Overview
In Theatrical Legitimation, Timothy Murray provides a post-structural analysis of three frameworks of 17th-century dramatic and literary criticism: authorship, patronage, and spectatorship. Discussing a wide range of primary materials from England and France—including dedicatory epistles, title pages, anti-theatrical tracts, and art treatises— Murray reflects on different strategies of "legitimating" theater, all illustrating the period's broader ideological concern with the "allegory of genius." Following introductory remarks linking "legitimation" to "allegory," Murray's detailed discussion of Ben Jonson and his folio reveals how printing contributed to conventions of authorial constancy and genius. He then moves on to an analysis of patronage that focuses on Richelieu and French written portraiture, arguing that the legitimation of theater memorialized historical personages as "textual figures." Finally, Murray demonstrates that French aesthetic theories fueled by the legitimation of drama ultimately dwell not on authorship or patronage, but on figures of spectatorship, desire, and the sublime.