Book excerpt: "This specifically "literary" historical study situates the rather sudden emergence of madhouses ("Bedlam") on the Shakespearean stage in the sophisticated literary dispute known as the "Poets' War," wherein various dramatists, particularly Jonson and Shakespeare, argued about what drama was supposed to be. "Madness" became a rhetorical battleground of artistic ideas, and that dispute, rather than any desire to represent the actual hospital, led to the appearance of "Bedlam" on the stage."