ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that the significance of Wollstonecraft's intertextual appropriation of Nicolas Rowe's play The Fair Penitent. It discusses how the novel consciously invokes the metaphor of acting and how the theater functions, literally and figuratively, in the characterization of Darnford, George, female theatergoers at Ranelagh who reject Maria for not posturing as a happy wife in 'the cloak of fashionable women', the 'mad' prisoners in the asylum whose mental aberrations allow for an unmediated and unpoliced playing of roles, and of Maria. Wollstonecraft's representation of the marital laws and the final courtroom scene would have been influenced by her knowledge of both treason trials and civil trials for adultery, both of which were popular entertainment in the late 1790s. The chapter discusses how the novel represents cultural displays of power in terms of their reliance upon theatricality, especially in the final trial scene.
