This course will examine the development of British drama from the late seventeenth and eighteenth-century. Studying a selection of plays from genres including comedy, tragedy, satire, and ballad-opera, and attending to changes in the staging conventions of the period, we will examine the historical and social contexts of the drama and look at the theatre as a site of political and social debate that engaged with topics such as gender and power, imperialism, British identity, and political corruption.