A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 11

Love letters and elaborate tricks share the stage in this volume of early English drama. The collection opens with Nathan Field's A Woman is a Weathercock, where Scudmore reads Bellafront's assurance that differences in wealth and birth will not weaken her affection. Prefaces, dedications and editorial notes accompany the plays, placing the dialogue beside discussions of acting, authorship and earlier printed editions.

The contents also include Amends for Ladies, Albumazar and The Heir. In the excerpt from Albumazar, grand claims about planetary influence mask a scheme to carry valuables out of a carefully chosen window. The gap between learned language and practical deception gives the scene its comic force. Readers can explore these works as plays, following speeches and stage directions, or examine how editors explain their wording and history. The mixture of courtship, social ambition and theatrical trickery offers several approaches to older comedy.