Proliferating Performance, Propagating Print: The Many Lives of Restoration Drama

Abstract

abstract:This essay explores the myriad stage and paper engagements with one of the most popular plays of the Restoration period: William Davenant and John Dryden's The Tempest, or the Enchanted Island (1670). It examines the flurry of printed materials circulated in the wake of the theatrical production, tracing The Tempest's migration from performance to print and back again. By charting how audiences and readers encountered the play beyond the playhouse, Stephen Watkins argues that we will begin to more accurately assess the role that commercial drama played in the cultural and imaginative lives of the people it originally entertained.