The primary aims of this project are to study the presence of France in early modern England. The idea is to use theatre as a means of assessing the cultural, linguistic, ideological, or indeed political impact of France during the period. The problematics of cultural exchange are thus at the heart of project. Whether private or public, courtly or popular, theatre never ceased to hold a mirror up to society. Dramatists were also quick to use social trends and anxieties as material for their plays. Our first task was therefore to find a way of recording and of classifying these varied allusions, or representations, of France and the French. We had first to agree on a number of criteria which would enable us to assess the data we gathered. We then chose a number of relevant headings which you will find when you perform a combined or advanced search of the database. These headings are the result of some four years of tests and development.

Our aim is also to go beyond the mere accumulation of quantitative data and try to interpret the material which we have assembled. For the moment results can only be partial of course as the work is still in progress.

Nevertheless, a series of working hypotheses have already emerged and these deserve our full attention. Our task now is to try out these hypotheses, perform appropriate searches of the database and debate these matters.

French allusions seem to be prominent in comedies and satirical plays. Some of us argue also that the more complex allusions - those we could call representations - are more numerous in tragedies than in lighter plays. At present there is no consensus among our team of researchers regarding the association of allusions with a particular genre. These conflicting hypotheses will have to be verified.


An important distinction has emerged though between rigid, stereotypical allusions - which are often reproduced mechanically and have little influence on the dramatic plot - and the complex and changing representations which have a direct bearing on the unfolding of the action. These representations are never where we might expect them and their subject matter is never predictable. This is no doubt because we are working on dramatic language which needs to be incarnated by living human beings and this language by essence is thus complex, ambivalent and undergoing a constant process of transformation.

From a methodological point of view, there is a need to combine different critical approaches. The most promising approaches are no doubt reception theories (the way dramatic language functions, dialogical elements, the relationship between actor and spectator), intertextuality (how representations are constructed through a network of texts and influences). Linguistic approaches are also useful (history of languages, the study of linguistic phenomena such as wordplay, hybrid constructions, linguistic transmutation, criss-crossing, translation, as well as the circulation and teaching of foreign languages in England). Cultural studies and history of ideas are fields which can help us produce equally fruitful analyses by foregrounding topical elements, paradigms, social concerns, the circulation of ideas and of writings, the criss-crossing of different discourses, the cultural influence of France, or the construction of national identities.