Shakespeare Among the Courtesans
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A01=Duncan Salkeld
abraham
Anglo-Italian cultural exchange
Ar Ish
aretino
Author_Duncan Salkeld
bawdy
Category=ATD
Category=DDA
Category=DS
Category=DSB
Category=DSBD
Category=DSG
Cowp Er
Del Bufalo
disease and morality in literature
doll
Doll Tear Sheet
early
early modern sexuality
Edward III
English theatre history
eq_art-fashion-photography
eq_bestseller
eq_biography-true-stories
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
eq_poetry
Foul Disease
Fowle Disease
fraunce
gender and power dynamics in Renaissance drama
Gesta Grayorum
Gray's Inn
Heywood's Edward IV
Hick Scorner
Honest Whore
house
King Richard III
literary representations of women
London Metropolitan Archives
Lucy Negro
Lusty Juventus
Margaret White
Mistress Harebrain
Mistress Overdone
modern
pietro
Renaissance drama studies
Richard III
Rose Flower
Sir Henry
Sir Walter Ralegh
tearsheet
Turnmill Street
Young Men
Product details
- ISBN 9781138252691
- Weight: 410g
- Dimensions: 156 x 234mm
- Publication Date: 09 Sep 2016
- Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd
- Publication City/Country: GB
- Product Form: Paperback
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Courtesans - women who achieve wealth, status, or power through sexual transgression - have played both a central and contradictory role in literature: they have been admired, celebrated, feared, and vilified. This study of the courtesan in Renaissance English drama focuses not only on the moral ambivalence of these women, but with special attention to Anglo-Italian relations, illuminates little known aspects of their lives. It traces the courtesan from a wry comedic character in the plays of Terence and Plautus to its literary exhaustion in the seventeenth-century dramatic works of Dekker, Marston, Webster, Middleton, Shirley and Brome. The author focuses especially on the presentation of the courtesan in the sixteenth century - dramas by Shakespeare, Marlowe, and Lyly view the courtesan as a symbol of social disease and decay, transforming classical conventions into English prejudices. Renaissance Anglo-Italian cultural and sexual relations are also investigated through comparisons of travel narratives, original source materials, and analysis of Aretino's representations of celebrated Italian courtesans. Amid these fascinating tales of aspiration, desire and despair lingers the intriguing question of who was the 'dark lady' of Shakespeare's sonnets.
Duncan Salkeld is Reader in Shakespeare Studies at The University of Chichester, UK.
