| The Aesthetics of Service in Early Modern England Subjects: English literature -- Early modern 1500–1700 -- History and criticism; Master and servant in literature; Household employees in literature; In The Aesthetics of Service in Early Modern England , Elizabeth Rivlin explores the ways in which servant-master relationships reshaped literature. The early modern servant is enjoined to obey his or her master out of dutiful love, but the servant's duty actually amounts to standing in for the master, a move that opens the possibility of becoming master. Rivlin shows that service is fundamentally a representational practice, in which the servant who acts for a master merges with the servant who acts as a master. ELIZABETH J. RIVLIN is Assistant Professor of English at Clemson University. |