Women and playwriting in nineteenth-century Britain

Bibliographic Information

Women and playwriting in nineteenth-century Britain

edited by Tracy C. Davis and Ellen Donkin

Cambridge University Press, 1999

  • : hbk
  • : pbk

Other Title

Women and playwriting in 19th century Britain

Available at  / 11 libraries

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Note

Includes bibliographical references and index

Contents of Works

  • The sociable playwright and representative citizen / Tracy C. Davis
  • To be public as a genius and private as a woman / Gay Gibson Cima
  • Mrs. Gore gives tit for tat / Ellen Donkin
  • Jane Scott, the writer/manager / Jacky Bratton
  • Illusions of authorship / Jane Moody
  • Sarah Lane / Jim Davis
  • Staging the state / Beth H. Friedman-Romell
  • The lady playwrights and the wild tribes of the East / Heidi J. Holder
  • From a female pen / Katherine Newey
  • Genre trouble / Susan Bennett
  • Sappho in the closet / Denise A. Walen
  • Conflicted politics and circumspect comedy / Susan Carlson

Description and Table of Contents

Description

Why does historical memory exclude nineteenth-century women playwrights when hundreds worked prolifically across the spectrum of professional theatre, amateur theatricals, and publishing? What might it mean to adjust the collective focus of cultural historians and literary critics so that these women can come into view? This collection of essays, written by a team of leading scholars in the field, undertakes not simply to recover the names and careers of women playwrights but to call into question the whole idea of what a playwright is, and what she does, and why it matters. Gender inquiry is the start: destabilising the category of playwrights loosens the borders of theatre history, making it possible to reconceptualize theatre and drama not as a product of culture but as social processes dynamically interacting with culture.

Table of Contents

  • List of illustrations
  • List of contributors
  • Acknowledgments
  • Introduction Tracy C. Davis and Ellen Donkin
  • Part I. In Judgment: 1. The sociable playwright and representative citizen Tracy C. Davis
  • 2. 'To be public as a genius and private as a woman': the critical framing of nineteenth-century British women playwrights Gay Gibson Cima
  • 3. Mrs Gore gives tit-for-tat Ellen Donkin
  • Part II. Wrighting the Play: 4. Jane Scott the writer/manager Jacky Bratton
  • 5. Illusions of authorship Jane Moody
  • 6. Sara Lane: questions of authorship Jim Davis
  • Part III. Staging the State: Joanna Baillie's 'Constantine Paleologus' Beth H. Freidman-Romell
  • 8. 'The Lady Playwrights' and 'The Wild Tribes of the East': female dramatists in the East End theatres, 1860-80 Heidi J. Holder
  • 9. 'From a female pen': the proper lady as playwright in the West End theatre, 1823-44 Katherine Newey
  • Part IV. Genre Trouble: 10. Genre trouble: Joanna Baillie, Elizabeth Polack - tragic subjects, melodramatic subjects Susan Bennett
  • 11. Sappho in the closet Denise A. Walen
  • 12. Conflicted politics and circumspect comedy: women's comic playwriting in the 1890s Susan Carlson
  • Index.

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