Exemplary EliteThe Revolution of 1688 and the Rhetoric of Dramatic Dedications

  1. Nora Rodríguez-Loro 1
  1. 1 Universidad de Salamanca
    info

    Universidad de Salamanca

    Salamanca, España

    ROR https://ror.org/02f40zc51

Libro:
Moving beyond the pandemic: English and American studies in Spain
  1. Francisco Gallardo-del-Puerto (coord.)
  2. Mª del Carmen Camus-Camus (coord.)
  3. Jesús Ángel González-López (coord.)

Editorial: Editorial de la Universidad de Cantabria ; Universidad de Cantabria

ISBN: 978-84-19024-15-2

Año de publicación: 2022

Páginas: 218-223

Congreso: Asociación Española de Estudios Anglo-Norteamericanos. Congreso (44. 2021. Santander)

Tipo: Aportación congreso

Resumen

This chapter provides a discussion of the dedications of plays that female members of the aristocracy were addressed in the period 1660-1714. It is my contention that the practice of dedicatory writing functioned as other forms of propaganda, such as court masques and portraits, and that this strategy not only benefitted playwrights but also their patronesses, who welcomed the social recognition acknowledged by their clients. Moreover, I explain how the growing importance attached to morality in the mid-1690s became apparent in dedications: the idealisation of the patronesses’ physical beauty in the reign of Charles II was replaced by a greater emphasis on female virtue in the texts published after the Revolution of 1689. In this paper, a number of dedications addressed to women of the Churchill family are considered to demonstrate that these ladies were praised for their modesty, presenting them as devoted wives, while celebrating the military victories of the duke.