame of her own
THE TWIST
pragya is not the type to be controlled or handled or tamed by anyone, thank you very much, and she turns abhi's trick back on him by suddenly becoming the most docile and servile wife that ever was. when he finally concedes that his servants have done an adequate job, she intervenes and says no no no, no one could do a better job than she can, and then she makes him wait even more hours for dinner and freshly laundered clothes and a toasty bed to sleep in. also she very prettily tells him that she absolutely understands that he has his rights and she is very willing for him to assert them, only please can they wait a few more days because erm it's kind of the wrong time of the month :S (this is a lie, but pragya knows what she's doing, and it's a lie with purpose)
abhi is no match for a plotting pragya, and her sweet wife act soon overwhelms him. his outsize temper and his exaggerated overbearing act fade away, and he turns kind of goofy as he gets used to pragya taking care of him.
over the next week they slowly build an understanding of each other as equals, and the basis emerges for a truly successful marriage to last many decades to come...but she still finds excuses for why they can't be man-and-wife yet, because day by day she learns more clearly that the best way to control him is through his appetites...
in the second week after their marriage they have to return to town for bb's engagement to purab, which is almost a non-event fiasco due to purab's nonsensical hidden-identity-as-a-tutor scheme, but abhi saves the day at the last minute, because he's the hero and also sarla's perfect damaad. everyone is incredibly amazed at pragya's seeming transformation into the perfect wife. sarla cries histrionic tears of maternal pride that she really has no right to, but pragya is beyond arguing with her mother's hypocrisy and simply accepts the compliments and affection that had heretofore been reserved for perfect bb. meanwhile suresh is sad flop in a corner, thinking about how he didn't win bb after all, and how he could've had a chance with pragya but he'd never known she could be so appealing.
just when abhi is getting bored partying with the gaonwaalon, someone proposes a bet for a contest to see whose wife is most obedient. abhi knows pragya would win by a mile but he's not stupid enough to bet on her as if she were a horse or a dog, so he declines. the other men make fun of him but then pragya comes and whispers in his ear that they should go home, now, because it's the right time of the month, and it would be a safe bet that neither of them cared for many weeks what anyone had to say about them anymore...
and then they lived happily ever after! :D
EXEUNT & END SCENE!
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