Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume XIV.djvu/847

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SHAKESPEARE 821 edited by J. O. Halliwell and Thomas Wright, 2 vols. 8vo, 1859), a learned and accurate work ; Shakespeare's Vorschule, edited, and accompanied with prefaces, by Ludwig Tieck (2 vols. 8vo, Leipsic, 1823 and 1829); "New Facts regarding the life of Shakespeare," by J. P. Collier (8vo, London, 1835) ; " New Par- ticulars regarding the Works of Shakespeare," by the same (8vo, London, 1836) ; " On- the Sonnets of Shakespeare, identifying the Per- sons to whom they are addressed, and elucida- ting several points in the Poet's History," by James Boaden (8vo, London, 1837) ; Ueber Shakespeare's dramatische Kunst und sein Ver- hdltniss zu Calderon und Goethe, by H. Ulrici (8vo, Halle, 1839; translated, 8vo, London, 1846); " Shakespeare's Library, a Collection of the Stories, Novels, and Tales used by Shake- speare as the Foundation of his Plays," edited by J. P. Collier (8vo, London, 1840-'41 ; new and enlarged ed., by W. Carew Hazlitt, 1875) ; "Remarks on Mr. J. P. Collier's and Mr. Charles Knight's Editions of Shakespeare," by the Rev. Alexander Dyce (8vo, London, 1844) ; G. G. Gervinus, Shakspeare (4 vols., Leipsic, 1849-'50) ; Shakspeare et son temps, etude lit- teraire, by Guizot (8vo, Paris, 1852); "The English of Shakespeare," by George L. Craik (12mo, London, 1857) ; " A Critical Examina- tion of the Text of Shakespeare," by William Sidney Walker (3 vols. 16mo, London, 1860). Mrs. Mary Cowden Cfarke's "Complete Con- cordance " or verbal index to the dramatic works of Shakespeare, the product of almost incredible labor and patience, appeared in 1846, and is an invaluable aid to the critical study of the poet. The multitudinous publi- cations of the Shakespeare society of London contain, among much that is either trivial or mere antiquarian rubbish, many volumes of valuable and well edited reprints of scarce old plays, of dramatic history, and of critical sug- gestions for the improvement of the text of Shakespeare. The "New Shakespeare Soci- ety" was established at London in 1874, under the directorship and chiefly by the exertions of the distinguished English scholar Frederick J. Furnivall. Its purposes and its publications thus far are more critical than those of the elder and extinct society. Eminent among the philosophical critics of Shakespeare is Sam- uel Taylor Coleridge, who by his lectures and by his essays (see his " Friend " and his " Lit- erary Remains ") did more perhaps than any other one writer to bring about a profound and thoughtful appreciation of the poet's works. Mrs. Jameson's "Characteristics of Women, Moral, Poetical, and Historical " (2 vols. 8vp, London, 1832), as a minute and sympathetic analysis of Shakespeare's principal female char- acters, must ever rank high in this department of literature. The Rev. H. N. Hudson's " Lec- tures on Shakespeare" (2 vols. 12mo, New York, 1848) are remarkable for the same qual- ities, which appear in a higher degree in the essays in his edition of the works above no- ticed. Those essays he has embodied with other kindred matter in "Shakespeare, his Life, Art, and Characters " (2 vols. 12mo, Bos- ton, 1872). Mr. R. Grant White, in " Shake- speare's Scholar " (8vo, New York, 1854), pub- lished historical and critical studies of the poet's text, characters, and commentators, and an examination of Mr. Collier's folio of 1682, the conclusions of which were sustained by discoveries made in England five years after- ward. The same writer, in his " Essay on the Authorship of the three Parts of King Henry the Sixth" (8vo, Cambridge, 1859, privately printed), has, by the general consent of Shake- spearian scholars, settled that interesting and long mooted question " so far as criticism can do it." This essay was afterward embodied in its author's edition of the poet's works. In 1852 Mr. J. P. Collier, who had previously brought forward many documents of ancient date in relation to Shakespeare, announced that he had become the possessor of a copy of the second folio edition of Shakespeare's plays (1632), which from the first page to the last contained "notes and emendations in a hand not much later than the time when it went to press." He published a history of his acquaintance with this volume, and detailed accounts, accompanied with comment, of its most plausible marginal changes in the text : " Notes and Emendations to the Text of Shake- speare's Plays, from early Manuscript Correc- tions in a copy of the Folio, 1632, in the Pos- session of J. Payne Collier, F. S. A." The sensation caused by this publication was wide- spread and profound. The majority of read- ers hailed it almost as a revelation from the tomb of Shakespeare himself ; and it seemed for the moment as if all previous editions of his works had become waste paper. A small minority doubted and wondered, and a few stoutly protested. The critics on the one hand supported it enthusiastically, and on the other attacked it vigorously. It was found that the greater part of its corrections had been antici- pated by the conjectural emendations of edi- tors and verbal critics ; and of the compara- tively small remainder, there were very few which commanded the general assent of Eng- lish scholars and students of Shakespeare. It was shown first in a paper in " Putnam's Mag- azine " (New York) for October, 1853, by R. Grant White, that the corrections, upon their own evidence, were made at so late a date as to have no authority from their antiquity. The folio having been placed for a time in the British museum, certain officers of that in- stitution, including the eminent palaeographer Sir Francis Madden, superintendent of the manuscript department, pronounced its margi- nal corrections spurious imitations of ancient handwriting, and announced that they had discovered partially erased guides in pencil, in modern handwriting, for the antique-seeming words in ink, and that in many instances the modern pencil writing appeared under that in