Description
In the 1780s and 90s, theatre critics described the stage as a state in political tumult, while politicians invoked theatre as a model for politics both good and bad. In this 2001 study, Betsy Bolton examines the ways Romantic women performers and playwrights used theatrical conventions to intervene in politics. Reading the public performances of Emma Hamilton and Mary Robinson through the conventions of dramatic romance, Bolton suggests that the romance of national identity developed by writers such as Southey and Wordsworth took shape in complex opposition to these unruly women. Setting the conventions of farce against those of sentiment, playwrights such as Hannah Cowley and Elizabeth Inchbald questioned imperial relations while criticizing contemporary gender relations. This well-illustrated study draws on canonical poetry and personal memoirs, popular drama and parliamentary debates, political caricatures and theatrical reviews to extend current understandings of Romantic theatre, the public sphere, and Romantic gender relations.
This 2001 book examines how Romantic women performers and playwrights used theatrical conventions to intervene in politics.
About the Author
Betsy Bolton is Associate Professor of English at Swarthmore College.
Reviews
"This is, perhaps, Bolton's most significant contribution to our understanding of how theater as an enacted medium...held such power in this period." Nineteenth Century Studies
"Entertaining as well as admirably researched; the readings are illuminating, and Bolton delivers an important reminder of the continuing power of the stage in the Romantic era." ASECS Book Reviews Online
"Women, Nationalism, and the Romantic Stage is to be admired for the originality of its contents and the value of its method..well written and clearly organized...While it offers illuminating readings and careful scholarship to be apreciated for their own ends, it is also a book that invites further thinking about larger issues, including definitions of nationalism and the nature of women's political and literary authority within Romanticism." The Wordsworth Circle
Book Information
ISBN 9780521023030
Author Betsy Bolton
Format Paperback
Page Count 292
Imprint Cambridge University Press
Publisher Cambridge University Press
Weight(grams) 445g
Dimensions(mm) 228mm * 154mm * 18mm
This 2001 book examines how Romantic women performers and playwrights used theatrical conventions to intervene in politics.
About the Author
Betsy Bolton is Associate Professor of English at Swarthmore College.
Reviews
"This is, perhaps, Bolton's most significant contribution to our understanding of how theater as an enacted medium...held such power in this period." Nineteenth Century Studies
"Entertaining as well as admirably researched; the readings are illuminating, and Bolton delivers an important reminder of the continuing power of the stage in the Romantic era." ASECS Book Reviews Online
"Women, Nationalism, and the Romantic Stage is to be admired for the originality of its contents and the value of its method..well written and clearly organized...While it offers illuminating readings and careful scholarship to be apreciated for their own ends, it is also a book that invites further thinking about larger issues, including definitions of nationalism and the nature of women's political and literary authority within Romanticism." The Wordsworth Circle
Book Information
ISBN 9780521023030
Author Betsy Bolton
Format Paperback
Page Count 292
Imprint Cambridge University Press
Publisher Cambridge University Press
Weight(grams) 445g
Dimensions(mm) 228mm * 154mm * 18mm
