Jennifer Panek is Assistant Professor of English at the University of Ottawa.

'Panek convincingly demonstrates that widows in sixteenth-century England, unlike their Continental counterparts, were encouraged to remarry for a variety of good social, economic and familial reasons.' The Times Literary Supplement

• Acknowledgements; A note on texts; Introduction; 1. The widow's choice: female remarriage in early modern England; 2. The widow's threat: domestic government and male anxiety; 3. The suitor's fantasy: courtship and compensation; 4. The husband's fear: the lusty widow as wife; 5. A playwright's response: four Middletonian remarriage plots; Notes; Works cited; Index.

Jennifer Panek is Assistant Professor of English at the University of Ottawa.

'Panek convincingly demonstrates that widows in sixteenth-century England, unlike their Continental counterparts, were encouraged to remarry for a variety of good social, economic and familial reasons.' The Times Literary Supplement

• Acknowledgements; A note on texts; Introduction; 1. The widow's choice: female remarriage in early modern England; 2. The widow's threat: domestic government and male anxiety; 3. The suitor's fantasy: courtship and compensation; 4. The husband's fear: the lusty widow as wife; 5. A playwright's response: four Middletonian remarriage plots; Notes; Works cited; Index.

Jennifer Panek is Assistant Professor of English at the University of Ottawa.

'Panek convincingly demonstrates that widows in sixteenth-century England, unlike their Continental counterparts, were encouraged to remarry for a variety of good social, economic and familial reasons.' The Times Literary Supplement

• Acknowledgements; A note on texts; Introduction; 1. The widow's choice: female remarriage in early modern England; 2. The widow's threat: domestic government and male anxiety; 3. The suitor's fantasy: courtship and compensation; 4. The husband's fear: the lusty widow as wife; 5. A playwright's response: four Middletonian remarriage plots; Notes; Works cited; Index.