Romantic Comedy
1st Edition
Published on 24. February 2022
184 pages
978-1-350-18339-1 (ISBN)
Description
'The course of true love never did run smooth' - so says Lysander in A Midsummer Night's Dream, and for more than 2000 years the problems faced by young men and women fighting to find and keep an appropriate sexual partner have been a theatrical staple. This book explores the shapes that Romantic Comedy has assumed from Greek New Comedy via Shakespeare to the present. Changing social values have helped to redefine the genre's traditional hetero-normativity, while the recent trend towards more fluid casting has opened up many romantic comedies to radical reinterpretations.
Organized chronologically to allow readers to trace the development of the form against changing societal norms, the book features a range of case studies of key works from the British tradition, including A Midsummer Night's Dream, Twelfth Night, Susanna Centlivre's A Bold Stroke for a Wife, Oliver Goldsmith's She Stoops to Conquer, Stanley Houghton's Hindle Wakes, Noël Coward's Private Lives, Shelagh Delaney's A Taste of Honey, Ayub Khan-Din's East is East and David Eldridge's Beginning.
Organized chronologically to allow readers to trace the development of the form against changing societal norms, the book features a range of case studies of key works from the British tradition, including A Midsummer Night's Dream, Twelfth Night, Susanna Centlivre's A Bold Stroke for a Wife, Oliver Goldsmith's She Stoops to Conquer, Stanley Houghton's Hindle Wakes, Noël Coward's Private Lives, Shelagh Delaney's A Taste of Honey, Ayub Khan-Din's East is East and David Eldridge's Beginning.
More details
Series
Edition
1. Auflage
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Illustrations
10 bw illus
ISBN-13
978-1-350-18339-1 (9781350183391)
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
Person
Trevor R. Griffiths is a visiting honorary professor in Humanities at the University of Exeter, UK, and formerly Professor of Theatre Studies at London Metropolitan University, UK. He is Vice-Chair of the Society for Theatre Research and coordinating editor of the refereed journal Theatre Notebook.
Content
List of Illustrations
Series Preface
Acknowledgements
Conventions
Introduction: 'The Course of True Love'
1. Shakespeare and Romantic Comedy
2. Romantic Comedy: 1660-1895
3. Romantic Comedies of (Bad) Manners: 1895 to the present
Epilogue
References
Index
Series Preface
Acknowledgements
Conventions
Introduction: 'The Course of True Love'
1. Shakespeare and Romantic Comedy
2. Romantic Comedy: 1660-1895
3. Romantic Comedies of (Bad) Manners: 1895 to the present
Epilogue
References
Index
