Did you know that books of jokes and amusing tales were a popular staple of early modern English literature? In addition to published collections, people put together their own, like the one discussed in this article. Although "teller of jokes at private dinners" may not fall in the usual image of dramatic performers, at least this article is vastly redeemed by an anecdote illustrating that ordinary women were wearing mascjuline clothing for active pursuits on occasion.
LHMP
Blog entry
This takes care of the less pertinent articles in the collection. There's one more article that to post from this collection, but it has enough interesting bits to get its own day.
Interesting, but not pertinent to my present purposes.
Margaret Cavendish is a fascinating person and even has her own tag in the Project. but this article isn't directly relevant to my interests.
I did warn folks that there are a handful of articles in this collection that both strain the book's premise and aren't pertinent to the background research for the "Stage and Actresses" tropes episode. This is one of them. In fact, I think I'm just going to throw up a handful today and get them out of the way.
This article points out that the position "women didn't act on the English stage until the Restoration" leans heavily on some very specific definitions of "act" and "stage." In particular, it erases non-commercial performances such as masques performed by ladies of the court.
So I picked up Women Players in England for the general background on the history of women in theater, but it does have one article directly touching on female homoeroticism on stage. And how Shakespeare's Twelfth Night is a pale echo of the Italian material that inspired it.
A bit tangential to the reasons I'm blogging this collection -- although not as tangential as some of the later articles will be. Stay with me.
This may have been my favorite article in the whole collection. Not only were actresses hitting it big on stage in Italy in the 16th century, they took the show on the road and influenced the reception of women on stage across western Europe.
This is a fascinating article drawing connections between early modern "traveling medicine show" performers and more commedia traditions, as well as simply recognizing the mountebank tradition as a form of theater. And, of course, we're intersted in the parts women played in this profession.
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