Literature in English, British Isles Commons^™

Review Of Relative Races: Genealogies Of Interracial Kinship In Nineteenth-Century America, By Brigitte Fielder, Shelby Johnson

ABO: Interactive Journal for Women in the Arts, 1640–1830

No abstract provided.

The Lady’S Museum Project: A Digital Critical Edition In Phase 1 Of Its Development, Now Available For Teachers And Students To Learn Collaboratively Through Charlotte Lennox’S Lady’S Museum (1761-62), Kelly Plante

ABO: Interactive Journal for Women in the Arts, 1640–1830

This announcement informs readers on how they can use, and participate in, the Lady's Museum Project (ladysmuseum.com). It discusses the work completed and the forthcoming updates planned for teachers', scholars', and students' use of this first critical edition of Charlotte Lennox's the Lady's Museum, as of spring 2022.

Arabella In The Salon: Teaching Charlotte Lennox’S Female Quixote With Madeleine De Scudéry’S “Carte De Tendre,” Clélie, And Conversations, Nicole Horejsi

ABO: Interactive Journal for Women in the Arts, 1640–1830

No abstract provided.

Teaching The Lady’S Museum And Sophia: Imperialism, Early Feminism, And Beyond, Karenza Sutton-Bennett, Susan Carlile

ABO: Interactive Journal for Women in the Arts, 1640–1830

This essay argues for the value of teaching Charlotte Lennox’s periodical The Lady’s Museum (1760-61) in undergraduate literature, history, media studies, postcolonial, and gender studies classrooms. Lennox’s magazine, which includes one of the first serialized novels “Harriot and Sophia” (later published as the stand-alone novel Sophia (1762)) encouraged debate of the proto-discipline topics of history, geography, literary criticism, astronomy, botany, and zoology. This essay offers a flexible teaching module, which can be taught in one to five days, that focuses on the themes of early female education and imperialism using full or excerpted portions of essays from the eidolon, “Of …

Concise Collections: Teaching Charlotte Lennox, Tiffany Potter

ABO: Interactive Journal for Women in the Arts, 1640–1830

The Spring 2022 issue of ABO inaugurates our new Pedagogies feature: the Concise Collections on Teaching Eighteenth-Century Women series. Each issue of ABO will include a Concise Collection on a different female writer or artist, with three to five articles offering critically-informed and practice-based strategies for teaching in survey or theme-based courses for different student audiences. This series seeks to facilitate the innovative and effective teaching of female creatives whose excellence and insight demand inclusion in our classrooms, but who have not yet received the attention they deserve in pedagogy publications, or who might not yet have been encountered by …

Unmasking Polly: Race And Disguise In Eighteenth-Century Plantation Space, Kristen Hanley Cardozo

ABO: Interactive Journal for Women in the Arts, 1640–1830

John Gay’s The Beggar’s Opera has influenced popular culture since its debut. Its 1729 sequel, Polly, has been understudied by literary critics, perhaps because of its suppression in Gay’s lifetime. However, Polly offers scholars new views on British imperialism before an active abolition movement in Britain. Gay confronts the evils of colonialism through his theatrical use of disguise. While other Caribbean plays of the period allow white characters to reinvent themselves abroad, in Polly disguise only intensifies the self, while the higher stakes of plantation space are where the characters meet the fates originally designated for them in The …

Succubus Matters, Jeremy Chow

ABO: Interactive Journal for Women in the Arts, 1640–1830

This essay argues that the Gothic succubus pioneers new frameworks for examining female sexuality, sexual violation, and consent in the eighteenth century. M. G. Lewis’s The Monk (1796) reveals the Bleeding Nun as a demonic female ghost that is both sadistic and hypersexualized, especially in her tryst with Don Raymond. The spectrality of the succubus reimagines the displacement of the female body as something both material and ethereal, and in so doing, renders consequent displacements of consent, agency, and sexuality, which may characterize queer Gothic tropes. I interweave discussions of consent alongside representations and theories of ghosts throughout the eighteenth …

Rosalind's Masculine Self: As You Like It And Criticism Of Male Communities, Faith Langford

Merge

No abstract provided.

Performance, Theatricality, And Identity In Shakespeare’S The Taming Of The Shrew, Nina Masin-Moyer

College Honors Program

William Shakespeare’s comedy The Taming of the Shrew is a curious and often controversial play due to its depiction of spousal abuse and female subordination. But despite that charged reputation, it continues to be produced on stages around the world, with creative choices that suggest an attempt to change a supposedly un-feminist play into a feminist one. My thesis argues that this play already features notable feminist elements at the level of the text itself, stemming in particular from its thematic and structural investment in performance and theatricality and in the roles that these elements play in constructing gender and …

“All The Daughters Of My Father's House, And All The Brothers Too”: Shakespeare’S Portrayal Of Gender Fluidity, Sebastian Lopez

Symposium of Student Scholars

This paper analyzes how Shakespeare's personal life influenced the relationship between Viola and Cesario in Twelfth Night through a feminist lens and an analysis of gender fluidity in the Elizabethan Era. It is a common misconception that conversations revolving around gender are a modern discussion. Shakespeare popularized the idea of gender fluidity in English literature in his play, Twelfth Night.

At the height of Shakespeare’s career, he wrote many comedies, yet few tragedies, however, a tonal shift occurred after the death of his son, Hamnet. Shakespeare was father to a pair of fraternal twins, Judith and Hamnet. However, the …

Sweet Fooling: Ethical Humor In King Lear And Levinas, Kent R. Lehnhof

English Faculty Articles and Research

"In recent years, scholars have increasingly put the works of William Shakespeare (1564-1623) in dialogue with the ethical philosophy of Emmanuel Levinas (1905-1995)... The majority of these Shakespearean references are to Hamlet and Macbeth, but contemporary critics working in the vein of Levinas have tended to favor King Lear. No Shakespearean play has been subjected to Levinasian analysis more fully or more frequently.⁵ This critical proclivity is not unwarranted, for Shakespeare's tragic play and Levinas's ethical writings tell the same basic story: that of the egoist who heedlessly pursues his own interests until he is until he …

British Literature I, Justin Shaw

Syllabus Share

What does it mean to belong? What does it mean to have an identity? This course serves as an entry point to the study of early British literature and its historical contexts. We examine texts written from the 7th to the 17th Centuries that comprise a portion of what we call British literature. This survey engages poetry, prose, and drama that reimagine the complexities of intersectional identity, render the nation as part of a global stage, and challenge conventions of sexuality and gender. It traces early texts written by and about people on the margins of “Britishness” and "Englishness" such …

Fun With Palamon And Arcite: Rationale And Strategies For Teaching The Two Noble Kinsmen As The Culmination Of The Shakespearean Canon, Joanne E. Gates

Presentations, Proceedings & Performances

Hardly noticed in the reception of Harold Bloom's Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human several years ago was his hint that not The Tempest but The Two Noble Kinsmen makes an appropriate final accomplishment. On one level, the play is merely a stage adaptation of Chaucer's The Knight's Tale, with a rather crude couple of subplots thrown in, perhaps to please the commoners. In an undergraduate forum, I am less inclined to evaluate Fletcher's contribution as distinct from Shakespeare, but I do think the play important for how it is representative of many of the co-authored English Renaissance plays …

Literature, Pandemic, And The Insufficiency Of Survival: Boccaccio’S Decameron And Emily St. John Mandel’S Station Eleven, Anthony P. Russell

Interdisciplinary Journal of Leadership Studies

The question of literature’s utility in relation to the “real world” has been asked since at least the time of Plato. This essay examines an extreme instance of this problem by investigating two works, Giovanni Boccaccio’s Decameron (1349-1353) and Emily St. John Mandel’s Station Eleven (2016), that argue for the value of art in the midst of catastrophe. Boccaccio’s collection of 100 tales, written in the context of the Black Plague, and Mandel’s post-apocalyptic novel about a world devastated by a killer flu, overlap and diverge in instructive ways in making their cases for the important role of literature in …

Samuel Beckett's Theory Of Repetition, Kennedy Carpenter

Online Theses and Dissertations

The thesis explores playwright, Samuel Beckett, and his use of repetition within four of his plays. The way in which repetition is discussed and shown in his plays displays Beckett’s own theories about repetition such as the futility and meaningless of life that repetition brings about, how repetition causes stagnation, repetition is something people are both trapped in and willing go towards for comfort, and the only way to break out of repetition is by involving others in one’s life. After literary analysis of repetition in Beckett’s works, his theories are then applied to Beckett’s personal life as a director …

“What We Ought To Say”: Debating The Morality Of Dishonesty And Equivocation In King Lear, Markelle Jensen

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

King Lear does not reveal the nature of honesty but provides a stage on which the morality of honesty can be debated. The play questions whether honesty is inherently moral at all, or if there are ways in which honesty can be considered harmful and even immoral. Other scholars have noted this as well in characters such as Edgar and Kent, but missing from the critical conversation are the ways in which Cordelia is the pillar of moral goodness in the play, and how her own paradoxical honesty and dishonesty were what enabled Lear to “see better” and ultimately, to …

Robert Burns’S Life On The Stage: A Bibliography Of Dramatic Works, 1842–2019, Thomas Keith

Studies in Scottish Literature

This article traces the changing history of how the Scottish poet Robert Burns has been portrayed on stage, both in Scotland and elsewhere, discussing the the issues playwrights have faced and some of the approaches they have used, and provides an annotated chronological bibliography of ninety plays about Burns's life written or first staged between 1842 and 2019, with information on first known performance and on any published versions or known manuscript or typescript, and with brief notes where information is available on the style of the play and critical reaction.

Wwa Reflection: Losing Sight, Making Scholarship, Sabrina M. Durso

ABO: Interactive Journal for Women in the Arts, 1640–1830

No abstract provided.

Wwa Reflection: Building Writing Momentum: A Year Of Digital Conferences, Brianna E. Robertson-Kirkland

ABO: Interactive Journal for Women in the Arts, 1640–1830

This reflection, which considers the positive impact of attending online conferences on building writing momentum is in response to the ABO Call for Short Reflections (500-750 words) on Writing and Research during the Pandemic.

Race And Racism In Austen Spaces: National Trust In Jane Austen’S Empires Of Sugar, Tré Ventour-Griffiths

ABO: Interactive Journal for Women in the Arts, 1640–1830

No abstract provided.

Race And Racism In Austen Spaces: Notes On A Scandal: Sanditon Fandom’S Ongoing Racism And The Danger Of Ignoring Austen Discourse On Social Media, Amanda-Rae Prescott

ABO: Interactive Journal for Women in the Arts, 1640–1830

Sanditon fans have used social media more than many other past Jane Austen adaptations to discuss the series and to share news developments about the series. This was partially due to the COVID-19 pandemic preventing in-person marketing and fandom gatherings, but also due to some traditional Austen discussion platforms ignoring or banning pro-Sanditon discussions. White women from the UK and Europe dominated these online communities and set the tone for discussions of the plot as well as news about the series. BIPOC fans repeatedly clashed with white fans because the promises of an “inclusive” community were frequently dashed as soon …

Race And Racism In Austen Spaces: Eroticizing Men Of Empire In Austen, Kerry Sinanan

ABO: Interactive Journal for Women in the Arts, 1640–1830

No abstract provided.

Grasses, Groves, And Gardens: Aphra Behn Goes Green, Heidi Laudien

ABO: Interactive Journal for Women in the Arts, 1640–1830

Laudien argues in “Grasses, Groves and Gardens: Aphra Behn Goes Green” that Behn moves beyond the stylized and artificial backdrops of most pastoral to explore the unique ways the landscape can be manipulated to investigate gender difference and the dynamics of desire and representation. Laudien suggests that in prioritizing the pastoral as political allegory in Behn, we overlook the descriptions of nature and the importance she places on the natural environments she creates. Through close readings of several of her pastoral poems, Laudien reveals that Behn’s landscapes destabilize existing notions of the pastoral space as an idealized and organized place …

Editors' Thanks To Dr. Linda Troost, Editor Of Ecw, Mona Narain

ABO: Interactive Journal for Women in the Arts, 1640–1830

No abstract provided.

Visions: Re-Historicizing Genre: Teaching Haywood’S The Adventures Of Eovaai In A Fantasy-Themed Survey Course, Megan E. Cole

ABO: Interactive Journal for Women in the Arts, 1640–1830

Eliza Haywood is an increasingly popular author to assign in eighteenth-century literature courses. But Haywood is also a prime figure to represent the eighteenth century in courses with a broader scope. This essay proposes teaching The Adventures of Eovaai in a fantasy-focused, introductory-level survey of British Literature. Identifying Eovaai as part of the fantasy tradition leverages students’ prior knowledge and facilitates teaching this complex novel to first-year students. Eovaai provides a wealth of topics for class discussions and activities, including the development of the novel as a genre, identity and othering in fantasy literature, and the use of fantasy conventions …

Visions: "Which Made It Look Like A Gentleman’S”: Anne Lister’S Use Of Lord Byron In Her Construction Of A Gentlemanly Image, Michelina Olivieri

ABO: Interactive Journal for Women in the Arts, 1640–1830

Despite the rigorous study of Anne Lister’s personal and public identities, scholars have only minimally acknowledged the ways in which Lister appropriated the ideas and practices of others to construct the image of herself they themselves are so fascinated by. From her teenage years onward, Lister collected ideas, images, and published works that broke with the traditional, conservative ideals on which she was raised and adapted them for her own use in expanding her queer identity. Of the scholars who do investigate Lister’s use of the publicly queer, even fewer have thoroughly examined Lister’s method of adaptation as a distinctly …

Visions: The Dance Most Of All: Envisioning An Embodied Eighteenth-Century Studies, Susannah Sanford, Sofia Prado Huggins

ABO: Interactive Journal for Women in the Arts, 1640–1830

The editors introduce this special issue of ABO, highlighting the work of the authors included in the issue. The introduction draws on recent scholarship re-visioning the work of the long, “undisciplined” eighteenth century, arguing for an eighteenth-century studies that embodies our intersectional identities and honors the experiences of bodyminds surrounding texts and authors, as well as the bodyminds that interact with those texts in the present. Throughout the years, scholars have demonstrated that there is no single vision of what eighteenth-century scholarship is or should be, but rather multiple visions. This introduction urges scholars to consider how an eighteenth-century studies …

Preaching To The Converted: Religious Conversion In East Anglian Medieval Drama, Eleanor Davis

English Theses and Dissertations

My dissertation investigates religious conversion in late medieval East Anglian drama (c. 1400–1500). Each of my chapters examines a play with ties to fifteenth-century East Anglia, an economically prosperous region where orthodoxy and heterodoxy coexisted and religious drama flourished. All of the plays stage at least one miraculous conversion experience, yet the plays also offer reminders that conversion is an ongoing process that demands the convert’s continual effort to keep growing in faith. I demonstrate how these anonymous plays deliver their most important lessons about conversion in their much less miraculous moments, exposing a dramaturgy that revels in its ability …

Marina Y Cleopatra En El Escenario Teatral, Jon Paul Lawton

World Languages and Cultures Student Papers and Posters

Cleopatra and Doña Marina come from distinct time periods in world history— respectively, the declining Ptolemaic dynasty of Egypt and the age of the Spanish conquest. Literature has been inspired by these historical figures, creating various interpretations of this Egyptian queen and Aztec translator. Fundamentally, these two personalities share similarities: both women fall in love with foreign invaders and harness influence in the political arena of their times. For this, they must rectify their romantic desires with loyalty for their home countries. The plays Todos los gatos son pardos by Carlos Fuentes and Antony and Cleopatra by William Shakespeare reveal …

Where Are The Women?: An Ecofeminist Reading Of William Golding’S Lord Of The Flies, Hawk Chang

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

The absence of female characters and their voices in William Golding’s Lord of the Flies (1954) has been previously examined. On the surface, this fiction focuses on the struggle and survival of a group of boys who are left alone on a Pacific island against the background of nuclear warfare. The only presence of women in the story seems to be the aunt via a boy’s narration. However, when approaching the fiction through the lens of ecofeminism, we can find a range of feminized entities which are metaphorically embodied in the natural surroundings of the secluded island. The boys’ interactions …