Drama of the English Republic, 16491660

Plays and entertainments

By (author) Janet Clare

Hardback - £85.00

Publication date:

16 May 2002

Length of book:

328 pages

Publisher

Manchester University Press

Dimensions:

216x138mm

ISBN-13: 9780719044823

Drama of the English Republic' is the first modern collection of plays and entertainments which were originally published and performed when England was a nominally a republic or commonwealth. The five texts, three of which have been edited here for the first time, illustrate how the dramatists devised new aesthetics in response to the ideological concerns of the republic. Clare argues that theatre, forced into a novel position of opposition, did more than survive in reduced form. The theatrical organism adapted to contain folk celebrations, current events and pamphlets, as well as 'royalist' plays offering oblique critiques of Caroline policies.