This important book chronicles the growing role of women playwrights, managers and actresses in the Victorian theatre.

List of illustrations: Preface; Part I. The Making of the Victorian Actress: 1. 'Think of the power-'; 2. Masculine panic and the panthers of the stage; 3. Actresses, managers and feminized theatre; Part II. Gender and Victorian Playwriting: 4. The impossibility of women playwrights; 5. Textual assaults: women's novels on stage; 6. Victorian plays by women; Part III. Revolution: 7. Elizabeth Robins, Oscar Wilde and the 'Theatre of the Future'; Notes; Index.