Hoeveler, Diane

English

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Marquette Universitye-Publications@MarquetteEnglish Faculty Research and Publications English Department1-1-2010Review of Gothic Plays and American Society,1794-1830, by M. Susan AnthonyDiane HoevelerMarquette University, diane.hoeveler@marquette.eduPublished version. Theatre History Studies, Vol. 30 (2010): 249-251. DOI. © 2010 University ofAlabama Press. Used with permission.{  249 }BOOk REV IEwSthe actress, who abandoned formal education as a teenager, equipped to become a respected author—a tribute to her tenacity, and apparently to her self- study. The idea of  actress- as- writer could certainly prompt another study of  Morris and others. Grossman’s detailed descriptions coupled with her use of  primary docu-ments makes tangible the most ephemeral aspect of  theatre history: perfor-mance. General Ameri can theatre history texts resort to categorizing, swarming with names and labels but little notion of  how acting style might have mani fested onstage. This study of  Clara Morris makes sense of  the “Emotional School,” ex-plaining and comparing Morris’s style with those of  others, illustrated by spe-cific examples from performance texts. A Spectacle of Suffering is a welcome ad-dition to reading for graduate seminars in Ameri can theatre  history. While it has illustrations and extensive notes for each chapter, A Spectacle of Suffering: Clara Morris on the Ameri can Stage does not include a bibliography. This omission may be owing to the press and not the author, but as a reader at-tempting to locate Morris’s works and specific reviews, and as an avid browser of  bibliographies, I found using notes alone frustrating and time- consuming. I was disappointed about this single aspect of  the book, especially as I plan to use it as an example for graduate students.ANNE FLETCHER—Southern Illinois University Carbondale \Gothic Plays and Ameri can Society, 1794–1830. By M. Susan Anthony. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland, 2007. 195 pp. 7 appendices. $39.95 paperback.Gothic Plays and Ameri can Society is the first full- length study of  gothic dra-mas in early America. Although Susan Anthony uses her study to suggest ways that Ameri can playwrights and actors attempted to appropriate and thereby na-tionalize the genre, the implication that gothic drama was in any meaningful way “Ameri can” is itself  more than a bit suspect. As her own research proves, there were only seven Ameri can playwrights producing gothic dramas during this period, and of  those seven, only one or possibly two could be seen as writ-ing new or original works. The other five were clearly recycling standard Brit-ish gothic fare, such as William Dunlap’s Bluebeard (1801) or J. D. Turnbull’s The Wood Daemon (1808). Nevertheless, this is an interesting study that opens up a curiously neglected area of  theatrical history in this country. For instance, {  250 }BOOk REV IEwSwhen Edgar Allan Poe published his only drama, Politian (1835), he could as-sume that his fellow citizens would have recognized it as a hybridized mix of  the gothic, the melodramatic, and the sentimental. The discussions of  gothic dramas in this book effectively explain the derivative and anxious theatrical cli-mate of  the early Ameri can republic. Written in a lively and jargon- free voice, Anthony’s study has both strengths and weaknesses, and I will address the former first. Using theatrical memoirs published in contemporary periodicals, and playbills and engravings housed in the Harvard Theatre Collection, the Free Library of  Philadelphia, and the Pennsylvania Historical Society, Anthony has assembled a good deal of  original research on the four major theatrical centers of  early Ameri can society: Phila-delphia, New York, Charleston, and Boston. Her eleven chapters (six of  which have been published in other venues) examine such topics as the construction of  maleness and femaleness in the gothic, the evolution of  the female “star” in gothic dramas, the use of  stage spectacle, the adaptation of  British plays for the Ameri can stage, and the largely negative critical reception of  gothic dra-mas. Her seven appendices are useful, particularly the one that lists the gothic dramas as they were first performed in the United States (159). This appendix makes it clear that only seven Ameri can playwrights were producing gothic dramas in America at this time and that the majority of  their works were clearly adaptations of  British gothic fare (for example, British dramatist Miles An-drews’s Mysteries of the Castle was adapted by Ameri can dramatist John Blake White). Anthony’s thesis, as she delineates in her preface, is that “Gothic plays re-flected the ambivalence of  Ameri cans. On the one hand, Gothic plays featured a villain who freely transgressed legal and moral boundaries, and yet, as a form of melodrama, these same plays ensured the triumph of virtue, reinstating so-cial order and conventional behavior” (2). This is not exactly a new insight, nor are its political, social, and cultural implications drawn out, and I am afraid that there are not many original, theoretical, or sophisticated analyses in this study. But what the book does offer, as I have suggested, is a fair amount of  useful ar-chival research that paves the way for gothic theorists to examine these long- neglected dramas. If  originality of  thought is not strongly evident here, neither is dogged re-search in the secondary scholarship on the gothic. My own book and articles on the subject are represented by a citation of  a Web site that I didn’t even know existed: www.virginia.edu. In place of  reading published books and articles, the author appears to have taken the easy way out on a number of  occasions by consulting dumbed- down Web sites. The other topic that is noticeably absent is {  251 }BOOk REV IEwSany awareness that issues of  religion, secularization, and modernization are cur-rently at the forefront of  gothic scholarship. For instance, in discussing the phe-nomenon of the ghost on the gothic stage, there is no analysis of  how conflicted the audience would have been about this avatar of  Catholicism, medievalism, and animism in their midst. While the book focuses on gender construction, a fairly overworked emphasis in gothic scholarship over a decade ago, it does not examine the more crucial issue that is currently being examined in gothic stud-ies: Why were these works so popular, and what sort of  cultural work was be-ing performed for their audience members? If  Ameri cans attended the theatre, were they motivated by a need to find a substitutive religious ritual, or did the plays enact the struggle that was currently being waged between the forces of  rationalism, science, and materialism and the opposing forces of  supernatural-ism, “superstition,” and a resurgence of  the transcendent? All of  this is to say that Anthony has provided us with a real service by ex-cavating the raw materials we need to locate and study these long- lost “Ameri-can” gothic dramas. They need, however, to be placed in a more nuanced, schol-arly, and interpretive framework that will allow us to understand exactly why they spoke to their early Ameri can audiences so powerfully.DIANE LONG HOEVELER—Marquette University \Dramaturgy and Performance. By Cathy Turner and Synne K. Behrndt. New York: Pal-grave Macmillan, 2008. xi + 229 pp. $26.95 paper.When discussing approaches to dramaturgical analysis in Dramaturgy and Per­formance, Cathy Turner and Synne K. Behrndt, both professional dramaturges and lecturers at the University of  Winchester, encourage openness and inclu-sivity. Building on numerous personal interviews with leading dramaturges in the United Kingdom, the United States, and Europe, as well as archival re-search, the authors present an understanding of  dramaturgy and dramaturgi-cal analysis that is expansive rather than reductive, suggesting numerous pos-sibilities and applications. As part of  the Palgrave series Theatre and Performance Practices, Turner and Berhrndt’s book is intended as an introductory text that offers a brief  and accessible analysis of  the historical developments and contemporary practices of  dramaturgy. Although the authors sometimes discuss dramaturgy in Eu-

Review of \u3cem\u3eGothic Plays and American Society, 1794-1830,\u3c/em\u3e by M. Susan Anthony

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Review of \u3cem\u3eGothic Plays and American Society, 1794-1830,\u3c/em\u3e by M. Susan Anthony

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