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Article: Life on the edge, 18th-century style.(Charlotte: Being a True Account of an Actress's Flamboyant Adventures in Eighteenth-Century London's Wild and Wicked Theatrical World)(Book Review)
- Article from:
- The Gay & Lesbian Review Worldwide
- Article date:
- September 1, 2005
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2005 Gay & Lesbian Review, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Charlotte: Being a True Account of an Actress's Flamboyant Adventures in Eighteenth-Century London's Wild and Wicked Theatrical World
by Kathryn Shevelow
Henry Holt. 433 pages, $27.50
"I'M ALMOST THROUGH MY memoirs, and I'm here!" sings aging actress Carlotta Campion in the musical Follies, as she casts a rueful eye over decades of ups and downs. Her song, "I'm Still Here," might almost have been inspired by Carlotta's namesake of some two hundred years earlier, Charlotte Charke. Born in 1713 as the daughter of Colley Cibber--actor, playwright, libertine, and poet laureate, dubbed "King of the Dunces" by Alexander Pope in The ...