The Pursuit of Style in Early Modern Drama examines how early modern plays celebrated the power of different styles of talk to create dynamic forms of public address. Across the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, London expanded into an uncomfortably public city where everyone was a stranger to everyone else. The relentless anonymity of urban life spurred dreams of its opposite: of being a somebody rather than a nobody, of being the object of public attention rather than its subject. Drama gave life to this fantasy. Presented by strangers and to strangers, early modern plays codified different styles of talk as different forms of public sociability. Then, as now, to speak of style was to speak of a fantasy of public address. Offering fresh insight for scholars of literature and drama, Matthew Hunter reveals how this fantasy - which still holds us in its thrall - played out on the early modern stage.
The Pursuit of Style in Early Modern Drama examines how early modern plays celebrated the power of different styles of talk to create dynamic forms of public address. Across the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, London expanded into an uncomfortably public city where everyone was a stranger to everyone else. The relentless anonymity of urban life spurred dreams of its opposite: of being a somebody rather than a nobody, of being the object of public attention rather than its subject. Drama gave life to this fantasy. Presented by strangers and to strangers, early modern plays codified different styles of talk as different forms of public sociability. Then, as now, to speak of style was to speak of a fantasy of public address. Offering fresh insight for scholars of literature and drama, Matthew Hunter reveals how this fantasy - which still holds us in its thrall - played out on the early modern stage.
Acknowledgments; Introduction: speaking of style; 1. Stage Talk; 2. Love Talk; 3. Court Talk; 4. Tough Talk; 5. Plain Talk; Afterword: speaking of judgment; Selected works cited; Index.
Matthew Hunter shows how early modern plays modeled diverse styles of talk for audiences inhabiting a newly public world.
Matthew Hunter is Assistant Professor of Literature at Texas Tech University. His research is focused on underscoring and exploring the connections between literary form and social life in early modern England. He is co-editor of Publicity and the Early Modern Stage: People Made Public (2021).
'The Pursuit of Style in Early Modern Drama is a powerful
intervention in early modern studies: a fresh analytic of the
social work of the stage, delivered in brisk, seductively enjoyable
prose. Hunter's exploration in cultural poetics reveals how
the London theatre forged a mutually constitutive relationship
between style and publicity, and also provides the outline of
a new history of English Renaissance drama.' András Kiséry, City
College New York
'Matthew Hunter brings an entirely fresh perspective to the notion
of style in early modern drama, conceiving it in terms of
generative forms directly affecting interaction in the public
world. He shows, on the one hand, how people adapted such polished
theatrical forms as 'tough talk,' 'court talk,' or' 'love talk' as
scripts for their own social performances, and, on the other, how
people reacted to one another's 'misfires' in their attempts at
stylistic appropriation. The book brilliantly illuminates the
dialogic feedback loop by which stage-plays both create and parody
the public's aspirational pursuit of style.' Lynne Magnusson,
University of Toronto
Hunter's book is not only about style but stylish in itself, and
although it is very high concept, it is also attentive to detail …
a sustained and perceptive account of the way in which early modern
plays contributed to the development of talk both on stage and off
it.' Lisa Hopkins, Modern Philology
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