Gender and the Italian Stage: From the Renaissance to the Present Day

Maggie GÜnsberg explores gender portrayal on the Italian stage, and its shifting relationship with other social categories of class, age and the family from the Renaissance to the present day. She examines both the formal properties of drama and the conventions of drama in performance. An interdisciplinary approach and feminist perspective inform her critique of work by Machiavelli, Ariosto, Goldoni, D'Annunzio and Pirandello. She concludes by assessing the impact of Franca Rame on contemporary Italian theater.

"Dexterously employing an interdisciplinary approach derived from semiotics, psychoanalysis, feminism, and dramatic theory (and writing with uncommon verve and lucidity)...the author maintains a skillful balance between analysis of intrinsically theatrical issues (dramatic form, plot convention, etc.) and attention to the socioeconomic context of institutions, writers, performers, and audience. Its broad historical scope and its focus on issues of representation set this useful work apart from both studies of women's authorship and more tightly focused examinations of particular aspects of theatrical tradition." S. Botterill, Choice