Shakespeare as Literary DramatistIn this groundbreaking study, Lukas Erne argues that Shakespeare, apart from being a playwright who wrote theatrical texts for the stage, was also a literary dramatist who produced reading texts for the page. The usual distinction that has been set up between Ben Jonson on the one hand, carefully preparing his manuscripts for publication, and Shakespeare the man of the theatre, writing for his actors and audience, indifferent to his plays as literature, is questioned in this book. Examining the evidence from early published playbooks, Erne argues that Shakespeare wrote many of his plays with a readership in mind and that these 'literary' texts would have been abridged for the stage because they were too long for performance. The variant early texts of Romeo and Juliet, Henry V, and Hamlet are shown to reveal important insights into the different media for which Shakespeare designed his plays. |
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Page 2
... passage may be of greater interest for what it tells us about the object of the attack than about the attacker . As early as 1592 , Shakespeare had done enough to awaken a rival playwright's jealousy . He was well advanced in the first ...
... passage may be of greater interest for what it tells us about the object of the attack than about the attacker . As early as 1592 , Shakespeare had done enough to awaken a rival playwright's jealousy . He was well advanced in the first ...
Page 14
... passages.45 In Drummond's lists , plays appear alongside " Knox , Chronicles , " " The Holie Loue of Heuinlie Wisdome , " and Sir Thomas Hoby's translation of Castiglione's Book of the Courtier , which indicates that he found nothing ...
... passages.45 In Drummond's lists , plays appear alongside " Knox , Chronicles , " " The Holie Loue of Heuinlie Wisdome , " and Sir Thomas Hoby's translation of Castiglione's Book of the Courtier , which indicates that he found nothing ...
Page 17
... passages , correctly attributed to two of England's greatest poets . Both excerpts will be recognized quite easily by those well versed in English literature . The first , is a stanza taken from The Faerie Queene ( 4.5.35 ) which ...
... passages , correctly attributed to two of England's greatest poets . Both excerpts will be recognized quite easily by those well versed in English literature . The first , is a stanza taken from The Faerie Queene ( 4.5.35 ) which ...
Page 18
... passages from Shakespeare plays and recognized literary masterpieces such as Spenser's Faerie Queene in an anthology of 1600 calls into question the view promoted by Bowers and others about the ( lack of ) prestige of plays in ...
... passages from Shakespeare plays and recognized literary masterpieces such as Spenser's Faerie Queene in an anthology of 1600 calls into question the view promoted by Bowers and others about the ( lack of ) prestige of plays in ...
Page 22
... passage from which I quote , Styan is paraphrasing and agreeing with John Russell Brown . For those who feel that The Shakespeare Revolution is a dated study by now , it may be well to quote from Styan's more recent Perspectives on ...
... passage from which I quote , Styan is paraphrasing and agreeing with John Russell Brown . For those who feel that The Shakespeare Revolution is a dated study by now , it may be well to quote from Styan's more recent Perspectives on ...
Contents
The legitimation of printed playbooks in Shakespeares time | 31 |
The making of Shakespeare | 56 |
Shakespeare and the publication of his plays I the late sixteenth century | 78 |
Shakespeare and the publication of his plays II the early seventeenth century | 101 |
The players alleged opposition to print | 115 |
TEXTS | 129 |
Why size matters the two hours traffic of our stage and the length of Shakespeares plays | 131 |
Editorial policy and the length of Shakespeares plays | 174 |
Bad quartos and their origins Romeo and Juliet Henry V and Hamlet | 192 |
Theatricality literariness and the texts of Romeo and Juliet Henry V and Hamlet | 220 |
The plays of Shakespeare and his contemporaries in print 15841623 | 245 |
Heminge and Condells Stolne and surreptitious copies and the Pavier quartos | 255 |
Shakespeare and the circulation of dramatic manuscripts | 259 |
262 | |
278 | |
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Common terms and phrases
abridgement acted actors Andrew Gurr anonymous appeared argued argument Beaumont and Fletcher Bibliography Blayney Cambridge University Press chapter Clarendon Press comedies copy dramatist Edward England evidence extant Folio text Greg Gurr Hamlet hath haue Heminge and Condell Henry Heywood Ibid John Jonson King Lear King's King's Men length Library lines literary London long texts Lord Chamberlain's Lord Chamberlain's Men Love's Labour's Lost manuscript playbooks memorial reconstruction Merry Wives modern omitted Oxford University Press passages Pavier play's players playhouse playtexts playwrights poems printed playbooks printer private transcripts Publication of Playbooks quarto of Hamlet quarto of Romeo quote readers revision Richard Richard III Robert Romeo and Juliet scene scholars script second quarto seems seventeenth century Shakespeare wrote Shakespeare's plays Shrew sixteenth Sonnets Spanish Tragedy Stationers Studies suggests Tamburlaine Textual Companion theater Thomas title pages Troilus and Cressida W. W. Greg William Shakespeare written
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Page 5 - But be contented : when that fell arrest Without all bail shall carry me away, My life hath in this line some interest, Which for memorial still with thee shall stay.