“That was a rare experiment of transfusing the blood of a sheep into a mad-man”: Animal Experiments and Satirical Knowledge in Thomas Shadwell’s The Virtuoso

Abstract

In Thomas Shadwell’s 1676 satirical play The Virtuoso, the performance of animal experiments serves as an essential element to satirize the brutality and hubris of experimental science at the time. But Shadwell not only relies on Robert Hooke’s Micrographia (1665) and other publications of the Royal Society for satirical purposes; he also introduces a reciprocal, if not reversed, logic of animal experimentation. By intersecting the animal experiments with the motifs of marriage, love affairs and passion, various cross-over scenarios are initially tested on animal bodies only to be subsequently translated into theatrical practices. As I will argue, the animal bodies thus enable the fundamental satirical logic of the play by producing satirical knowledge—that may not be of scientific, but certainly of theatrical value.