{"id":29137,"date":"2022-03-31T02:37:00","date_gmt":"2022-03-31T02:37:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=29137"},"modified":"2022-06-07T09:49:36","modified_gmt":"2022-06-07T09:49:36","slug":"why-werent-women-allowed-to-act-in-shakespeares-plays","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/why-werent-women-allowed-to-act-in-shakespeares-plays\/","title":{"rendered":"Why weren\u2019t women allowed to act in Shakespeare\u2019s plays?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Elizabeth Steinway<\/a>, Colorado State University<\/a><\/em><\/h1>\n\n\n\n
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Curious Kids<\/a> is a series for children of all ages. If you have a question you\u2019d like an expert to answer, send it to curiouskidsus@theconversation.com<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Why weren\u2019t women allowed to act in Shakespeare\u2019s plays? \u2013 Anastasia, age 15, Herdon, Virginia<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

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The role of Desdemona, the devoted, loving wife murdered by her husband in \u201cOthello,\u201d wasn\u2019t performed by a woman<\/a> until 1660 \u2013 about six decades after Shakespeare wrote the play<\/a>. This is because when Shakespeare was writing for the early modern stage, young men and boys performed all the women\u2019s parts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Numerous English theatergoers considered seeing women on the public stage for the first time a pivotal moment, including the civil servant and diarist<\/a> Samuel Pepys<\/a>. It was just one month after the first female actress played Desdemona that Pepys recorded \u201cthe first time that ever [he] saw Women come upon the stage.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

King Charles subsequently issued a royal proclamation<\/a> to make it official: \u201cWee doe \u2026 permit and give leave That all the woemens part to be acted in either of the said two Companies for the time to come maie be performed by woemen.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A puzzling situation<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

I have thought a lot about why men performed women\u2019s roles because I research how pregnancy was represented<\/a> on the early modern English stage during this period of all-male casts. The restriction has long puzzled scholars, mostly because no clear legal statute<\/a> prohibited it, and women acted professionally in other countries<\/a> during this period.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Also, women could perform in other venues, such as masques<\/a>, where dance, music and spectacles were enjoyed by aristocrats in England during the 16th and 17th centuries, and country house entertainments<\/a> \u2013 short plays that were staged for the queen and performed at country estates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s possible that women were allowed to perform in these settings because they were more private and associated with an elevated class status. There was something inappropriate, however, about women professionally acting on the public stage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These restrictions on women may be related to some of the negative views of acting in general, summarized in Puritan writer William Prynne\u2019s declaration<\/a> that \u201cpopular stage-playes are sinfull, heathenish, lewde, ungodly spectacles, and most pernicious corruptions.\u201d According to many anti-theatricalists, plays were \u201csinfull\u201d because they promoted pleasure and encouraged people to watch an \u201cungodly spectacle\u201d rather than working or attending church. For women in particular, it was generally deemed indecent to participate in and make money from such public performances.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Others commented on the difference between English theater and the theater in continental Europe, where women did act professionally. The writer Thomas Nashe wrote<\/a>: \u201cOur Players are not as the players beyond sea, a sort of squirting baudie Comedians.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even though many writers condemned the practice of men\u2019s wearing female attire on stage<\/a>, to them it was still preferable to having women become public spectacles on the professional stage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although women weren\u2019t on stage during Shakespeare\u2019s lifetime, they were involved with theatrical productions<\/a> in other ways<\/a>. For example, they made and altered costumes, collected admissions fees, sold food and other goods used in the theater<\/a>, and even owned playing houses<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now women can play men<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"Actress<\/a>
Actress Sarah Bernhardt portraying Hamlet. Bettmann via Getty Images<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Since Charles\u2019 declaration that women\u2019s parts \u201cmaie be performed by woemen,\u201d women have played an increasingly diverse role in Shakespearean theater \u2013 including playing lead male roles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1899, Sarah Bernhardt performed as Hamlet<\/a>. More recently, Jessika D. Williams played the lead<\/a> in \u201cOthello.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These gender reversals are a reminder that much has changed since men and boys played all the women\u2019s parts, and that much more will continue to change as society grapples with questions about gender, identity and performance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Hello, curious kids! Do you have a question you\u2019d like an expert to answer? Ask an adult to send your question to CuriousKidsUS@theconversation.com<\/a>. Please tell us your name, age and the city where you live.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

And since curiosity has no age limit \u2013 adults, let us know what you\u2019re wondering, too. We won\u2019t be able to answer every question, but we will do our best.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Elizabeth Steinway<\/a>, Instructor of Literature and Composition, Colorado State University<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This article is republished from The Conversation<\/a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Elizabeth Steinway, Colorado State University Curious Kids is a series for children of all ages. If you have a question you\u2019d like an expert to answer, send it to curiouskidsus@theconversation.com. Why weren\u2019t women allowed to act in Shakespeare\u2019s plays? \u2013 Anastasia, age 15, Herdon, Virginia The role of Desdemona, the devoted, loving wife murdered by […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":29138,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[293,8025],"tags":[11104,6689,6786,2197,2595,1044,7717],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29137"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29137"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29137\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29823,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29137\/revisions\/29823"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29138"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}