Regicide and Restoration: English Tragicomedy, 1660–1671

by Nancy Klein Maguire

• ISBN13: 9780521023733
• ISBN10: 0521023734
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2005-11-17
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Summary

When the theatres reopened in 1660, tragedy, the greatest of the Renaissance genres, had vanished. Focusing on the directions taken by tragicomedy and the court masque, this book accounts for the shift in the generic system. After the Restoration a network of Royalist playwrights attempted to redefine their society. Defending the traditional power structure in the new circumstances, they fabricated pious, backward-looking and repetitious myths of monarchy. Carolean tragicomedy reflects the persistent attempt to hold together an uneasily integrated culture, and shows us something of the early Restoration's division and intolerance of ambiguity. In Regicide and Restoration Nancy Klein Maguire accords the long-neglected plays of the 1660s the status of major historical documents.

Table of Contents

List of illustrations	x
Acknowledgements	xii
A note on texts and dates	xiv
Abbreviations	xvi
Introduction	1	(12)
The politics of Restoration tragicomedy	13	(30)
Theatrical restoration, 1660--1665	43	(40)
The rhymed heroic masque	83	(19)
The commercial market: genre as commodity	102	(36)
The divided kings in divided tragicomedy	138	(26)
The rhymed heroic apology of Roger Boyle, Earl of Orrery	164	(26)
John Dryden: Stuart mythographer and masque-maker	190	(25)
Some conclusions and directions	215	(6)
Notes	221	(39)
Selected editions of the playwrights' works	260	(4)
Index of dramatic works	264	(3)
General index	267