Early Modern Performance Beyond the Public Stage
Extra-Theatrical Forms and Spaces
Published on 18. September 2025
Book
Hardback
488 pages
978-1-350-36796-8 (ISBN)
Description
The first major work to explore and analyse the popular 'extra-theatrical' performances in late medieval and Renaissance England.
This wider heterogeneous category of early modern performance included puppetry, fireworks shows, rope dancing, minstrelsy, performing animals, games, civic drama, court masques, university drama, morris dances, and ceremonial rituals, all taking place in a variety of venues.
The volume reveals how these extra-theatrical productions shaped urban and rural life and conveyed a sense of spectacular excess, of exceeding traditional genres, conventional modes of performance and the typical bounds of theatrical space. The spaces where medieval and early modern drama flourished include pageant carts, convents, private homes, universities, waterways, and the streets of both urban and rural communities. Much like public theatres, these performance spaces also played a pivotal role in articulating individual, communal, and national aspirations.
Spanning the medieval period to the late 17th century, this volume engages with questions of spatiality, gender, religion, transcontinental exchanges, and colonialism, presenting the latest research from scholars across the globe.
This wider heterogeneous category of early modern performance included puppetry, fireworks shows, rope dancing, minstrelsy, performing animals, games, civic drama, court masques, university drama, morris dances, and ceremonial rituals, all taking place in a variety of venues.
The volume reveals how these extra-theatrical productions shaped urban and rural life and conveyed a sense of spectacular excess, of exceeding traditional genres, conventional modes of performance and the typical bounds of theatrical space. The spaces where medieval and early modern drama flourished include pageant carts, convents, private homes, universities, waterways, and the streets of both urban and rural communities. Much like public theatres, these performance spaces also played a pivotal role in articulating individual, communal, and national aspirations.
Spanning the medieval period to the late 17th century, this volume engages with questions of spatiality, gender, religion, transcontinental exchanges, and colonialism, presenting the latest research from scholars across the globe.
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Illustrations
18 bw illus
Dimensions
Height: 240 mm
Width: 161 mm
Thickness: 30 mm
Weight
886 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-350-36796-8 (9781350367968)
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
Persons
Amrita Sen is Associate Professor of English at the University of Calcutta, India. She is co-editor of Civic Performance: Pageantry and Entertainments in Early Modern London (2020), and a special issue of the Journal for Early Modern Cultural Studies on "Alternative Histories of the East India Company" (2017).
Jennifer Linhart Wood is Assistant Professor of English at George Mason University, USA. She is the author of Sounding Otherness in Early Modern Drama and Travel: Uncanny Vibrations in the English Archive (2019), winner of the 2021 MRDS David Bevington Award for Best New Book.
Jennifer Linhart Wood is Assistant Professor of English at George Mason University, USA. She is the author of Sounding Otherness in Early Modern Drama and Travel: Uncanny Vibrations in the English Archive (2019), winner of the 2021 MRDS David Bevington Award for Best New Book.
Content
Introduction: 'All the World's a Stage': Reconceptualizing Renaissance Performance
Jennifer Linhart Wood, George Mason University, USA, and Amrita Sen, University of Calcutta, India
Section I: Documents of Performance
Chapter 1: Stage Directions in the Medieval English Theatre: Functions, Conventions, and Transitions
Philip Butterworth, University of Leeds, UK
Chapter 2: 'Take some part in this booke and act it': Amateur Actor's Parts and Professional Drama
Daniel Yabut, Ecole Nationale Superieur d'Art Dramatique (ENSAD) and Universite Paul-Valery Montpellier 3, France
Chapter 3: Marks of Amateur Performance: Edward Dering's Manuscript of King Henry the Fourth and Other Traces of Performance-Minded Readers
Meaghan Brown, National Endowment for the Humanities, USA
Chapter 4: Oxford and the Morris Dance: University and Communal Performances
Natalia Pikli, Eoetvoes Lorand University, Hungary
Section II: Devotional Performances
Chapter 5: Recreation, Pleasure and Performance in the Medieval Convent
Olivia Robinson, University of Birmingham, UK
Chapter 6: Closet Catholicism, Private Entertainments, and Shakespeare in Seventeenth-Century Yorkshire
Chelsea McKelvey, Clemson University, USA
Chapter 7: Performing Religious Reform in the Mid-Tudor Parish Church
Anne Heminger, University of Tampa, USA
Section III: Musical Performances
Chapter 8: Local Community and Performativity: The Tutbury Minstrel Court
Csilla Virag, Eoetvoes Lorand University, Hungary
Chapter 9: Contextualising Shakespeare's As You Like It Within Court Performance
Murat OEguetcue, Adiyaman University, Tuerkiye
Chapter 10: Memory, Music, and the Politics of Forgotten Entertainments in Early Modern London
Sarah F. Williams, University of South Carolina, USA
Section III: Political Entertainments
Chapter 11: The King's Players and London's Civic Drama: Richard Burbage and London's Love to the Royal Prince Henry (1610)
Siobhan Keenan, De Montfort University, UK
Chapter 12: From Britain to Fairyland: Prince Henry's Investiture and the Fictionalizing Power of the Stuart Court Masques
Gabriel Lonsberry, Jacksonville State University, USA
Chapter 13: Revising Patriarchal Gender Politics in the Masques of Charles I and Henrietta Maria
Effie Botonaki, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece
Chapter 14: Performative Encounters in Seventeenth-Century British North America
Alden T. Vaughan, Columbia University, USA, and Virginia Mason Vaughan, Clark University, USA
Section IV: Materialities of Performance
Chapter 15: 'Under Pretence of Rope Dancing': Headlining Performances at the Interregnum Red Bull
Emma Rose Kraus, University of Kent, UK
Chapter 16: Monsters and Machines: Puppets as Performers, Props, and Stages in English Political Pageantry
Nicole Sheriko, Yale University, USA
Chapter 17: Performing Play: Chess, Performance, and Spectacle in Early Modern England Souvik Mukherjee, Centre for Studies in Social Sciences Calcutta, India
Section V: Spectacular Performances
Chapter 18: Performing Primates: Simantics, Racialization, and Extra-theatrical Archives
Teresa Simone, University of Mississippi, USA
Chapter 19: Fireworks and Pyrotechnic Performance
Maria Shmygol, British Shakespeare Association, UK
Chapter 20: Early Modern Performative Failures
Abbie Weinberg, Independent Scholar, USA
Jennifer Linhart Wood, George Mason University, USA, and Amrita Sen, University of Calcutta, India
Section I: Documents of Performance
Chapter 1: Stage Directions in the Medieval English Theatre: Functions, Conventions, and Transitions
Philip Butterworth, University of Leeds, UK
Chapter 2: 'Take some part in this booke and act it': Amateur Actor's Parts and Professional Drama
Daniel Yabut, Ecole Nationale Superieur d'Art Dramatique (ENSAD) and Universite Paul-Valery Montpellier 3, France
Chapter 3: Marks of Amateur Performance: Edward Dering's Manuscript of King Henry the Fourth and Other Traces of Performance-Minded Readers
Meaghan Brown, National Endowment for the Humanities, USA
Chapter 4: Oxford and the Morris Dance: University and Communal Performances
Natalia Pikli, Eoetvoes Lorand University, Hungary
Section II: Devotional Performances
Chapter 5: Recreation, Pleasure and Performance in the Medieval Convent
Olivia Robinson, University of Birmingham, UK
Chapter 6: Closet Catholicism, Private Entertainments, and Shakespeare in Seventeenth-Century Yorkshire
Chelsea McKelvey, Clemson University, USA
Chapter 7: Performing Religious Reform in the Mid-Tudor Parish Church
Anne Heminger, University of Tampa, USA
Section III: Musical Performances
Chapter 8: Local Community and Performativity: The Tutbury Minstrel Court
Csilla Virag, Eoetvoes Lorand University, Hungary
Chapter 9: Contextualising Shakespeare's As You Like It Within Court Performance
Murat OEguetcue, Adiyaman University, Tuerkiye
Chapter 10: Memory, Music, and the Politics of Forgotten Entertainments in Early Modern London
Sarah F. Williams, University of South Carolina, USA
Section III: Political Entertainments
Chapter 11: The King's Players and London's Civic Drama: Richard Burbage and London's Love to the Royal Prince Henry (1610)
Siobhan Keenan, De Montfort University, UK
Chapter 12: From Britain to Fairyland: Prince Henry's Investiture and the Fictionalizing Power of the Stuart Court Masques
Gabriel Lonsberry, Jacksonville State University, USA
Chapter 13: Revising Patriarchal Gender Politics in the Masques of Charles I and Henrietta Maria
Effie Botonaki, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece
Chapter 14: Performative Encounters in Seventeenth-Century British North America
Alden T. Vaughan, Columbia University, USA, and Virginia Mason Vaughan, Clark University, USA
Section IV: Materialities of Performance
Chapter 15: 'Under Pretence of Rope Dancing': Headlining Performances at the Interregnum Red Bull
Emma Rose Kraus, University of Kent, UK
Chapter 16: Monsters and Machines: Puppets as Performers, Props, and Stages in English Political Pageantry
Nicole Sheriko, Yale University, USA
Chapter 17: Performing Play: Chess, Performance, and Spectacle in Early Modern England Souvik Mukherjee, Centre for Studies in Social Sciences Calcutta, India
Section V: Spectacular Performances
Chapter 18: Performing Primates: Simantics, Racialization, and Extra-theatrical Archives
Teresa Simone, University of Mississippi, USA
Chapter 19: Fireworks and Pyrotechnic Performance
Maria Shmygol, British Shakespeare Association, UK
Chapter 20: Early Modern Performative Failures
Abbie Weinberg, Independent Scholar, USA