Unruly audiences and the theater of control in early modern London / Eric Dunnum.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Dunnum, Eric, author.

Contributor:

Horace Howard Furness Memorial Library (University of Pennsylvania)

Series:

Studies in performance and early modern drama

Standardized Title:

Performing the audience

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Theater audiences--England--London--History--16th century.

Theater audiences.

Theater audiences--England--London--History--17th century.

English drama--Early modern and Elizabethan, 1500-1600--History and criticism.

English drama.

English drama--17th century--History and criticism.

Theater--England--London--History--16th century.

Theater.

Theater--England--London--History--17th century.

English drama--Early modern and Elizabethan.

England--London.

Genre:

Criticism, interpretation, etc.

History.

Physical Description:

264 pages ; 25 cm.

Place of Publication:

Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2020.

Summary:

"Unruly Audiences and the Theater of Control in Early Modern London explores the effects of audience riots on the dramaturgy of early modern playwrights, arguing that playwrights from Marlowe to Brome often used their plays to control the physical reactions of their audience. This study analyses how, out of anxiety that unruly audiences would destroy the nascent industry of professional drama in England, playwrights sought to limit the effect that their plays could have on the audience. They tried to construct playgoing through their drama in the hopes of creating a less-reactive, more pensive, and controlled playgoer. The result was the radical experimentation in dramaturgy that, in part, defines Renaissance drama. Written for scholars of Early Modern and Renaissance Drama and Theatre, Theatre History, and Early Modern and Renaissance History, this book calls for a new focus on the local economic concerns of the theatre companies as a way to understand the motivation behind the drama of early modern London"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Introduction : the alterity of early modern audiences

Audience response to performance : fear of riots, closures and unruly playgoers

Performance's response to audience : the relationship among audience, performance and reality

Fictional audience's responses to fictional performances : the didactic role of metadrama

Unstable texts, active readers; stable performances, non-reactive playgoers

Anti-mimetic drama : performance's relationship to reality and the playgoer's interpretive agency

Coda : return to Malfi : the secrecy of performance and the consequences of constructing playgoing.

Notes:

Revision of author's thesis (doctoral)--Marquette University, 2011, titled Performing the audience : constructing playgoing in early modern drama.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Other Format:

Online version: Dunnum, Eric. Performing the audience Unruly audiences and the theater of control in early modern London.

ISBN:

9780815369332

0815369336

OCLC:

1114283953

Publisher Number:

40029553037