The Widdow Ranter, or, the History of Bacon in Virginia
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The Widdow Ranter, or, the History of Bacon in Virginia is a tragicomic play written by Aphra Behn and first performed posthumously in 1689.[1] It is a highly fictionalized version of Bacon's Rebellion of 1676, and is one of the first plays to be set in British colonial America.[2] It is also the first travel play known to have been written not only by a woman, but by a playwright who had actually traveled to the Americas.[2]
Through her heroic presentation of Nathaniel Bacon and his contempt for the colonial administration, Behn seems to voice her own disillusionment with the morality of colonization (an attitude that also finds expression in her novel Oroonoko).[3]