Introduction: Disability in Early Modern Theatre

The introduction to this selection of essays briefly outlines the recent flourishing of scholarship in disability studies and its perhaps rather belated entry into the field of early modern drama. It discusses the broader opportunities presented by synthesizing developments in disability theory with research on early modern theatre and argues for the vital importance of historical disability scholarship. While introducing some of the directions that disability scholarship on early modern theatre might take, this introduction argues that studying early modern disability offers innovative ways of imagining difference in bodies and minds both in the past and now.