Authorised by Academic Registrar, April 1996
Synopsis The subject invites students to consider the representation of women and the discourse on feminity in a range of dramatic texts from the first half of the seventeenth century in light of the position of women in seventeenth-century English society and the approaches offered by feminist literary criticism. The subject will raise a number of topics for discussion including (i) the range and significance of female character types (the shrew, the widow, the whore etc.); (ii) female sexuality; (iii) love, marriage, property; (iv) male attitudes to women, especially stage misogyny; (v) relations between the sexes (husbands and wives, fathers and daughters); (vi) intersections of gender, class and racial difference.
Assessment Exercise (1500 words): 20% + Short essay (1500 words): 30% + Long essay (3000 words): 50% + Seminar participation