Elaine McGirr is a literary and theatre historian specialising in the long eighteenth century. Research interests include politics and/of performance, eighteenth-century Shakespeare, celebrity studies, and the intersections of gender and genre. Recent publications include A Performance History of The Fair Penitent (CUP, forthcoming) Partial Histories: a Reappraisal of Colley Cibber (Palgrave, 2016), and articles on celebrity origin stories, fictional biographies, eigheenth-century Shakespeare, and the authority of actresses. She is currently working on the memoirs of Mary Ann Yates, the greatest actress you've never heard of.