Overview

Puts canonical texts by Shakespeare and Marlowe into dialogue with plays which are much less well known but which have things to tell us both about the climate of opinion in post-Reformation England and also about the way the early modern stage represented particular locations. The book discusses the demarcation of secular and sacred territory in early modern English drama. It focuses primarily on four plays, Thorney Abbey, A Knack to Know a Knave, A Shoemaker a Gentleman and The Lovesick King, but puts these in dialogue with Hamlet, Macbeth, King Lear and Doctor Faustus.

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9781839995118

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Reviews

Taking us through the layered histories of early English spaces invoked on the stage, Hopkins makes a fascinating and informed case for the contribution of the theatre in early modern England’s negotiation of the pre-Reformation histories which disrupted and underwrote the reformed understanding of sacred space.” —Alison Knight, Royal Holloway, University of London, UK. Focused on four plays about place, this book explores how drama in post-Reformation England resonated with importantly local cultural memories. Though literary in approach, the book reminded me of Alexandra Walsham’s major historical work, The Reformation of the Landscape; I hope other literary scholars will follow and develop Hopkins’ approach.” —Dr Thomas Rist, Department of English, University of Aberdeen, UK.

Author Information

Lisa Hopkins is Professor Emerita of English at Sheffield Hallam University. She is a co-editor of Journal of Marlowe Studies and of Shakespeare, the journal of the British Shakespeare Association, and a series editor of Arden Critical Readers and Arden Studies in Early Modern Drama.

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