Feminist Comedy

Feminist Women Playwrights of London treats the eighteenth-century comic stage as an important place for feminist critique, practice and experiment. The book concentrates on five women who wrote for the stage in the later part of the century: Catherine Clive, Frances Brooke, Frances Burney, Hannah Cowley and Elizabeth Inchbald.

It argues that comedy was central to these women's professional success in an industry dominated by men, and it identifies a shared thread of feminist critique running through their plays. Male detractors of the era denied that women could be funny, but these playwrights were at the forefront of comedy, and their feminist influence can be traced to stage and screen today. The book acknowledges that the history connecting feminism and comedy is a troubled one.