Medieval English Theatre 46

<b>Newest research into drama and performance from the Middle Ages and the Tudor period.</b><br><br><br><i>Medieval English Theatre is the premier journal in early theatre studies. Its name belies its wide range of interest: it publishes articles on theatre and pageantry from across the British Isles up to the opening of the London playhouses and the suppression of the civic religious plays and also includes contributions on European and Latin drama together with analyses of modern survivals or equivalents and of research productions of medieval plays.</i><br><br>This volume is testament to the lively range of current research across the field of medieval theatre. It investigates different traditions of performance through a variety of theatrical theological and material approaches. It opens with an analysis of a fascinating Dutch rhetoricians play-text revealing how its engagingly disruptive female character Everyday Chitchat proves central to a serious discussion of censorship - in a play which was itself censored. Although no play-text survives from medieval Beverley the next contribution shows how local records of its Corpus Christi plays offer rich details of a range of pageants and organisation not dissimilar from its more famous neighbour York. The two following articles investigate theological issues. A nuanced re-reading of <i>The Treatise of Miracles Playing</i> considers how priestly involvement in performance raised anxieties about the role and authority of priests including at the Mass. Attitudes to dread revealed through the taxonomies of fear developed by medieval theologians then illuminate the didactic role of fear engendered in the protagonists and audiences of the Macro morality plays. The volume closes with the second part of an investigation into John Blanke's Hat. Following the first part's demonstration in the previous volume of <i>METh</i> that the Black trumpeter's headgear was not a marker of his faith this uncovers the true identity of the hat asking how far it can offer evidence for his history. The present volume thus throws new light on familiar texts and questions offering important contributions to newly developing fields of study.