Quantitative Literary Analysis of the Works of Aphra Behn

This book explores the works of Aphra Behn (16401689) synchronically through word counts and statistical measures.

It analyses, by genre, poetry, drama, and prose, examining the quantification of Behn's literary style. The conclusion applies thematic questions to the full corpus for an innovative and comprehensive assessment of Behn's writing.

Aphra Behn (16401689), prolific and popular playwright, poet, novelist, and translator, has a fascinating and extensive corpus of literature that plays a key role in literary history. This book offers an analysis of all of Behn's literary output. It examines the author's use of words in terms of frequencies and distributions and stacks the oeuvre in order to read Behn's word usage synchronically. Organised into three main chapters addressing her chief genres of writing (poetry, plays, and prose) this exploratory project analyzes the texts through statistical queries and identifies Behn's unique style across genres and among her peers. It identifies Behn's keywords as compared to literary works of the period to provide an index of characteristic themes and qualities, such as 'oh', 'young', 'lover', 'love', 'marry', 'charming', 'heart', 'gay', 'soft'. Each of these words opens a window on her corpus as a whole. A unique case study of a significant author using new literary methodologies, this book provides an appealing snapshot of Behn's whole career informed by deep knowledge of the Restoration era and developments in digital humanities and cultural analytics.