The Theater of Experiment

Jan Golinski, The Eighteenth Century Coppola's deeply researched book brings to the table subtle readings of theatrical texts that historians of science have not previously considered relevant to their domain. For this, all scholars of the period should be grateful. ...Al Coppola has inspired a new round of research in this field and exemplified the best that can be hoped for in terms of its quality.

John O'Brien, The Scriblerian and the Kit-Cats Mr. Coppola's research is thorough, and his approach deeply and literally imaginative, evoking in the mind's eye how performances built on and then reinforced associations between the production of scientific knowledge and the pleasures of staged entertainment. ... Mr. Coppola's Theater of Experiment is an excellent and pleasurable performance.

Larry Stewart, Metascience Coppola approaches the satires and theatre of Restoration and Hanoverian England to reveal the complexity of comprehension of early modern science. He suggests that these performances reveal a significant epistemological change following upon the increasing number of "spectacular demonstrations of matters of fact" (20) throughout the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. This is an intriguing notion, as it also converges with numerous lampoons of collectors, experimenters and the social contrivances of would-be scientific gentlemen.

Alessio Mattana (University of Leeds), The British Society for Literature and Science The Theater of Experiment is such a valuable addition not solely for the scholarship of eighteenth-century natural philosophy but for the cultural history of the age at large. With his protean focus on visuality, Coppola is able to unearth a number of questions that, tying together scientific and literary production under the aegis of epistemology, are central for the study of the eighteenth-century culture.

George E. Haggerty, SEL Studies in English Literature 1500-1900 This remarkable book puts theater and science in conversation with one another in utterly new ways. Whether Coppola reads The Rehearsal from the perspective of a Restoration scientist, or looks at Isaac Newton as a harlequin, he fills this book with astonishing insights and arresting comparisons. I have not enjoyed a book so much in quite a while.

Matthew Paskins, Isis Journal Drawing on work from theater studies and history of science, Al Coppola moves beyond generalizing or analogical connections between science and performance to show the rich imbrications between a culture of natural philosophy and a view of theatrical performance that saw it as acting to reform its audience's political opinions and moral outlook through mocking laughter. ... It will certainly interest historians of science who want to ground their understandings of public scientific performance in the specificities of eighteenth-century theatrical cultures, as well as those with interests in the long-run history of literature and science.

Al Coppola is Assistant Professor of English at John Jay College of Criminal Justice at the City University of New York.

Introduction Science as Performance; Science in Performance Against the Virtuosi A Matter of Concern Prologue: ": The Panorama of Science, Magic and Pantomime