Amorous Hope, A Pastoral Play A Bilingual Edition

A seventeenth-century play showing the reality of life for women. Valeria Mianis Amorous Hope is a play of remarkable richness, subtlety, and verve. It presents a scathing exposure of societys double-standards and it champions womens dramatic agency by centering on the bleak reality they often faced, a reality that attempted to harm and silence its victims. The plays salient episodes reflect realities modern women still face today. Mianis literary achievements attest to her emergence as a cultural protagonist alongside Europes most talented women writers, such as Isabella Andreini, and she challenged the premodern notion that a womans eloquence is an indication of her sexual promiscuity.