Shrewridden

In Scylla and Charybdis, prompted by John Eglinton, Stephen associates Shakespeare’s unhappy wedlock with Socrates’ marriage to “A shrew” named Xanthippe, and in Circe he adds a third great man to the club: "We have shrewridden Shakespeare and henpecked Socrates. Even the allwisest Stagyrite was bitted, bridled and mounted by a light of love.” Shakespeare allegedly hated his wife, Anne Hathaway. Socrates was hated by Xanthippe. As for Aristotle (the “Stagyrite”), Stephen is referring to a Renaissance-era misogynistic woodcut that shows Aristotle ridden like a horse by his lover Herpyllis.

Andy Han 2018

Xanthippe Empties the Chamberpot over the Head of Socrates, engraved print in the emblem book Emblemata Horatiana, Imaginibus In Aes Incisis Atque Latino, Germanico, Gallico Et Belgico Carmine Illustrata by Otho Vaenius (1607). Source: Wikimedia Commons.

Aristotle and Phyllis, 1513 woodblock print by Hans Baldung held in the Germanisches Nationalmuseum and in the Louvre. Source: Wikimedia Commons.