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Aphra Behn (1640–1689), prolific and popular playwright, poet, novelist, translator, has a fascinating and extensive corpus of literature that plays a key role in literary history. Quantitative Literary Analysis of the Works of Aphra Behn: Words of Passion offers what no book has done to date, an analysis of all Behn’s literary output. It examines the author’s use of words in terms of frequencies and distributions and stacks the words in context to read Behn’s word usage synchronically. Using this experimental method, the book brings digital humanities into literary criticism, to enhance our understanding and appreciation of literature beyond what is possible in diachronic reading and scholarship less supported by digital means. The empirical approach works in collaboration with existing scholarship to understand Behn’s distinct language of love and extreme passions across her genres.
“Runge’s wide-ranging analysis draws deeply on her own rich familiarity with Behn’s works, a bang up-to-date knowledge of their critical reception and a carefully designed, computer-aided analysis of the texts. The result is a tour de force, a fascinating exploration of Behn in the passions of her times. I learned from this book, argued with it and loved it.” — Professor Elaine Hobby, Loughborough University, Principal Investigator of Editing Aphra Behn in the Digital Age.
Laura L. Runge is a professor of English at the University of South Florida. She specializes in women’s writing of the long eighteenth century, digital humanities, and book history.
Table of Contents; Acknowledgements; Note on Texts and Data; List of Figures and Tables; Preface; Introduction; Chapter One: The Poetry of Love; Chapter Two: The Drama of Love; Chapter Three: The Prose of Love; Conclusion; Appendices; Index.