LGBTQ+ Performance History Roger Baker Drag and the Global Stage Traditions of Female Impersonation 1968

Roger Baker

First Edition

Baker, Roger. Drag: A History of Female Impersonation on the Stage, 1968, surveys the historical development of drag performance across theatrical traditions and situates gender impersonation within global performance culture. The study traces practices from early stage conventions in Asia and Europe through modern entertainment circuits, distinguishing between drag as theatrical performance and cross dressing as personal identity expression. By documenting performers, venues, and performance styles, Baker provides a consolidated account of drag within stage history, offering material for the study of gender representation, theatrical convention, and LGBTQ+ cultural expression in the mid twentieth century.

Baker, Roger. Drag: A History of Female Impersonation on the Stage. London: Triton Books, 1968. Signed by the author on the title page, “Roger Baker, April 1969.” First edition. One volume. 256 pages. Illustrated with 92 black and white photographs and illustrations depicting performers, productions, and historical figures. Original brown cloth binding with titled spine; original dust jacket featuring drag performer imagery. Also included are two loose signed black and white photographs of performer Gary Webb, one in drag and one out of costume, whose career is referenced within the text. The volume includes discussion of figures such as Chevalier d'Éon, Vesta Tilley, Marlene Dietrich, and Julian Eltinge, alongside analysis of performance traditions in Elizabethan theatre, pantomime, Kabuki, vaudeville, and opera.

Published during a period of expanding visibility for gender nonconforming performance and emerging queer cultural discourse, the work consolidates earlier theatrical traditions into a single historical narrative accessible to contemporary audiences. Its combination of textual analysis and photographic documentation supports research into performance studies, gender history, and the evolution of drag as both entertainment and cultural practice. Dust jacket shows edge wear and is price clipped; volume otherwise clean and intact; overall very good condition.

Item #20771

Price: $550.00