Fairleigh Dickinson University Press Marriage and Land Law in Shakespeare and Middleton

Marriage and Land Law in Shakespeare and Middleton examines the dynamics of early modern marriage-making, a time-honored practice that was evolving, often surreptitiously, from patriarchal control based on money and inheritance, to a companionate union in which love and the couple's own agency played a role. Among early modern playwrights, the marriage plays of Shakespeare and Middleton are particularly, though not uniquely, concerned with this evolution, observing the movement towards spousal choice determined by the couple themselves. Through the late Elizabethan and early Jacobean period, the role of the patriarch, though often compromised, remained intact: the father or guardian negotiated the financial terms. And, in a culture that was still tied to feudal practices, land law held a primary place in the bargain. This book, while following the arc of changing marriage practices, focuses on the ways in which the oldest determination of status, land, affects marital decisions. Land is not a constant topic of conversation in the twenty-one theatrical marriages scrutinized here, but it is a persistent and omnipresent truth of family and economic life. In paired discussions of marriage plays by Shakespeare and Middleton-The Taming of the Shrew/A Chaste Maid in Cheapside, All's Well That Ends Well/A Trick To Catch the Old One, Measure for Measure/A Mad World, My Masters, The Merchant of Venice/The Roaring Girl, and Much Ado About Nothing/No Wit, No Help Like A Woman's-this book explores the attempts, maneuvers, intrigues, ruses, and schemes that marriageable characters deploy in order to control spousal choice and secure land. Special attention is given to patriarchal figures whose poor judgment exploits inheritance law weaknesses and to the lack of legal protection and hence the vulnerability of women-and men-who engage the system in unconventional ways. Investigation into the milieu of early modern patriarchal influence in marriage-making and the laws governing inheritance practices enables a fresh reading of Shakespeare's and Middleton's marriage comedies. Review Bunker enriches these plays by showing the inseparability of marriage from land law. Her expertise in the subtleties of Renaissance marriage and finance is manifest, and her sustained focus on the precarious role of women in premarital property negotiations is particularly insightful. . . .This volume is . . . a valuable resource that emphasizes with conviction and specificity the intractable economic consequences of English Renaissance marriage.-- "The Sixteenth Century Journal"The impressive number of plays examined combined with the author's thorough knowledge of early modern land law and marital contracts makes this book a useful addition to any early modern scholar's library and an indispensable guide for a course devoted to the two playwrights. . . .This book's exploration of Middleton's and Shakespeare's comedies in thematic pairs, its analysis of understudied plays with overstudied ones, is a valuable and much-needed scholarly endeavor.-- "Renaissance Quarterly" About the Author Nancy Bunker is associate professor of English at Middle Georgia State College.