The traditional view of pastoral as a static genre, aimed at the recreation of an idyllic past, has recently been challenged by historicist critics. Here Judith Haber complicates the opposition between humanist and historicist perspectives by examining ways in which pastoral poets themselves interrogate the contradictory relations inherent in their genre. Focusing on texts by Theocritus, Virgil, Sidney, and Marvell, Haber revises current understanding of pastoral, and raises wider questions about literature in society and the establishment of literary tradition.

This wide-ranging study investigates the intersections of erotic desire and dramatic form in the early modern period, considering to what extent disruptive desires can successfully challenge, change or undermine the structures in which they are embedded. Through close readings of texts by Marlowe, Shakespeare, Webster, Middleton, Ford and Cavendish, Haber counters the long-standing New Historicist association of the aesthetic with the status quo, and argues for its subversive potential. Many of the chosen texts unsettle conventional notions of sexual and textual consummation. Others take a...

This wide-ranging study investigates the intersections of erotic desire and dramatic form in the early modern period, considering to what extent disruptive desires can successfully challenge, change or undermine the structures in which they are embedded. Through close readings of texts by Marlowe, Shakespeare, Webster, Middleton, Ford and Cavendish, Haber counters the long-standing New Historicist association of the aesthetic with the status quo, and argues for its subversive potential. Many of the chosen texts unsettle conventional notions of sexual and textual consummation. Others take a...