The Secret Life of Aphra Behn

The Secret Life of Aphra Behn
Author: Janet Todd
Publisher: A&C Black
Total Pages: 830
Release: 2013-09-19
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1448212545

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'All women together ought to let flowers fall upon the tomb of Aphra Behn; for it was she who earned them the right to speak their minds,' said Virginia Woolf. Yet that tomb, in Westminster Abbey, records one of the few uncontested facts about this Restoration playwright, poet, novelist and spy: the date of her death, 16 April 1689. For the rest secrecy and duplicity are almost the key to her life. She loved codes, making and breaking them; writing her life becomes a decoding of a passionate but playful woman. Janet Todd draws on documents she has rediscovered in the Dutch archives, and on Behn's own writings, to tell a story of court, diplomatic and sexual intrigue, and of the rise from humble origins of the first woman to earn her living as a professional writer. Aphra Behn's first notable employment was as a Royal spy in Holland; she had probably also spied in Surinam. It was not until she was in her thirties that she published the first of the 19 plays and other works which established her fame (though not riches) among her 'good, sweet, honey-candied readers'. Many of her works were openly erotic, indeed as frank as anything by her friends Wycherley and Rochester. Some also offered an inside view of court and political intrigues, and Todd reveals the historical scandals and legal cases behind some of Behn's most famous 'fictions'.


The Secret Life of Aphra Behn
Language: en
Pages: 830
Authors: Janet Todd
Categories: Biography & Autobiography
Type: BOOK - Published: 2013-09-19 - Publisher: A&C Black

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'All women together ought to let flowers fall upon the tomb of Aphra Behn; for it was she who earned them the right to speak their minds,' said Virginia Woolf.
The Secret Life of Aphra Behn
Language: en
Pages: 612
Authors: Janet Todd
Categories: Biography & Autobiography
Type: BOOK - Published: 1997 - Publisher: Rutgers University Press

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"Behn is a mass of contradictions: a high Tory who disliked traditional power structures; a powerful, autonomous woman who depended on men's approval; a woman w
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Language: en
Pages: 181
Authors: Aphra Behn
Categories: Drama
Type: BOOK - Published: 2015-06-02 - Publisher: Joe Books Ltd

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Aphra Behn
Language: en
Pages: 0
Authors: Janet Todd
Categories: Authors, English
Type: BOOK - Published: 2017 - Publisher:

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The life, work and history of Aphra Behn: 17th-century dramatist, poet, novelist, political propagandist, bisexual and spy.
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Language: en
Pages: 300
Authors: Aphra Behn
Categories: Great Britain
Type: BOOK - Published: 1736 - Publisher: ReadHowYouWant.com

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