Women go to the theatre too. Female theatregoers in early modern Europe

This book explores the female audience in European theatre through a wide variety of texts, inviting readers to compare the elusive reality of female spectators with the many ways in which they have been portrayed. Female spectators were fully involved in theatrical activity and played a significant role in the modernisation of the theatre from the 16th to the 17th century. Their presence highlights the physical setting and the sensual nature of the theatrical experience; it sheds light on the modes of reception, which combine emotion with judgement, and contributes to the emergence of critical discourse; it reveals the audience’s participation in the production of meaning and the possible repercussions of fiction on real life. These various perspectives, in which women’s cultural power and the social power of theatre are closely intertwined, are of direct relevance to our own time.

Editor’s website