Early Modern English Drama: A Critical Companion presents twenty-seven analytical essays on individual plays from the early modern period. Each essay is written by a leading scholar and examines a play in terms of a cultural or literary topic, from London to the law, servants to sovereigns, and geography to religion. Incorporating current perspectives in critical studies, the essays address issues of race, class, gender, sexuality, and colonialism, as well as key aspects of intellectual and social history, including humanism, science, the law, and theology.
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Examining sixteenth and seventeenth century conceptions of memory and forgetting, this study demonstrates their importance to the drama and culture of the time. Garrett A. Sullivan discusses memory and forgetting in terms of which a variety of behaviors--from seeking salvation to pursuing vengeance to succumbing to desire--are conceptualized. Focusing on works such as Macbeth, Hamlet, Dr. Faustus and The Duchess of Malfi, he reveals memory and forgetting to be dynamic cultural forces central to early modern understandings of embodiment, selfhood and social practice.