Drag
A British History
1st Edition
Published on 1. August 2023
Book
Hardback
272 pages
978-0-520-39332-5 (ISBN)
Description
"A must-read for anyone interested in the history of drag performance."-?Publishers Weekly
A rich and provocative history of drag's importance in modern British culture.
Drag: A British History is a groundbreaking study of the sustained popularity and changing forms of male drag performance in modern Britain. With this book, Jacob Bloomfield provides fresh perspectives on drag and recovers previously neglected episodes in the history of the art form.
Despite its transgressive associations, drag has persisted as an intrinsic, and common, part of British popular culture-drag artists have consistently asserted themselves as some of the most renowned and significant entertainers of their day. As Bloomfield demonstrates, drag was also at the center of public discussions around gender and sexuality in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, from Victorian sex scandals to the "permissive society" of the 1960s. This compelling new history demythologizes drag, stressing its ordinariness while affirming its important place in British cultural heritage.
A rich and provocative history of drag's importance in modern British culture.
Drag: A British History is a groundbreaking study of the sustained popularity and changing forms of male drag performance in modern Britain. With this book, Jacob Bloomfield provides fresh perspectives on drag and recovers previously neglected episodes in the history of the art form.
Despite its transgressive associations, drag has persisted as an intrinsic, and common, part of British popular culture-drag artists have consistently asserted themselves as some of the most renowned and significant entertainers of their day. As Bloomfield demonstrates, drag was also at the center of public discussions around gender and sexuality in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, from Victorian sex scandals to the "permissive society" of the 1960s. This compelling new history demythologizes drag, stressing its ordinariness while affirming its important place in British cultural heritage.
Reviews / Votes
"An excellent examination of the complexities of various forms of stage drag and its mainstay role in British popular culture." * Library Journal * "A new look at the history of drag. . . . Bloomfield illustrates how drag has long been a complex yet 'ordinary' artform, historically straddling queer radicalism and mass entertainment along the way." * ArtReview * "A thoughtful and fascinating read." * Everything Theater * "A fascinating overview of the story of British drag artists." * Aleks Sierz * "An excellent primer to the complexities of drag as 'a queer art form' and so much else besides."* New Humanist * "Dr. Jacob Bloomfield is the uncontested expert when it comes to the history of drag in this country." * The Herald * "A rich and fascinating account about female impersonation that will greatly add to contemporary, often ahistorical, understandings of drag." * CHOICE * "A fascinating and richly illustrated history." * Journal of Social History * "An eloquent model of how to map the meeting points between theatre and social history." * Nineteenth Century Theatre and Film * "Bloomfield's interventions are welcome. His measured analysis prompt us to reconsider how we understand 'gender variance,' especially in the interwar period. Anxiety may have been prevalent. . . but we shouldn't assume that this anxiety was totalizing. Not all gender play was necessarily troublesome. In fact, as Bloomfield repeatedly stresses, drag could be downright ordinary." * Journal of Modern History * "Drag: A British History celebrates the significance of popular performance and has the potential to stimulate research from new generations who too have overlooked, or not been aware of the artform's rich history." * Studies in Costume and Performance * "Drag: A British History illuminates how drag performance has endured as a central and cherished part of British popular culture. . . . Drag aficionados will learn about new archival discoveries and might be surprised by the popularity, boldness, and ingenuity of drag well over a century before RuPaul's Drag Race. Newcomers will get a brisk survey of significant people, places, and events in British drag history." * NOTCHES *
More details
Series
Edition
First Edition
Language
English
Place of publication
Berkerley
United States
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Product notice
Cloth over boards
Illustrations
19 bw figures
Dimensions
Height: 236 mm
Width: 160 mm
Thickness: 26 mm
Weight
538 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-520-39332-5 (9780520393325)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
E-Book
08/2023
1st Edition
Naval Institute Press
€24.49
Available for download
Person
Jacob Bloomfield is Zukunftskolleg Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Konstanz and Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Kent. His research is situated primarily in the fields of cultural history, the history of sexuality, and gender history. He is currently working on a book about the historical reception to musician Little Richard in the United States and Europe.
Content
Contents
List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
Introduction
1 Old Mother Riley and the Modern Dame
2 Splinters: Cross-Dressing Ex-Servicemen on the Interwar Stage
3 Danny La Rue: Conservative Drag in the "Permissive Society"
4 Skirting the Censor: Drag and the Censorship of the British Theater, 1939-1968
Epilogue: How Queer Is Drag?
Notes
Bibliography
Index
List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
Introduction
1 Old Mother Riley and the Modern Dame
2 Splinters: Cross-Dressing Ex-Servicemen on the Interwar Stage
3 Danny La Rue: Conservative Drag in the "Permissive Society"
4 Skirting the Censor: Drag and the Censorship of the British Theater, 1939-1968
Epilogue: How Queer Is Drag?
Notes
Bibliography
Index