17th-century and Restoration Literature

This book studies the cultural and economic status of playwriting in the later 17th and early 18th centuries, and argues that the period was a decisive one in the transition from Renaissance conceptions of authorship towards modern ones. In Shakespeare's time, creative originality and independence of voice had been little prized. Playwrights had appropriated materials from earlier writings with little censure, while the practice of collaboration among dramatists had been taken for granted. The book demonstrates that, in the decades following the Restoration, those attitudes were challenged by new conceptions of dramatic art, which required authors to be the sole begetters of their works. This book explores a series of developments in the theatrical marketplace that increased both the rewards and the prestige of the dramatist, and shows the Restoration period to have been one of serious and animated debate about the methods of playwriting. Against that background, the book offers a fresh account of the formation of the canon of English drama, revealing how the moderns — Dryden, Otway, Lee, Behn, and then their successors Congreve, Vanbrugh, and Farquhar — acquired an esteem equal, even superior, to their illustrious predecessors Shakespeare, Jonson, and Fletcher.

This magisterial work forms a close critical study of all the surviving plays first written and professionally premiered in England between 1660 and 1700. The author's readable volume analyses many texts, often in detail and for the first time, and also places them within the range of contemporary theatrical output, with its diversity of outlook and constant shifts in fashion and subject. The Country-Wife and The Man of Mode are treated not as typical ‘Restoration Comedies’ but as almost unique plays. The book also presents innovative work on the political, intellectual, and social background of the corpus, with extensive discussion of its treatment of women and the contribution of women dramatists.

This study is the first systematic exploration of Racine's theatricality. It is based on a close examination of all Racine's plays and on evidence for performance of them from the seventeenth century to the present day. The author considers, with the help of illustrations, the relationship between verbal and visual effects. He shows how the decor in plays such as Andromaque, Britannicus, and Berenice is significant for the action, and indicates the rich, often symbolic implication of stage properties and physical gestures, particularly in Mithridate, Phedre, and Athalie. Racine's usually neglected single comedy, Les Plaideurs, is shown to cast light on the theatrical language of his eleven tragedies. Some familiar topics of tragedy — moral ambiguity, error, and transcendence — emerge in a fresh light, and the concept of the tragic genre is critically examined from the theatrical standpoint. This study challenges many long-established views of Racine and lays the foundation for a reassessment of his role in French drama. It also opens new perspectives on his relationship with dramatists writing in other languages.

Restoration Theatre and Crisis is a seminal study of the drama of the Restoration, in particular that of the Popish Plot and Exclusion Crisis. This was a time of unprecedented political partisanship in the theatre. This book considers all the known plays of this period, including works by Dryden and Behn, in their historical context. It examines the complex ways in which the drama both reflected and intervened in the political process, at a time when the crisis fractured an already fragile post-interregnum consensus, and modern party political methods first began to develop.