Comparing the Characters
What is a character? How are characters are important in a story? How are do the actions of the characters shape the plot in the story? Comprehension is a huge part of learning for fourth grade standards, and one of the objectives of this unit is to understand that characters have traits, actions have motivations, and motivations can change the plot of the story. With this unit I am planning on comparing the Navajo Oral Creation story about Bear Maiden and Coyote with characters in Taming of the Shrew, and Othello. The characters in both stories have motivations that influence the outcome of the plot. The interesting thing here is that the male characteristic traits are consistent throughout the stories. However, the characteristics of both the Tingling Woman and Katharina change drastically—while for that matter the character of Desdemona seems to change in Othello’s eyes.
The main characters I will focus on for this unit are Bear Maiden and Coyote, comparing and contrasting their traits and motivations with those of Kate in Taming of Shrew and Iago in Othello. The objective of the unit is that the students will not only compare and contrast character traits, but learn that motivation is a powerful tool for changing the course of action of the characters.
The lesson will begin with introducing the female characters. First I will read the section of the Bear Maiden where she is being courted by the coyote. Although the Tingling Woman had numerous admirers, she had no interest in marrying any of them. She often challenged her admirers with impossible tasks to keep them at bay. The pertinent characteristic of Tingling Woman is that she is an independent strong woman who was happy in her current state. In Navajo culture and history, it was the custom to marry off young women at a young age to any man who would present a dowry. The woman was expected to be docile and obedient to her husband, and to become completely devoted to her husband. He comes first before her family, and becomes the single most important individual in her life. A woman creates a home life that includes taking care of the husband by cooking for and feeding him, keeping the household clean, and bearing children for her husband. Tingling Woman’s duty and devotion before she succumbed to the Coyote had been to her brothers, but then to the Coyote after she has married him. How is this similar to and different from the character of Kate in Taming of the Shrew?
The following excerpt from Taming of the Shrew gives a small but powerful glimpse of the characteristics of Kate.
Baptista. Gentlemen, importune me no farther,
For how I firmly am resolved you know,
That is, not to bestow my youngest daughter
Before I have a husband for the elder.
If either of you both love Katherina,
Because I know you well and love you well,
Leave shall you have to court her at your pleasure.
Gremio. To cart her rather. She’s too rough for me.
There, there, Hortensio, will you any wife?
Kate. I pray you, sir, is it your will
To make a stale of me amongst these mates?
Hortensio. Mates, maid? How mean you that? No mates for you
Unless you were of gentler, milder mold.
Kate. I’ faith, sir, you shall never need to fear:
Iwis it is not halfway to her heart.
But if it were, doubt not her care should be
To comb your noddle with a three-legged stool
And paint your face and use you like a fool.
Hortensio. From all such devils, good Lord deliver us!1
Like the Tingling Woman, Kate is a strong independent woman who has no interest in marriage. However, marriage was imperative for young ladies. The pressure to get married for Kate was more for the sake of cultural expectations than for the betterment of her situation. Kate used her hot tempered and aggressive nature as a defense. She often spoke her mind and was not afraid to argue her point. Her defense was what kept any chance of having a male suitor unlikely. These would be some of the observations I would like my students to make after watching a clip of the Elizabeth Taylor movie with the excerpt from the play. Because these are fourth graders, I would not expect them to understand the excerpt from Shakespeare. We will read the passage from the graphic novel. The graphic novel I selected is transcribed into modern plain English, the type of English narrative that my fourth grade ELL students will be able to comprehend. Then we will go back and discuss what kind of characteristics they believe that Kate has, and what are some possible motivations. Other questions may include, is she interested in marriage? Why or why not? Then the students will watch the clip with the previous excerpt from Taming of the Shrew. I will ask them again what words in the passage might suggest her characteristics and motivations. Once the students establish character traits and motivation, I will read them the beginning story of Maiden Bear, when she was still known as Tingling Woman. Once I read them that section, the students will discuss how Tingling Woman is similar to and how she is different from Kate. What characteristics do they share? Are their motivations similar?
Although the Tingling Woman had numerous admirers, she had no interest in marrying any of them. She often challenged her admirers with impossible tasks to keep them at bay. In Taming of Shrew, Kate like the bear maiden was not interested in marriage. The characteristic she used for her defense was to be hot tempered and aggressive. These are characteristics of the two maids that will be explored. Although their characteristics are quite different, the bottom line is that both ladies did not want to be married and used different defenses to keep admirers at bay.
When the two ladies decided after all that they did want to get married, that created an opening for to how to ‘tame’ them. With both ladies, their defenses were completely shattered by characters with whom, at the beginning they were not in love, but characters who loved the idea of winning a challenge owing to their own set of motivations.
When the two ladies do get “tamed,” how do their traits differ from those they had at the beginning? More evidence of the characteristics of both the Tingling Woman and Kate will be explored as we read Saddleback’s Illustrated Classics of Taming of the Shrew. At the end of the story, are they still the same? How did Tingling Woman completely change by the time her story ends?
The other characters I want to compare are Coyote in Bear Maiden story, and Iago of Othello. These characters are more complex than their female counterparts, but are more transparent in their intent. Iago and Coyote have traits that are devious in nature from the beginning all the way to the end of their stories. The motivation of Iago is revenge arising from envy. His devious nature allows him to plot and move the others as pawns as though they were on a chess board. A sociopath, he had no qualms about who he hurt or who he used to plot his revenge. His ultimate goal was to destroy Othello. Coyote is also devious, but at the beginning of the story he uses cunning without malice to trick Tingling Woman into becoming his wife. Once he had his wife, his characteristics and motivation then became foolishly boastful, and that got him killed.
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