Includes bibliographical references (pages 153-161) and index.
Contents:
Introduction: Elizabeth I, John Lyly, and the monstrosity of icons -- Rulership and the monarch's two bodies in Sapho and Phao, Campaspe, and Midas -- Gender, alpha males, and all-around bullies in Love's Metamorphosis -- Sexuality, lesbian desire, and the necessity of a penis in Gallathea -- Male friendship and unruly women in Endimion -- Early modern economics in the entertainments -- Coda: the Man in the Moon and "The Woman in the Moon", or, whose moon is it really?
Summary:
"This study considers how John Lyly's characters who are allegorical representations of Elizabeth validate the queen, but at the same time raise troubling issues as to her true nature. Theodora Jankowski looks at both the light and the dark side of the Elizabeth character in each of Lyly's court plays, while at the same time considering how that allegory works in terms of the various issues Lyly debates within the plays. She reveals the fraught nature of John Lyly's relationship to Queen Elizabeth. He was not the first creative artist to introduce subversive undercurrents in entertainments designed to flatter the queen. However, Jankowski demonstrates how Lyly, while praising the queen and accepting her beneficence, simultaneously manages to present his audiences with the "dark queen," the opposite side of the positive image of the Queen of England"-- Provided by publisher.
Series:
Late Tudor and Stuart drama: gender, performance, and material culture
This resource is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act as administered by State Library of Iowa.