Literary and Dramatic Representations of Coercion and Consent
This panel proposes that early modern transformations in rape law placed pressure on issues concerning female self-possession, sexual knowledge, pleasure, and consent and that these tensions were critiqued and, at times, exploited by playwrights and authors of the period. In what ways do sixteenth and seventeenth century poetry, drama, and literature explore the injustices and ambiguities arising from the elision of resistance, coercion, and consent in sexual encounters?