Southern Belles and Hussies in Modern Drama: Enhancing Women's Collections

Imagine a southern belle—sweet, submis‐sive, and charming with her flattering ways and soft drawl. Now conjure up a hussy— lewd, loud, brassy, or perhaps just self‐centered and strongly self‐assertive, forcing her will on everyone around her. The ease with which the pictures leap to mind attests to the vitality of the stereotypes, for stereotypes they are, powerful ones in the American mythology. Although they are clearly unrealistic conceptions of real‐life modern women, they have had and still exercise a potent influence on the literature of the south. Moreover, as the works of many modern southern playwrights show, popular adherence to such myths of femininity—and their inevitable corollaries for masculinity as well—resulted in a miserable human bondage for both women and men.