Female Spectacle

"Female Spectacle reveals the theater to have been a powerful new source of cultural authority and visibility for women. Ironically, theater also provided an arena in which producers and audiences projected the uncertainties and hostilities that accompanied changing gender relations. From Bernhardt's modern methods of self-advertising to Emma Goldman's political theatrics, from the female mimics and Salome dancers to the upwardly striving chorus girl, Susan Glenn shows us how and why theater mattered to women and offers fascinating insights into its pivotal role in the emergence of modern feminism."--BOOK JACKET.