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Male-to-Female Crossdressing in Early Modern English Literature Simone Chess

Male-to-Female Crossdressing in Early Modern English Literature By Simone Chess

Male-to-Female Crossdressing in Early Modern English Literature by Simone Chess


Male-to-Female Crossdressing in Early Modern English Literature Summary

Male-to-Female Crossdressing in Early Modern English Literature: Gender, Performance, and Queer Relations by Simone Chess

This volume examines and theorizes the oft-ignored phenomenon of male-to-female (MTF) crossdressing in early modern drama, prose, and poetry, inviting MTF crossdressing episodes to take a fuller place alongside instances of female-to-male crossdressing and boy actors' crossdressing, which have long held the spotlight in early modern gender studies. The author argues that MTF crossdressing episodes are especially rich sources for socially-oriented readings of queer gender-that crossdressers' genders are constructed and represented in relation to romantic partners, communities, and broader social structures like marriage, economy, and sexuality. Further, she argues that these relational representations show that the crossdresser and his/her allies often benefit financially, socially, and erotically from his/her queer gender presentation, a corrective to the dominant idea that queer gender has always been associated with shame, containment, and correction. By attending to these relational and beneficial representations of MTF crossdressers in early modern literature, the volume helps to make a larger space for queer, genderqueer, male-bodied and queer-feminine representations in our conversations about early modern gender and sexuality.

Male-to-Female Crossdressing in Early Modern English Literature Reviews

Not just an important contribution to early modern and trans studies, but an essential work of transfeminist scholarship.

Kadin Henningsen - Trans Studies Quarterly

The scope of this monograph is ambitious [and] would be of interest to a wide audience not only for those working on early modern literature but also to any working on gender and sexuality across historical periods and geographic boundaries.

Vanessa Wright, University of Leeds

About Simone Chess

Simone Chess is an Assistant Professor of English and an affiliate of the Gender, Sexuality and Women's Studies Program at Wayne State University in Detroit. Her research interests are in Early Modern literary and cultural studies, queer studies, and gender and sexuality studies. She has published articles and book chapters on the topics of crossdressing, bathroom activism, ballads, and blindness.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Passing Relations

1. Doublecrossdressing Encounters: Haec Vir and Hic Mulier, The Faerie Queene, May Day, and Robin Hood and the Bishop

2. Crossdressed Brides and the Marriage Market: A Mad World, My Master, Epicoene, and Phylotus and Emelia

3. Crossdressing and Queer Heterosexuality: Arcadia, Urania, Isle of the Gulls, and Sport Upon Sport

4. Crossdressing, Sex, and Gender Labor: Convent of Pleasure, Gallathea, and The Male and Female Husband

Epilogue

Additional information

NLS9780367210472
9780367210472
0367210479
Male-to-Female Crossdressing in Early Modern English Literature: Gender, Performance, and Queer Relations by Simone Chess
New
Paperback
Taylor & Francis Ltd
2019-01-17
196
N/A
Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.
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