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Page 4
Be that as it may, it was well that at the moment when the reading
public began rapidly to expand in England, Tonson should have made
Shakespeare available in an attractive and convenient format; and it was
a happy choice that brought Rowe to the editorship of these six volumes.
As poet, playwright, and man of taste, Rowe was admirably fitted to
introduce Shakespeare to a multitude of new readers. Relatively innocent
of the technical duties of an editor though he was, he none the less was
capable of accomplishing what proved to be his historic mission: the
easy re-statement of a view of Shakespeare which Dryden had earlier
articulated and the demonstration that the plays could be read and
admired despite the objections of formal dramatic criticism. He is more
than a chronological predecessor of Pope, Johnson, and Morgann. The line
is direct from Shakespeare to Davenant, to Dryden, to Rowe; and he is an
organic link between this seventeenth-century tradition and the
increasingly rich Shakespeare scholarship and criticism that flowed
through the eighteenth century into the romantic era.
_Notes_
[Footnote 1: Alfred Jackson, "Rowe's edition of Shakespeare," _Library_
X (1930), 455-473; Allardyce Nicoll, "The editors of Shakespeare from
first folio to Malone," _Studies in the first Folio_, London (1924), pp.
158-161; Ronald B. McKerrow, "The treatment of Shakespeare's text by his
earlier editors, 1709-1768," _Proceedings of the British Academy_, XIX
(1933), 89-122; Augustus Ralli, _A history of Shakespearian criticism_,
London, 1932; Herbert S. Robinson, _English Shakespearian criticism in
the eighteenth century_, New York, 1932.]
[Footnote 2: Nicoll, _op. cit._, pp. 158-161; McKerrow, _op. cit._, p.
93.]
[Footnote 3: London _Gazette_, From Monday March 14 to Thursday March
17, 1708, and From Monday May 30 to Thursday June 2, 1709. For
descriptions and collations of this edition, see A. Jackson, _op. cit._;
H.L. Ford, _Shakespeare 1700-1740_, Oxford (1935), pp. 9, 10; _TLS_ 16
May, 1929, p. 408; Edward Wagenknecht, "The first editor of
Shakespeare," _Colophon_ VIII, 1931. According to a writer in _The
Gentleman's Magazine_ (LVII, 1787, p. 76), Rowe was paid thirty-six
pounds, ten shillings by Tonson.]
[Footnote 4: Identified and described by McKerrow, _TLS_ 8 March, 1934,
p. 168. See also Ford, _op. cit._, pp. 11, 12.]
[Footnote 5: The best discussion of the Curll and Lintot Poems is that
of Hyder Rollins in _A new variorum edition of Shakespeare: the poems_,
Philadelphia and London (1938) pp. 380-382, to which I am obviously
indebted. See also Raymond M. Alden, "The 1710 and 1714 texts of
Shakespeare's poems," _MLN_ XXXI (1916), 268-274; and Ford, _op. cit._,
pp. 37-40.]
[Footnote 6: For example, he dropped out Rowe's opinion that Shakespeare
had little learning; the reference to Dryden's view as to the date of
Pericles; the statement that _Venus and Adonis_ is the only work that
Shakespeare himself published; the identification of Spenser's "pleasant
Willy" with Shakespeare; the account of Jonson's grudging attitude
toward Shakespeare; the attack on Rymer and the defence of _Othello_;
and the discussion of the Davenant-Dryden _Tempest_, together with the
quotation from Dryden's prologue to that play.]
[Footnote 7: Edmond Malone, _The plays and poems of William
Shakespeare_, London (1790), I, 154. Difficult as it is to believe that
so careful a scholar as Malone could have made this error, it is none
the less true that he observed the omission of the passage on "pleasant
Willy" and stated that Rowe had obviously altered his opinion by 1714.]
[Footnote 8: Beverley Warner, _Famous introductions to Shakespeare's
plays_, New York (1906), p. 6.]
[Footnote 9: Gerald E. Bentley, _Shakespeare and Jonson_, Chicago
(1945). Vol. I.]
[Footnote 10: D. Nichol Smith, _Eighteenth century essays on
Shakespeare_, Glasgow (1903), pp. xiv-xv.]
The writer wishes to express his appreciation of a Research Grant from
the University of Minnesota for the summer of 1948, during which this
introduction was written.
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