The Pursuit of Style in Early Modern Drama

The Pursuit of Style in Early Modern Drama examines how early modern plays celebrated the power of different styles of talk to create dynamic forms of public address. Across the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, London expanded into an uncomfortably public city where everyone was a stranger to everyone else. The relentless anonymity of urban life spurred dreams of its opposite: of being a somebody rather than a nobody, of being the object of public attention rather than its subject. Drama gave life to this fantasy. Presented by strangers and to strangers, early modern plays codified different styles of talk as different forms of public sociability. Then, as now, to speak of style was to speak of a fantasy of public address. Offering fresh insight for scholars of literature and drama, Matthew Hunter reveals how this fantasy - which still holds us in its thrall - played out on the early modern stage.

Author: Matthew Hunter
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 08/25/2022
Pages: 270
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.17lbs
Size: 9.00h x 6.00w x 0.63d
ISBN13: 9781316517468
ISBN10: 1316517462
BISAC Categories:
- Literary Criticism | English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh
- Drama | European | English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh