The Palgrave Handbook of the History of Women on Stage

This book brings together nearly 40 academics and theatre practitioners to chronicle and celebrate the courage, determination and achievements of women on stage across the ages and around the globe. The collection stretches from ancient Greece to present-day Australasia via the United States, Soviet Russia, Europe, India, South Africa and Japan, offering a series of analytical snapshots of women performers, their work and the conditions in which they produced it. Individual chapters provide in-depth consideration of specific moments in time and geography while the volume as a whole and its juxtapositions stimulate consideration of the bigger picture, underlining the challenges women have faced across cultures in establishing themselves as performers and the range of ways in which they gained access to the stage. Organised chronologically, the volume looks not just to the past but the future: it challenges the very notions of ‘history’, ‘stage’ and even the definition of ‘women’ itself.                      Review “I would have looked forward to articles which evaluate the impact of [the] contemporary female theatre practitioners’ work (which is often therapeutic in aim). Nonetheless, these personal narratives contribute richly to the wealth of knowledge in this tome accessible to the general reader, theatre practitioner, or researcher. They extend the discourse so that it interweaves the subject of women in theatre and performance with human rights.” (Dana Rufolo, Plays International & Europe, Vol. 36 (1-3), 2021) Review “It is quite wonderful. I love the range – temporal, cultural, geographical, and the depth. The presentation is beautiful, of course, and the whole is so, so much more than the sum of its parts. As a work of reference it will be much used and have a long life.” (Dr. Penelope Freedman, writer and academic) From the Back Cover This book brings together nearly 40 academics and theatre practitioners to chronicle and celebrate the courage, determination and achievements of women on stage across the ages and around the globe. The collection stretches from ancient Greece to present-day Australasia via the United States, Soviet Russia, Europe, India, South Africa and Japan, offering a series of analytical snapshots of women performers, their work and the conditions in which they produced it. Individual chapters provide in-depth consideration of specific moments in time and geography while the volume as a whole and its juxtapositions stimulate consideration of the bigger picture, underlining the challenges women have faced across cultures in establishing themselves as performers and the range of ways in which they gained access to the stage. Organised chronologically, the volume looks not just to the past but the future: it challenges the very notions of ‘history’, ‘stage’ and even the definition of ‘women’ itself. About the Author Jan Sewell teaches Humanities at the Open University, UK. She was Assistant Editor of the RSC Complete Works of Shakespeare (2007) as well as the individual editions of Shakespeare’s Plays (2008-2012); she is co-editor of William Shakespeare and Others: Collaborative Plays (2013) and Plays of Shakespeare’s Company (forthcoming). Clare Smout is a Teaching Fellow at the University of Birmingham. Her current teaching portfolio also includes work on Shakespeare for Staffordshire University, the University of Cambridge Institute of Continuing Education, and i-Learner in Hong Kong. She previously spent twenty years as a theatre practitioner specialising in new writing.