Author: Brody. Alan
Title: The English Mummers and Their Plays. Traces of Ancient Mystery
Description: London, Routledge & Kegan Paul, (1970). orig.boards. 22x14cm, xiii, 201 pp, Binding corner bumped. Name inked on flyleaf. In a heavily rubbed, soiled & torn dustwrapper.. 13pp photoplates. 22 pages bear pencilled underlining &/or marginal marks, Good+. ¶ Contents: Investigating the Action: The Three Types; The Scholarship; The Play as an Action; The Problem of History; Performing the Action: The Visit; The Stage & the Circle; The Players; The Dress; The Acting Style; The Hero-Combat: The Netley Abbey Mummers' Play - A Representative Text; The Combat; The Lament; The Cure; The Quete: The Procession of Characters; The Entertainment & Collection; The Quete & the Komos; The Sword Play: The Greatham Text & the Sequence of Action; The Earsdon Dance: The Old Version & the Buophonia; The Modern Version & an Insight into its Development; The Ampleforth Play & the Problems of Bowdlerization; The Ampleforth Play & Literary Influences; The Common Action: The Lock; The Development of the Dance; The Wooing Ceremony: The Bassingham Play; Ritual Origins & Continental Analogues; The Corn Spirit; The Sacred Wedding; The Later Development; The Recruiting Sergeant; Traces of Ancient Mystery: Myth, Ritual, and Drama; The Sword Ceremony: Totemism; The Wooing Ceremony: The Fertility Daimon; The Hero-Combat: St. George as Hero-Daimon; The Nature of the Ceremony Today; Appendices: The Netley Abbey Mummers' Play; The Greatham Sword Dance Play; The Bassingham Men's Play 1823 Xmas; Excursus on the Entertainment at Revesby; Excursus on the Papa Stour Text; Lines 109- 131 of 'The Alcestis'; The Rumanian Kalusari Play; Extract of a Letter from E.M. Leather; An Account of the Mummers, 1793. Notes; Bibliography.

Keywords: Ritual Drama, English Mummers, Folklore, Great Britain, Folk Theatre, Mummers' Plays, Mumming, England,