Aphra Behn: Encyclopedia - Aphra Behn

Aphra Behn

Aphra Behn, nee Aphra Johnston (c. 1640 – April 16, 1689) was a prolific dramatist of the Restoration, and considered to be one of the first English professional woman writers. Her writing participated in the amatory fiction genre of British literature.

Few hard facts can be pinned down regarding Behn's life. She may have been born in Wye near Canterbury, on July 10, 1640, daughter of a barber named Johnston. In the 1660s she probably travelled to an English sugar colony on the Surinam River, on the coast east of Venezuela, a region later known as Dutch Guiana. The trip may have inspired her most famous novel, Oroonoko. The veracity of her journey to Surinam has often been called into question; however, enough evidence has been found that most Behn scholars today believe that the trip did indeed take place.

How she acquired the name Behn is also unclear. The most likely theory is that in 1658 she married - or pretended to marry - a Dutch merchant by the name of Behn. She returned to England a widow in 1666 at the age of 26. However, some scholars have suggested that she and her husband might simply have separated, or even that she was never actually married at all. Since widows were afforded a great deal more legal freedom than either wives or unmarried women under English law, it would have been in Behn's interest to claim the title of widow.

She then became attached to the Court, and was probably dispatched as a political spy to Antwerp by Charles II. Her code name for her exploits is said to have been Astrea, a name under which she subsequently published much of her writings. The Second Anglo-Dutch War had broken out between England and the Netherlands in 1665. Her exploits were not profitable, however, as Charles was slow paying for her services, leading her to return to London. She cultivated the friendship of various playwrights, and starting 1670 she produced many plays and novels, also poems and pamphlets. She died on April 16, 1689, and was buried in Westminster Abbey.

Aside from Oroonoko, her other best-known work was The Rover; or The Banish'd Cavaliers.

Some of Behn's less-known works are available from the Women Writers Project.

Aphra Behn - Plays

• The Forced Marriage (1670)
• The Amorous Prince (1671)
• The Dutch Lover (1673)
• Abdelazer (1676)
• The Town Fop (1676)
• The Rover (1677 [part one] and 1681 [part two])
• Sir Patient Fancy (1678)
• The Feigned Courtesans (1679)
• The Young King (1679)
• The False Count (1681)
• The Roundheads (1681)
• The City Heiress (1682)
• Like Father, Like Son (1682)
• The Lucky Chance (1686)
• The Emperor of the Moon (1687)

and posthumously performed:

• The Widow Ranter (1689)
• The Younger Brother (1696)

Aphra Behn - Novels

• The Fair Jilt
• Agnes de Castro
• Oroonoko
• Love Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Aphra Behn", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki