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228 LETTERS IN CANADA 1996 Michael R. Booth, JaM Stokes, and Susan Bassnett. Three Tragic Actresses: Siddons, Rachel, Ristori Cambridge University Press. x, 200. us $49.95 The three tragic actresses of this comparative volume form a lineage of stage stars extending from the lateeighteenth century, when SarahSiddons made her second, successful debut at Drury Lane in the 1782-83 season, through the nineteenth, when Rachel Felix was the leading French tragedienne (from the 18)os until her death in 1858) and Adelaide Ristori filled an analogous position in Italy and on numerous tours from the 18S0S until her retirement in 1885. These women have in common their fame, which led Rachel and Ristori to be compared to Siddons and to compete directly with each other, and their embodiment of Tragedy for their respective audiences. The brief introduction to Three Tragic Actresses suggests other similarities: each represents 'a particular image of the feminine' and, through her roles, offered alternatives to the dominant ideology of female domesticity. Yet, despite the introduction's implication that the essays will explore such subjects as tragic acting by women and the cultural role of the tragic actress through these examples from three different traditions, it is for the most part up to the reader-to make such connections. The essays are largely self~contained and are more concerned with factual accounts of the acting styles and careers of these superstars than with addressing general questions, although each touches on issues of gender and the implications of each actress's fame. Each essay provides a brief scholarly and informative treatment of its subject, with somewhat different emphases. Michael R. Booth, in his account of Sarah Siddons, and John Stokes in his of Rachel, attempt to reconstruct their subjects' performances as far as the historical record allows. Booth focuses on those roles of Siddons's first successful London season that remained mainstays of her repertoire, and on her definitive Lady Macbeth. Booth also gives considerable attention to Siddons's often overwhelming effect on her audiences. Stokes, relying in particular on the detailed descriptions of English spectators, can give much more specific accounts of Rachel's interpretations of her major roles than is possible for Siddons. Susan Bassnetfs essay on Ristori not only analyses her acting but draws on Ristori's memoirs and personal papers to emphasize her selfconstructed roles as an actor-manager, as an unofficial ambassador for a united Italy, and as an exemplary noblewoman, married to a marchese. Each essay is generously illustrated and supplemented by a Select Bibliography. While all three essays provide valuable and informative accounts oftheir subjects, Bassnett's is the richest because it combines a recreation of Ristori's art and life with a substantial analysis of her position within her HUMANITIES 229 cultural context. Stokes, while he discusses Rachel's symbolic position as a Jew, as a tragedienne, and as an image of revolution, is principally concerned to determine 'whatexactlyRachel did on stage.I Stokesexplicitly differentiates his goals from those of Rachel M. Brownstein in her seminal postmodern biography of Rachel, Tragic Muse, which I finds myth as meaningful as fact,' but both his essay and Booth's would have benefited from more attention to the contribution made by 'myth' to the documentary evidence on which their reconstructions rely. Further, as parts of Stokes's essay suggest and as Bassnett's confirms, consideration of each actress's symbolic status within her culture widens the appeal of the volume beyond those with a specialized interest in acting history. The volume as a whole would also have been strengthened by more numerous links among its three parts, either through more cross-referencing within the essays or through a more substantial introduction. While Three Tragic Actresses achieves its limited aims, focused on reconstructing the contribution of individual performers, this volume suggests the potential value of a more ambitious comparative cultural analysis of these tragedie1U1es. (NANCY COPELAND) 'Garth R. Lambert. Dethroning Classics and Inventing English: Liberal Education and Culture in Nineteenth-Century Ontario Lorimer. x, 234ยท $19.95 At the outset of Dethroning Classics and Inventing English, Garth R. Lambert considers how John, later Bishop, Strachan strove to rough-hew how he could an...

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