Coyness, conduct, and She would if she could -- Feminine illusion and masculine violence in Wycherley's comedies -- Unruly women and patriarchal control in Dryden's The kind keeper -- Coyness, love, and money in Behn's comedies -- Liberty and coyness in Shadwell's comedies -- Novelty and coyness in Congreve and Trotter -- Marriage, virtue, and coyness in Southerne, Vanbrugh, and Pix.
Summary:
"Coyness and Crime examines the extraordinary focus on feminine coyness in forty English comedies by ten diverse playwrights of the late seventeenth-century. In contexts ranging from reaffirmations of church and king to emerging interests in liberty and novelty, these plays consistently reveal women caught in an ironic and nearly intractable convergence of objectification and culpability that allows them little innocent sexual agency; this is both the source and the legacy of coyness in Restoration comedy"-- Provided by publisher.
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.