THE ARGUMENT LUCIUS TARQUINIUS, for his excessive pride named Superbus, after he had caused his own father-in-law Servius Tullius to be cruelly murdered, and contrary to the Roman laws and customs, not requiring or staying for the people's suffrages, had possessed himself of the kingdom, went, accompanied with his sons and other noblemen of Rome, to besiege Ardea. During which siege the principal men of the army meeting one evening at the tent of Sextus Tarquinius the king's son, in their discourses after supper every one commended the virtues of his own wife; among whom Collatinus extolled the incomparable chastity of his wife Lucretia. In that pleasant humour they all posted to Rome; and intending, by their secret and sudden arrival, to make trial of that which every one had before avouched, only Collatinus finds his wife, though it were late in the night, spinning amongst her maids: the other ladies were all found dancing and revelling, or in several disports. Whereupon the noblemen yielded Collatinus the victory, and his wife the fame. At that time Sextus Tarquinius, being inflamed with Lucrece' beauty, yet smothering his passions for the present, departed with the rest back to the camp; from whence he shortly after privily withdrew himself, and was, according to his estate, royally entertained and lodged by Lucrece at Collatium. The same night he treacherously stealeth into her chamber, violently ravished her, and early in the morning speedeth away. Lucrece, in this lamentable plight, hastily dispatcheth messengers, one to Rome for her father, another to the camp for Collatine. They came, the one accompanied with Junius Brutus, the other with Publius Valerius, and finding Lucrece attired in mourning habit, demanded the cause of her sorrow. She, first taking an oath of them for her revenge, revealed the actor and whole manner of his dealing, and withal suddenly stabbed herself. Which done, with one consent they all vowed to root out the whole hated family of the Tarquins; and bearing the dead body to Rome, Brutus acquainted the people with the doer and manner of the vile deed, with a bitter invective against the tyranny of the king wherewith the people were so moved, that with one consent and a general acclamation the Tarquins were all exiled, and the state government changed from kings to consuls. PREFACE TO THE RAPE OF LUCRECE THE EARLY EDITIONS. The first edition of Lucrece was published in quarto in 1594, with the following title-page: --- "LVCRECE. | LONDON. | Printed by Richard Field, for Iohn Harrison, and are | to be sold at the signe of the white Greyhound | in Paules Church-yard. 1594 | ". The running title is "The Rape of Lvcrece." The Bodleian Library copies of this edition differ in some important readings, showing that the text was corrected while passing through the press. Seven new editions appeared by the year 1655; the 1616 issue purported to be "newly revised," but the variant readings are of very doubtful value. THE SOURCE OF THE PLOT. The story of Lucrece had been treated by many English writers before Shakespeare chose it as the subject of "the second heir" of his invention. Chaucer told her story in his Legende of Good Women, quoting "Ovid and Titus Livius" as his origi nals (see Ovid's Fasti, ii. 741; Livy, i. 57, 58). Lydgate treated the same theme in his Falls of Princes; Painter, in his Palace of Pleasure, 1567. There were other Eng lish renderings, notably "ballads " entered on the Sta tioners' Registers in the years 1568, 1570; a ballad was also printed in 1576. Shakespeare seems to have read Ovid's version, and this may be considered his main source.1 THE DATE OF COMPOSITION. In the dedication of Venus and Adonis to the Earl of Southampton, the poet had vowed "to take advantage of all idle hours" till "I have honoured you with some graver labour." Lucrece must therefore have been written after the dedication containing these words, and before its entry on the books of the Stationers' Company, that is, between April, 1593, and May, 1594. Like the former poem, Lucrece was also addressed to Southampton: it is instructive, however, to compare the two dedications; between the first and second letters timid deference towards an exalted patron has ripened into affectionate devotion. A comparison of the two companion poems, Venus and Adonis and Lucrece, the one a study of "female lust and boyish coldness," the other of "male lust and womanly chastity," brings out prominently the advance made in the later poem in respect of ease of versification, maturity of observation, and didactic tendency. This latter superiority seems to have been noted by Shakespeare's contemporaries: 2 "Who loves chaste life, there Lucrece for a teacher: 1 See Baynes's essay on Shakespeare and Ovid, with reference to his early poems (Fraser's Magazine, xxi.). • Compare Preface to Venus and Adonis. The earliest allusion to Shakespeare by name occurs in connection with a reference to his Lucrece, in the commencing verses of a laudatory address prefixed to Willobie his Avisa, 1594. In the same year the author of an Elegy on Lady Helen Branch included among "our greater poetes" "You that have writ of Chaste Lucretia." Drayton's reference, in his Matilda, also in 1594, may have been to a play on the subject, as, in all probability, was Heywood's allusion in his Apology for Actors, 1612. Heywood's play on Lucrece is not devoid of merit. In 1595 the following words are found in the margin of a curious volume, entitled Polimanteia, published at Cambridge: "All praise worthy Lucrecia Sweet Shakspeare." Sir John Suckling's "supplement of an imperfect Copy of Verses of Mr. Wil. Shakespears" appears at first sight to commence with two six-line stanzas, representing a different and perhaps earlier recension of Lucrece, but this is doubtful, and in all probability the alterations were Sir John Suckling's, the verses being derived from one of the books of Elegant Extracts, namely, England's Parnassus. |