Abstract
Plays written by early modern Englishwomen have, for too long, been imprisoned conceptually within the small, domestic space of closet drama: from T.S. Eliot’s categorization of Mary Sidney and her circle as “shy recluses” whose dramatic endeavors were “bound to fail,” to present-day performances of the texts, all too often set in academic halls and darkened auditoria, the theatrical writing of early modern women has been reductively framed. This chapter questions such assumptions and explores how these women dramatists engaged with a more expansive understanding of space. The argument here, therefore, focuses upon the evocation of multiple geographical settings to appreciate their radical interventions across an array of social and political discourses.