The Scandal of the Century
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Summary
There are few labels not attached to Aphra Behn - playwright, poet, a spy, a starlet woman condemned for loose morals. And yet, for all her notoriety Aphra Behn is an enigma.
Born in around 1640, her early life isn't well recorded and facts about her are continually disputed. Her birth name may have been Eaffrey Johnson and she could have been the daughter of a Canterbury barber, although neither fact is certain. And, just after the Restoration she probably briefly lived in the English colony of Surinam in South America, where she was perhaps embroiled in political espionage. Whatever the truth, Behn was in London by 1664 and six years later was writing for the stage.
For a decade, Behn's work dominated the London stage. Then, suddenly in 1682, she was charged with libel. Her plays could not be produced and by the time of the trial of the century Behn was broke. She decided that writing would be her way out and began to write a novel based on the most notorious adultress of a notoriously adulterous age - Lady Henrietta Berkeley.
Born in around 1640, her early life isn't well recorded and facts about her are continually disputed. Her birth name may have been Eaffrey Johnson and she could have been the daughter of a Canterbury barber, although neither fact is certain. And, just after the Restoration she probably briefly lived in the English colony of Surinam in South America, where she was perhaps embroiled in political espionage. Whatever the truth, Behn was in London by 1664 and six years later was writing for the stage.
For a decade, Behn's work dominated the London stage. Then, suddenly in 1682, she was charged with libel. Her plays could not be produced and by the time of the trial of the century Behn was broke. She decided that writing would be her way out and began to write a novel based on the most notorious adultress of a notoriously adulterous age - Lady Henrietta Berkeley.
Reviews
'A landmark book, a sweeping, scintillatingly original, exciting and game changing exploration of writer, spy, power player, lover Aphra Behn. Thrilling, scholarly, powerfully researched, this is Aphra as she’s never been seen before. She bursts from the page, and Lisa Hilton brings to complex, unforgettable, vibrant life this fascinating woman and her unstable, dangerous times that have so much in common with ours'
Kate Williams, historian and author of Rival Queens: The Betrayal of Mary, Queen of Scots