This chapter tackles the question of how "sameness" in the context of same-sex relations reflected and represented concerns about social leveling. It begins by considering an example of the "metamorphic" framing: a 17th c. book of curiosities that included a chapter of 24 instances of persons changing sex. Though the book was reprinted regularly, the sex-change chapter was dropped, perhaps reflecting a shift from an earlier miracle-accepting age to one more concerned with rational explanations.
Agnes de Castro (Aphra Behn or Catharine Trotter Cockburn)
Note: there are two separate plays by this title but sources aren’t always clear which is being discussed, so I’ve used a combined tag when the identity is uncertain. 17th century English play about two women competing for the love of the same man. In some versions, the play ends tragically with the women bonded together.
