“Melodrama bore all the defects and virtues of its parent, the French Revolution. Given to wild flights, neck-breaking twists and turns, stark judgements of good and evil, the genre also brought public attention onto private life and the vicissitudes of underprivilege. Melodrama taught much to the Russians who appropriated it. As the contributors to the present volume demonstrate, it taught ... Read morethem how to see, to understand and even how to accomplish history. An imitator surely, but also a creator of life—we can all be grateful to Neuberger and McReynolds for bringing this to our attention.”—James von Geldern, Macalaster College Show Less