Renaissance Earwitnesses Rumor and Early Modern Masculinity

Renaissance Earwitnessesexamines masculinity on the early modern stage through sensory culture. In his reading of plays by Marlowe, Shakespeare, Cary, and Jonson, Keith M. Botelho argues that earwitnessing, or judicious listening, is a vehicle early modern dramatists used to rethink constructions of male informational authority. Drawing on sound and gender studies and providing close analysis of the circulation of rumor both on and off the stage, Botelho reveals male anxieties to be self-generated, emerging not from female gossip, but from male rumormongering. By rethinking the gendered dimensions to the flow of information, Botelho makes an important contribution to early modern scholarship.

Keith M. Botelho is Assistant Professor of English at Kennesaw State University.