4. Transforming Sexuality : Jacobean Tragicomedy and the Reconfiguration of Private Life

Jacobean tragicomedy is the last original formal creation of En­ glish Renaissance drama meant for a public audience. Despite many illuminating studies , no explanation has ever accounted for all of the oddities of this hybrid genre, the most prominent of which remains the striking discrepancy between the aesthetic in­ feriority of many of the plays and their undoubted historical im­ portance, including their contemporary popularity and the crucial role they played in the long-term development of seventeenth­ century drama. 1 Explanations that center on Shakespeare's ro-