Staging England in the Elizabethan History Play

Applying current political theory on nationhood and methods established by recent performance studies, this study sheds new light on the role the public theatre played in the rise of English national identity around 1600. It situates selected history plays in the context of non-fictional texts - historiographies, chorographies and political treatises - and cultural artefacts such as maps or portraits to highlight the circulation, and mutation, of national thought in late 16th-century culture.