Fairies, Fractious Women, and the Old Faith: Fairy Lore in Early Modern British Drama and CultureFairies, unruly women, and vestigial Catholicism constituted a frequently invoked triad in late sixteenth- and early seventeenth-century drama which has seldom been critically examined and therefore constitutes a significant lacuna in scholarly treatments of early modern theater, including the work of Shakespeare. Fairy tradition has lost out in scholarly critical convention to the more masculine mythologies of Christianity and classical Greece and Rome, in which female deities either serve masculine gods or are themselves masculinized (i.e., Diana as a buckskinned warrior). However, the fairy tradition is every bit as significant in our critical attempts to situate early modern texts in their historical contexts as the references to classical texts and struggles associated with state-mandated religious beliefs are widely agreed to be. fairy, rebellious woman, quasi-Catholic trio repeatedly stages resistance to early modern conceptions of appropriate class and gender conduct and state-mandated religion in A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Merry Wives of Windsor, Cymbeline, All's Well That Ends Well, and Ben Jonson's The Alchemist. |
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Page 40
... actors who portrayed them on the stage . Fairies are actors in both senses of the word : they are doers , endlessly in motion , whether it be dancing , cleaning , milking cows , or scattering the contents of the coal hod across the ...
... actors who portrayed them on the stage . Fairies are actors in both senses of the word : they are doers , endlessly in motion , whether it be dancing , cleaning , milking cows , or scattering the contents of the coal hod across the ...
Page 106
... actors on the early modern stage . As the final salvo in the play's consistent interrogation of socially pre- scribed gender roles and the conduct appropriate to them , in the final act two of these boy actors play not only boys playing ...
... actors on the early modern stage . As the final salvo in the play's consistent interrogation of socially pre- scribed gender roles and the conduct appropriate to them , in the final act two of these boy actors play not only boys playing ...
Page 122
... actor , early mod- ern impersonator of women and fairies as well as urban dandies like Dapper , in her discussion of Dapper's reaction to and interaction with his ... actors were children 122 FAIRIES , FRACTIOUS WOMEN , AND THE OLD FAITH.
... actor , early mod- ern impersonator of women and fairies as well as urban dandies like Dapper , in her discussion of Dapper's reaction to and interaction with his ... actors were children 122 FAIRIES , FRACTIOUS WOMEN , AND THE OLD FAITH.
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Alchemist All's ambiguous Ann Jeffries asserts associated audience Belarius Ben Jonson Bertram boy actor Catholic Catholicism changeling Christian Comedy Countess court critics cultural Cymbeline Daemonologie Dapper Demetrius demonic Diana Diane Purkiss discussion disguise Dunlop Early Modern England edited Elizabethan English Essays Faerie fairy belief fairy bride tradition fairy lore fairy queen fairyland Falstaff female feminine Folklore gender roles Guiderius healing Helena Hermia Herne the Hunter heroine human husband Iachimo Imogen invokes James Jeffries's John Jonson Katharine Briggs King Kirk liminal linked Literature London magic male marriage Merry Wives Midsummer Night's Dream midwives Mistress mortal narrative notes Oberon pagan Pitt play play's plot political popular Posthumus Posthumus's Protestant Puck puppet Puritans Reginald Scot Religion Renaissance Robert Routledge scene seventeenth century sexual Shakespeare social sociocultural spirits stage story supernatural theatrical Thomas tion Titania W. W. Greg Wales Welsh wife witchcraft witches Wives of Windsor woman women York