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Good, Sweet, Honey, Sugar-candied READER,
(Which I think is more than anyone has call’d you yet,) I must have a word or two with you before you do advance into the Treatise; but ‘tis not to beg your pardon for diverting you from your affairs, by such an idle Pamphlet as this is, for I presume you have not much to do, and therefore are to be obliged to me for keeping you from worse imployment, and if you have a better, you may get you gone about your business: but if you will mispend your Time, pray lay the fault upon yourself; for I have dealt pretty fairly in the matter, and told you in the Title Page what you are to expect within.
—Aphra Behn, The Dutch Lover
So Aphra Behn (1640–1689) begins her epistle to the reader, published with her play The Dutch Lover in 1673. It gives a flavour of the teasing irony which threads through most of her writing, and suggests something of the fascinating personality who is the subject of this study and seems an appropriate opening to my own introduction.
Usually recognised as the first professional woman writer, Aphra Behn (1640–1689) has become a popular subject for academic study. Most scholars have concentrated on her poetry, her short stories, and her one full-length novel, finding fuel for arguments that suggest she was an early feminist or a proponent of antiracism. Although there have been examinations of individual plays, the prefaces, and epistles, and studies which examine her plays against aspects of the cultural context of the time and the political background, these have usually been used as examples supporting a particular argument, in relation to certain events of the time. No one has considered her simply as a dramatist, and one of the most prolific and popular amongst her contemporaries, working in the theatre at a particular time in theatrical history, nor has anyone discussed how her plays reflect and use the changing staging methods to convey their themes. Moreover, because of her comparatively enormous output and her exceptionally detailed stage directions, Behn can be considered an exemplar of the changes that occurred in the ways of staging on the Restoration stage.