Women's Comedic Art as Social Revolution

[Though comic women have existed since the days of Baubo, the mythic figure who used sexual humor to lift the veil of mourning from the goddess Demeter's eyes, they have been neglected by scholars and critics. This pioneering volume tells the stories of five women who have created revolutionary forms of comic performance and discourse that defy the flagrant prejudices about women/feminists. The artists include 16th-century performer Isabella Andreini, 17th-century improviser Catherine Biancolelli, 20th century Italian playwright Franca Rame, and contemporary performance artists Deb Margolin and Kimberly Dark. All create humor that subverts patriarchal modes of representation, conventional notions of gender roles, and stereotypical images of women. Closing with a practical guide for performers and teachers of theater, this work illustrates the life-affirming possibilities of creating empowered communities and initiating social change through comedy, laughter and feminist humor.]

“Never before has the history of Western women in comedy been written with such historical scope or comparative detail. Radulescu brings the astute eye of the theatre historian to a socially committed feminist inquiry into women’s humor, creating a study that’s useful for scholars and practitioners, teachers and students. Tracing women’s use of commedia dell’arte from 16th century Italy to the contemporary United States, by women clowns from Isabella Andreini and Caterina Biancolelli to Franca Rame and Deb Margolin, Radulescu creates a new genealogy for feminist comic performance, dispelling the stereotype of women as humorless once and for all. In lively prose, grounded in precise arguments, evidence, and exercises, Radulescu draws together Bergson, Bakhtin, and feminist performance critics to chart women’s specific contributions to the important work of humor in providing insight into our common—as well as our specifically gendered—situations and circumstances.”—Jill Dolan, Director, Program in Gender and Sexuality Studies, Annan Professor in English and Professor, Theatre Program at Princeton University.

Domnica Radulescu is Professor of French and Italian at Washington and Lee University and the cofounding chair of the Women’s and Gender Studies Program. She has authored, edited, or co-edited nine scholarly books, several collections of essays and dozens of articles on subjects ranging from early modern and modern French and Italian theater to feminist activism in academia.