Women and Medieval Drama: Selected Sisters and Worshipful Wives

Over the last four decades, the painstaking work of Records of Early English Drama has revealed the breadth of medieval dramatic performance, and unearthed fascinating evidence concerning the staging of early English drama. Drawing on these discoveries, this chapter explores women and drama of the English Middle Ages. Employing a broad definition of interaction to encompass commissioning, the practicalities of staging, performing and spectating, it is clear that medieval women’s relationship to drama was multifaceted. This chapter examines women’s roles in liturgical drama, saints’ plays, and cycle pageants, in determining the nature and degree of women’s involvement in the drama of the Middle Ages.