“The next good mood I find my father in, I'll get him quite discarded” With these chillingly offhand words, Beatrice-Joanna, the spoilt daughter of a powerful nobleman, plots to get rid of the family servant who has crossed her once too often. The Changeling's vivid tale of sexual appetite, repulsion, betrayal and lunacy remains one of the most compelling tragedies of the 17th century. Exposing the vexed relationship between servants and masters, setting notions of `change' against the revelation of psychological 'secrets' as ways of explaining human behaviour, and exploring the idea of love as a `tame madness', the play reveals the terrifying consequences of ungoverned sexual appetite and betrayal. Featuring the full and modernized play text, this revised edition includes incisive commentary notes which explain the nuances of the play's vibrant, colloquial language and demonstrate its sly delight in the characters' conscious and unconscious wordplay. Michael Neill's illuminating introduction provides a firm grounding in the play's socio-political context, demonstrates how careful close-reading can expand your enjoyment of the play, explains the play's violent linkage of comic and tragic plots and gives theatrical life to the text via a discussion of its stage history, with a particular emphasis on the most interesting recent productions. The New Mermaids plays offer: · Modernized versions of the play text edited to the highest textual standards · Fully annotated student editions with obscure words explained and critical, contextual and staging insight provided on each page · Full Introductions analyzing context, themes, author background and stage history

Modern-day Elle is tired of the dating scene and of being single and poor. When a strange old woman gives her a coupon for a free husband, she half-jokingly redeems it, and finds herself swept back in time and into the life of Eleanor Moore, a wealthy heiress engaged to the impoverished Earl of Allsbrook. She quickly learns the truth of the old adage that you should be careful what you wish for... you just might get it.

At midlife, Mary Rose O'Reilley reflects on her past and her hard-won sense of self. She is determined, now, not to sacrifice or waste her self. She has struggled for years along the paths set by her suburban childhood, her Catholic upbringing, her failed marriage, and the mute duties of daughterhood. Now, she is trying to see the world through the eyes of the deer that stop outside her window and look in at her. As a wildlife rehabilitator, she feels a closer connection to the natural world as experienced by animals. As an apprentice potter, she sees in a Japanese tea bowl the ultimate balance of action and contemplation. As a Quaker, she can both sit still and sing. And as a writer, O'Reilley can speak clearly to readers at midlife who are expected to know it all, but don't.

" Whether called "the good people," "the little people," or simply "them," fairies are familiar from their appearances in Shakespeare's plays, Disney's films, and points in between. In many cultures, however, fairies are not just the stuff of distant legend or literature: they are real creatures with supernatural powers. The Good People presents nineteen essays that focus on the actual fairies of folklore -- fairies of past and living traditions who affected, and still affect, people's lives in myriad ways.

Pascale Aebischer provides the only comprehensive analysis of early modern drama on screen, expanding the scope of Shakespearean performance studies.

This collection of original essays on Thomas Middleton and William Rowley's unsettling revenge tragedy The Changeling represents key new directions in criticism and research. The 13 chapters fall into six groups focusing on questions of space, theology, collaboration, disability both mental and physical, and performance both early modern and contemporary. The Changeling's critical and theatrical history, and a selected bibliography for the volume helps readers easily find the most frequently cited materials in the volume as a whole, while individual essays detail the full expanse of critical sources to pursue for further analysis. With contributors ranging from highly regarded critics to emerging scholars drawn from the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, France and Switzerland, the collection equips readers to engage with a variety of critical approaches to the play, moving a long way beyond the last century's tendency to treat Middleton as 'the early modern Ibsen', to ignore Rowley, and to focus almost wholly on a single aspect of the play's plot. Key themes and topics include: · Performance · Space and affect · Authorial collaboration · Gender and representation · Violence · Disability

Modernism's Mythic Pose recovers the tradition of Delsartism, a popular international movement that promoted bodily and vocal solo performances, particularly for women. This strain of classical-antimodernism shaped dance, film, and poetics. Its central figure, the mythic pose, expressed both skepticism and nostalgia and functioned as an ambivalent break from modernity.