Description: Contributors to this collection argue for the importance of academic drama as a site of cultural production in England from 1500 to 1700. They explore how these plays address various aspects of culture, including the relationship between the academy and the state, the tensions between humanism and religious reform, the social profits and economic liabilities of formal education, and the increasing involvement of universities in the commercial market, among other issues.
Review Quotes: 'Early Modern Academic Drama is an admirably coherent anthology, with chapters linked by an important central thesis: while drama is central to humanist educational conventions and aims, such works also probe the gap between ''practices and ideals'', exploring the relationship between humanist pedagogy and the civically-minded critical, but loyal, subject that such pedagogy was supposed to develop.' Renaissance Quarterly 'Early Modern Academic Drama, edited by Jonathan Walker and Paul Streufert, is a vital re-evaluation of the performance cultures of Early Modern educational institutions. ... A major strength of this collection is the connections between individual essays which foreground crucial topics but approach[es] them from diverse perspectives.' Parergon 'The publication of Early Modern Academic Drama is at once overdue and timely... The quality and variety of essays in Jonathan Walker and Paul D. Streufert's collection is commendable, and one leaves the volume energized by the groundbreaking material it contains.' English Studies