The performance of sexual and economic politics in the plays of Aphra Behn. Item Type text; Dissertation-Reproduction (electronic) Authors Snook, Lorrie Jean Publisher The University of Arizona. Rights Copyright © is held by the author. Digital access to this material is made possible by the University Libraries, University of Arizona. Further transmission, reproduction or presentation (such as public display or performance) of protected items is prohibited except with permission of the author. Download date 07/10/2021 22:26:32 Link to Item http://hdl.handle.net/10150/185960 INFORMATION TO USERS This manuscript has been reproduced from the microfilm master. UMI films the text directly from the original or copy submitted. Thus, some thesis and dissertation copies are in typewriter face, while others may be from any type of computer printer. The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. 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Contact UMI directly to order. V·M·I University Microfilms International A Bell & Howellinformalion Company 300 North Zeeb Road. Ann Arbor. MI 48106-1346 USA 313.'761-4700 800/521-0600 Order Number 9303302 The performance of sexual and economic politics in the plays of Aphra Behn Snook, Lorrie Jean, Ph.D. The University of Arizona, 1992 Copyright ©1992 by Snook, Lorrie Jean. All rights reserved. V·M·I 300 N. Zccb Rd. Ann Arbor. MI 48106 THE PERFO~~CE OF SEXUAL AND ECONOMIC POLITICS IN THE PLAYS OF APHRA BEHN by Lorrie Jean Snook Copyright © Lorrie Jean Snook 1992 A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of the DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY In the Graduate College THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA 199 2 2 THE u~IVERSITY OF ARIZONA GRADUATE COLLEGE As members of the Final Examination Committee, we certify that we have read the dissertation prepared by Lorrie Jean Snook --~~~~~~~~~-------------------- entitled ______________________________________________________________The Performance of Sexual and Economic Politics __ in the Plays of Aphra Behn and recommend that it be accepted as fulfilling the dissertation requirement for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy ~- Dat'e Date Date Final approval and acceptance of this dissertation is contingent upon the candidate's submission of the final copy of the dissertation to the Graduate College. I hereby certify that I have read this dissertation prepared under my direction and recommend that it be accepted as fulfilling the dissertation requirement. ~ ~h~ #1~~ D te / 3 STATEMENT BY AUTHOR This dissertation has been submitted in partial fulfillment of requirements for an advanced degree at The University of Arizona and is deposited in the University Library to be made available to borrowers under rules of the Library. Brief quotations from this dissertation are allowable without special permission, provided that accurate acknowledgment of source is made. Requests for permission for extended quotation from or reproduction of this manuscript in whole or in part may be granted by the copyright holder. SIGNED: 4 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank my committee, J. Douglas Canfield, William Epstein, and Susan Hardy Aiken, for working with me. Special thanks go to Dr. Canfield, my dissertation director, without whom this dissertation likely would not have been written. In addition, much appreciation goes to Laurie MacDiarmid and Stephanie Dryden for their readings and comments on earlier drafts of Chapter 1, and to David T. Peterson for help with last­ minute administrative errands. Me Linda Johnson also deserves many thanks for her invaluable help with scheduling, formatting and administrative questions. 5 TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT . 6 CHAPTER 1: Introduction . 8 Reading Behn • • • . • • • • . • . 12 Reading Performance • ••.• 22 Reading Behn's Performances •.••. 36 Notes to Chapter 1 • . • . •. ••• 40 CHAPTER 2: The Performance of Association: Behn's Intrigue Comedies .••... 42 The Dutch Lover: Intrigue and Character . 59 The Feign'd curtezans: Intrigue, Identity and Economy . • • • • • . • • •• •...• 82 Notes to Chapter 2 . • . • • . • . • . 104 CHAPTER 3: The Merchants of Love: The Rake-Hero, The Courtesan, and the Witty Virgin in The Rover, Part I and II ••...••.• 105 The Rover: The Rake as Commodity • • . • . • 113 The Rover, Part II: Playing to and for Commodities 137 Notes to Chapter 3 ••......•.•.•... 170 CHAPTER 4: The Powers of Convention: Behn's Town Comedies .•..•• · 172 Sir Patient Fancy: The Redistribution of Power 185 The City Heiress: The Resumption of Power • . • . · 202 The Lucky Chance: The Power of Magic . • 229 Notes to Chapter 4 • . • • • . • . • 256 WORKS CITED •••.••..•...•••...•..•.••.•.•••.............. 259 6 ABSTRACT Since her work as a professional playwright in the 1670s and 1680s, critics have sought to equate Aphra Behn and her plays, to fix and stabilize the body of the writer and of her work. She has been marked as a prostitute, a feminist, and a masculinist hack, in each case her gender determining the value of and audience for her writing. This dissertation argues that Behn's plays--and Behn--should be read in terms of her controlling tropes and forms of performance and intrigue. Her plays and her presence use these tropes and forms to decenter the idea of identity and manipulate conventions of gender roles in the patriarchal Restoration theater. In doing so, she recasts and reconstitutes the structure of the patriarchal theater and economy. Chapter 1 introduces my argument and presents an overview of critical and feminist responses to Behn. I use this overview to present my own view of identity as performance, opposing such essentialist theorists as Helene cixous. Chapter 2 develops the historical and metaphorical associations of intrigue and performance, beginning with her Preface to The Dutch Lover; in reading two of her lesser-known intrigue-comedies, The Dutch Lover and The Feign'd curtezans, or a Night's Intrigue, I then argue that 7 performance and intrigue challenge the conventional engendering of roles such as the rake and the courtesan. Chapter 3 expands these associations and reads her economic metaphors, as I look at Behn's most famous intrigue-comedy, The Rover, and its sequel; as well as challenging conventional roles and economic valuations, however, The Rover. Part II emphasizes the ultimate inescapability of these roles and valuations in the patriarchal theater. Chapter 4 moves to her town-comedies; I argue that Behn adapts the intrigue-form to her comedies of manners, working out the characters' struggle between convention and nature to define public and private selves. sir Patient Fancy sets up the power that the manipulation of convention offers; The City Heiress emphasizes the limits of such manipulation; The Lucky Chance offers magic and ambiguity as new theatrical possibility to subvert convention and recast role. 8 CHAPTER 1: Introduction To enter a world once closed or inaccessible is a significant act; such entrance reconstitutes world and place, allowing new possibilities for character and movement. Such entrance also allows one's act to be read by others who come later. In the case which concerns me for the next two hundred pages, how should we read the First Professional Woman Playwright and her work? Audiences-­ theatrical, literary, critical--bring into play their own set of generic expectations and ways of reading the character. How should she behave? What should she be like? Indeed, what is most important to read: her professionalism or her gender? Her character must be constructed and performed so that contemporary and future audiences may accept her in the role. She must appear to be a worthy woman of letters. Aphra Behn does enter in the character of the First Woman Professional Playwright. Although the nun Hroswitha writes dramatic pieces in the 10th century, and women attempt to enter the patriarchal English theater in the turbulent 1660s, Behn is the first to make a living (or rather, eke out a living) by her writing: at least eighteen produced plays, as well as poems, works of fiction, and translations. Just as important is that she writes without 9 a husband to support her (such as Katherine Philips has) or without family and name to give her a place in the market (such as Margaret Cavendish, the Duchess of Newcastle, has). Without these supports, Behn must stage her own entrance and her own character in the hitherto closed world of the theater. Although she has earned at least the name of First Professional Woman Playwright, her status as that character is not so