Staging sumptuousness: Regulating identity in early modern England.

Abstract

Staging Sumptuousness: Regulating Identity in Early Modern England considers the emergence of the early modern public theater in the context of what was a crisis in sumptuary attitudes and practices. This crisis centered upon the problem of self-representation. The effort to signify a fixed social identity became increasingly difficult within a rapidly changing consumer culture. Innovations in textile production and burgeoning markets in second-hand apparel made sumptuous items newly accessible to the majority of Elizabethans. By considering the material conditions of playing in tandem with the dramatic literature of the period this study explores how the early modern theater negotiated the profound social and political implications of not only cross-class and cross-gender dressing, but also of dressing per se. The first part of this study considers the conditions, reception, and implementation of a body of Elizabethan laws that restricted the apparel of all male subjects in accordance with the rank and income of the wearer. Here I explore a profound cultural contradiction: More proclamations regulating dress were promulgated during Elizabeth's reign than at any other time in English history. In this same period, the public stage functioned as the privileged site of sumptuary transgression. Actors and the characters they played daily changed and exchanged clothes and in so doing demonstrated the pleasures and perils of disguise, counterfeit, and extravagance. The second part of this study explores both published and archival materials to consider the rise of fashion, London's first shopping arcades, and second-hand apparel markets. The final part of this study addresses James' sudden repeal of these laws and argues that there is a shift in the focus of sumptuary concern. While Elizabethan sumptuary laws sought to regulate men, Jacobean sumptuary discourse was primarily concerned with the sartorial habits of women. The stage was integral to the radical transformations the category of sumptuousness underwent in this period.