This volume highlights the variety of forms comedy took in England, with reference to developments in Europe, particularly France, during the European Enlightenment. It argues that comedy in this period is characterized by wit, satire, and humor, provoking both laughter and sympathetic tears. Comic expression in the Enlightenment reflects continuities and engagements with the comedy of previous eras; it is also noted for new forms and preoccupations engendered by the cultural, philosophical, and political concerns of the time, including democratizing revolutions, increasing secularization, and growing emphasis on individualism.
Discussions emphasize the period's stage comedy and acknowledge comic expression in various forms of print media including the emerging literary form we now know as the novel. Contributions from scholars reflect a wide variety of interests in the field of 18th-century studies, and the inclusion of a generous number of illustrations throughout demonstrates that the period's visual culture was also an important part of the Enlightenment comic landscape.
Each chapter takes a different theme as its focus: form, theory, praxis, identities, the body, politics and power, laughter and ethics. These eight different approaches to Enlightenment comedy add up to an extensive, synoptic coverage of the subject.
List of Illustrations Notes on Contributors Editor’s Acknowledgments Series Preface Introduction, Elizabeth Kraft (University of Georgia, USA) 1. Form, Brian Corman (University of Toronto, Canada) 2. Theory, Jean I. Marsden (University of Connecticut, USA) 3. Praxis: The Practice of Comedy in the Restoration and Eighteenth Century, Laura J. Rosenthal (University of Maryland, USA) 4. Identities: Deception, Discovery, and the Paradox of the Dark Lantern, Heather Ladd (Kwantlen Polytechnic University, Canada) 5. The Body: Performing Comic Eighteenth-Century Embodiment, Misty G. Anderson (University of Tennessee, Knoxville, USA) 6. Politics and Power, Aparna Gollapudi (Colorado State University, USA) 7. Laughter: Enlightenment Philosophies of Laughter, from Superiority Theory to Incongruity Theory, Andrew Benjamin Bricker (Ghent University, Belgium) 8. Ethics, Melvyn New (University of Florida, USA) Notes References Index
Elizabeth Kraft is Professor of English at the University of Georgia, USA.
