Aphra Behn, The Rover (1677)—The Rover is the most successful and perhaps the greatest of the many plays that this female dramatist wrote for the London theater.

Charlotte Charke, A Narrative of the Life of Mrs. Charlotte Charke (1775)—In this memoir, the inimitable Charlotte Charke, an actress of the eighteenth-century London stage, tells of her exploits, which include a prolonged period of transvestism and the impersonation of a husband. Charke was the daughter of the noted actor, playwright, and English poet laureate Colly Cibber, and her adventures on the stage and off provide an unparalleled window onto the social history of the English stage in the eighteenth century.

Pierre Corneille, Plays (1630–1677)—Corneille's tragedies and comedies helped to establish a distinctive French art form characterized by formal verse and introspective concentration on the trials, triumphs, and failures of his heroes and heroines. Many...