Print publication of The Forc'd Marriage

In 1671, Aphra Behn published her debut play, The Forc'd Marriage, in printed form, following its successful stage run the previous year. The published edition carried a striking French epigraph — "Va mon enfant! Prend ta fortune" ("Go, my child! Take your fortune") — a defiant, almost autobiographical statement about launching a literary work, and by extension a literary career, into the world.

Publishing a play in print was a significant professional step beyond simply having it performed; it meant entering the commercial book trade and asserting authorship in a durable, sellable, and citable form. For a woman writer in Restoration England, this was a bold act of self-assertion, since print culture, like the stage, was overwhelmingly the domain of men.

This publication helped establish Behn as a professional author who intended to make writing not merely a pastime but a livelihood — a stance that would later lead Virginia Woolf and other feminist critics to celebrate her as a foundational figure for women who wished to write for money rather than only for private or aristocratic circulation. The 1671 print edition remains an important artifact in tracing the earliest phase of Behn's prolific and genre-spanning career.