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Challenging narratives : gender, politics, and performance in mid-Victorian classical burlesque
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Grossi, Alessandra (2022) Challenging narratives : gender, politics, and performance in mid-Victorian classical burlesque. PhD thesis, University of Warwick.
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Official URL: http://webcat.warwick.ac.uk/record=b3862353
Abstract
This thesis aims to challenge the accepted historical narrative developed by classical scholars on mid-Victorian classical burlesque, which they describe as a demotic form of entertainment encoding politically subversive meanings in terms of gender. The first section challenges the assumption that classical burlesque authors had politically radical beliefs in relation to the issue of gender. Despite their Bohemian lifestyle, the analysis of memoirs, novels, comedies, and farces written by classical burlesque authors, as well as the satirical representations of gendered social types in magazines like Punch and Fun, illustrate that their degree of political involvement was limited. The second section of this thesis claims that classicists have interpreted classical burlesques merely as written scripts, thus neglecting the comicality embedded in performances. The acting styles, use of cross-dressing and linguistic conventions of classical burlesque are analysed as elements which enabled the achievement of comic effects in performance and undercut the serious significance of the characters’ verbal claims. The third section of this thesis questions the alleged demotic appeal of classical burlesque despite the lack of sufficient evidence. It argues that a considerable portion of the burlesque public may have been composed of upper- and middle-class young gentlemen, who lived a ‘fast’ and mildly dissipated lifestyle. Ultimately, this thesis offers an historical investigation which aims to re-instate the centrality of classical burlesques as comic performances which satirised the conventional mid-Victorian gender paradigms, without seriously endorsing the need for reform, and without aiming at indoctrinating their audiences, whose background may have been more privileged and conservative than classical scholars have acknowledged.
Item Type: | Thesis (PhD) | ||||
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Subjects: | H Social Sciences > HQ The family. Marriage. Woman P Language and Literature > PN Literature (General) > PN2000 Dramatic representation. The Theater |
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Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH): | Burlesque (Theater) -- Great Britain -- History -- 19th century, English drama (Comedy) -- 19th century -- History and criticism, Burlesques, Burlesque (Literature) -- History and criticism, Sex role -- Great Britain -- History -- 19th century | ||||
Official Date: | May 2022 | ||||
Dates: |
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Institution: | University of Warwick | ||||
Theses Department: | School of Theatre, Performance and Cultural Policy Studies | ||||
Thesis Type: | PhD | ||||
Publication Status: | Unpublished | ||||
Supervisor(s)/Advisor: | Davis, Jim, 1949- | ||||
Format of File: | |||||
Extent: | vii, 272 pages : illustrations | ||||
Language: | eng |
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