Elizabeth Cooper's The Rival Widows, or Fair Libertine provides a unique opportunity to restore to scholarly and pedagogical attention a neglected female writer and a play with broad and significant implications for studies of eighteenth-century history, culture and gender. Following the adventures of Lady Bellair, a "glowing, joyous young Widow," the storyline regenders standard expectations about desire, marriage, libertinism and sentiment. The play has not been reprinted since 1735; therefore this old-spelling edition gives scholars access to an important but neglected resource for studies of women writers and eighteenth-century theatre. In an original and extensive introduction, Tiffany Potter presents cultural and historical information that highlights the scholarly implications of this newly available play. She offers a brief biographical sketch of the playwright; a summary of sources for specific elements of the play; an overview of the theatrical climate of the time (with particular focus on the conditions leading to the Licensing Act of 1737); a discussion of the place of women in eighteenth-century society; a summary of symbiotic cultural discourses of libertinism and sensibility in the early eighteenth century; and a discussion of the general cultural significance of Cooper's demonstration of the malleability of prescriptive gender roles. Further value is added to this edition through its appendices, which reproduce documents relating to the playwright Elizabeth Cooper and to the Licensing Act of 1737 (including the text of the Act itself).

.."". the anthology is engaging and informative and should stimulate further research into this fascinating yet neglected area."" -- English .."". most interest are newly recovered materials... with several works appearing in English translation for the first time. The excellent introductions and reference notes along with the samplings of writings will pique the interest of students of both literature and history. A good readings text for college students and anyone interested in the development of literature and culture."" -- Library Journal This anthology demonstrates women's participation in the construction of criticism as a literary genre. The selected writings, by forty-one of the women who produced criticism between 1660 and 1820, include writers from England, France, Germany, and the United States.

This study investigates interpretation of a late-fourteenth-century fictional character in both verbal and visual art of the period 1660–1810. Audiovisual analysis and diachronic afterlife studies intertwine concerning the Wife of Bath in songs, scholarship, commentary, poetic paraphrases, musical theater in London and on the Continent, paintings, and book illustrations.