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Reviews449 perspective—the staging conventions that were to coexist with those of medieval religious staging, providing thereby the complex and varied pattern of dramatic activity that made for such diversity in the Renaissance. Theater ofthe Low Countries, presented here byElsa Streitman and Lynette R. Muir, adroitíy combines the religious with the vernacular. The Low Countries were a crossroads of European languages and were subject to repeated invasions so that neither the region nor its dramatic art is stable and cohesive; and much ofthe drama from this region still remains to be edited. The present volume points masterfully in the directions that research and publication need to take. So too with the dramaofthe Iberian Peninsula, presented here byLouise M. Haywood. The transnational and interdisciplinary character ofthis far-ranging book is one of its chief treasures. This book is a major achievement. It should do much to broaden our investigations into medieval drama and staging in all its diversity and richness across Europe. So much work done until recently is parochial , understandably so, given the immensity of the field now opening up increasingly to us. The mastery needed to be a true comparatist in this field is a daunting challenge, linguistically and in every other way. It is a move we all need to take, like converting to a Europe today of flexible boundaries and a common currency. The present volume offers an invaluable road map for this exploration. David Bevington University of Chicago Derek Hughes, The Theatre ofAphra Behn. New York: Palgrave, 2001. Pp. vüi + 230. $65.00. Serious re-evaluation ofthe works ofAphra Behn has virtually exploded in the past decade. Approximately two-thirds of all Behn criticism listed in the MLA database has appeared in the last tenyears, aperiod that has also seen the completion ofJanet Todd's seven-volume edition of Behn's WorL·, the appearance of Todd's lengthy and authoritative biography, and the formation of the Aphra Behn Society in the United States. Given the persistent interest in studies in the history of the novel, it is perhaps no surprise that the majority of this scholarship has focused on her prose fiction, especially Oroonoko. In fact, a cursory tally of this recent scholarship suggests that, excepting essays on The Rover, treatments of her prose fiction are double those of her plays, with the latter more than tripling the amount of criticism explicitly devoted to her poetry. 450ComparativeDrama Even taking into consideration the current state of affairs, it is still rather surprising to note, as the dust jacket for the present volume announces, that there has been no previous book-length study ofBehn's theatrical output, despite the fact that her involvement in the Restoration theater dominated her professional writing life as well as the age in which she wrote. For this reason alone, The Theatre ofAphra Behn is a welcome and long overdue contribution to Behn studies. It is also the work of an expert in the history ofthe theater and of Restoration history and culture more broadly. Indeed , Hughes goes to great pains to place Behn's work within the theatrical culture in which it belongs and consistendy returns not only to essential historical considerations—the militarism of the Civil War period, seventeenthcentury philosophical debates, the uncertainty of the political and theatrical landscape during the Exclusion crisis and the Protestant succession—but also to the specific considerations of the theater itself—everything from casting decisions to reception history, from the use ofspace onstage to the influence of playwright predecessors and competitors. This rich contextual mix provides a compelling backdrop to a series ofsustained close readings ofeach ofthe plays in Behn's established corpus, fourteen in all. (A fifteenth play, Like Father, Like Son, is lost, and others ofdoubtful attribution, such as TheDebauchee, are briefly addressed.) The chapters themselves are divided into author-centered thematic categories tracing (some might say determining) Behn's personal and artistic development: following the introductory"Background" chapter, we are guided through "First Attempt," "First Impact," Experimentation," "Maturity," "Political Crisis," "Political Triumph," "Dearth and Famine," and finally moving from dearth to death (and quoting from the Prologue to her posthumously staged play, The Younger Brother) with a concluding chapter entitled...

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