b'Short Essays Carrie Neilsonmechanism or control, defined however the public sphereHughes, D. and Todd, J. (2004). The Cambridge Companion to Aphra Behn. sees fit. Cromwells decision to submit to political andCambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press.sexual submissiveness (Owen, 1994: n/a), shows thatKubek, E.B. (1994). Nightmares of the Commonwealth: Royalist gender transgression reinforces the social presumption,Passion and Female Ambition in Aphra Behns The Roundheads. typifying a world upside down (Todd, 2004: 69). TheStudies in English Literary Culture, 1600- 1700 (2), pp. 88-103.women of the play behave in ways which complementLatta, K. (2004). Aphra Behn and The Roundheads, Journal for Early the anti-suffragist, thus Behns habitual - and liberatingModern Cultural Studies, 4(1), pp.136.- depictions of women who are wiser and wittier thanOwen, S. J. (1994). Suspect My Loyalty When I Lose My Virtue: their husbands co-exist with and is overdetermined bySexual Politics and Party in Aphra Behns Plays of the Exclusion Crisis, a conventional Tory rhetoric of gender difference and1678-83. Restoration: Studies in English Literary Culture, 1660-1700 (1), pp. 37-47.subordination (Suzuki, 2011: 1). Behns integrating of characters who defy the male protagonist or antagonistSuzuki, M. (2011). RECOGNIZING WOMENS DRAMAS AS POLITICAL WRITING: THE PLAYS OF 1701 BY WISEMAN, PIX allows women to contest the position of power inAND TROTTER. Womens Writing, 18(4), pp.547564.the gender politics of the era, arguably undermining morality or sanity as seen through the eyes of men. The tension between the men and women in Aphra Behns The Roundheads becomes more apparent in the method it is being staged, positing a shared responsibility for the hypocrisy and morality displayed by both genders. The Roundheads formulates an uneasy alliance between conventional representation of gender and politics in Behns subversive personal style (Kubek, 1993:88). The staging of the play provides a theatrical representation which is derived from the perspective of a proto-feminist author, valorising a heroine who challenges the gendering of political power (Kubek, 1993:88). This indicates that Behn is adopting the position to contribute towards the controversy, positioning a heroine who is prepared to challenge the male dominated public sphere. Behn utilised the mockery of religious outlooks using metaphorical language at the forefront of the plays plot. The term morality became synthesized within the duality of sexual and religious hypocrisy, allowing the playwright license to creative freedom to challenge the significance of religion during the Restoration era.33'