Romantic Drama: Acting and Reacting

by Frederick Burwick

Overview

Drama in the Romantic period underwent radical changes affecting theatre performance, acting, and audience. Theatres were rebuilt and expanded to accommodate larger audiences, and consequently acting styles and the plays themselves evolved to meet the expectations of the new audiences. This book examines manifestations of change in acting, stage design, setting, and the new forms of drama. Actors exercised a persistent habit of stepping out of their roles, whether scripted or not. Burwick traces the radical shifts in acting style from Garrick to Kemble and Siddons, and to Kean and Macready, adding a new dimension to understanding the shift in cultural sensibility from early to later Romantic literature. Eye-witness accounts by theatre-goers and critics attending plays at the major playhouses of London, the provinces, and on the Continent are provided, allowing readers to identify with the experience of being in the theatre during this tumultuous period.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780511847882
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	02/19/2009
Series:	Cambridge Studies in Medieval Life and Thought: Fourth Series
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

Frederick Burwick is Emeritus Professor of English Literature at the University of California, Los Angeles.

Table of Contents

Introduction; 1. Periscopes into the theatre; 2. Nationalism and national character; 3. Genre: the realism of fantasy, the fantasy of realism; 4. Acting, histrionics, and dissimulation; 5. Transvestites, lovers, monsters: character and sexuality; 6. Setting: where and elsewhere; 7. Gothic and anti-Gothic: comedy and horror; 8. Blue-Beard's castle: mischief and misogyny; 9. Vampires in kilts.

Editorial Reviews

"As indicated by its subtitle, Frederick Burwick’s lively and innovative Romantic Drama gives ‘primary attention to the varied dynamics of performance and audience response’ (8)...with its abundance of knowledge and enjoyable content, its unusual angle, its astute observations and insights, all delivered in an appealing and entertaining style, this highly informative work is a valuable asset to Romantic theatre studies and leaves us looking forward to the author’s forthcoming publication."
-Stephanie Dumke, Coleridge Bulletin

From the Publisher