[N B.

A SYNOPSIS

OF THE FOLLOWING ESSAY.

I. THE MAIN SOURCES OR SHAKESPEARE'S PLOT-Books.

- signifies that there is some probability of the former existence of a more direct source (possibly an early play) than the one mentioned.

Pericles (only in part by Shakespeare) Gower and Twine.

II. OTHER BOOKS AND LITERARY PRODUCTIONS, REFLECTED IN

SHAKESPEARE'S WORKS.

The Plays of Marlowe, Lyly, Kyd, Peele, Greene, Gascoigne, Preston, Alexander, etc. Mysteries and Moralities.

Poems of Marlowe, Daniel, Chaucer, Sidney, etc.

Prose Writings of Lyly, Sidney, Harsnet, Ralegh, Eden, etc.

School-books and Classical Authors. The Horn-book, ABC-book with the Catechism,

Lily's Latin Grammar, Æsop's Fables, Mantuanus's Eclogues, Ovid, Cæsar, Seneca, Plautus (see above), Pliny, etc. Ovid he certainly knew both in the original and in the English translation; but Plutarch (see above) and Heliodorus in English dress alone.

French Authors. Montaigne in Florio's Translation, Ronsard, Rabelais.

As to Spanish and Italian authors comp. above.

Religious Books. The Bible (with the Apocrypha)- no work is more often quoted or alluded to by Shakespeare-,Book of Common Prayer, with the metrical Psalms. Romantic Stories of Arthur, Guy, Bevis, etc.

Ballads of Robin Hood, Cophetua, Susanna, Jephthah, etc.

Many Songs; Roundelays; Popular Rhymes; Popular Tales; Proverbs; Folk-lore. Much of his knowledge and information Shakespeare, of course, derived from the lips of other men.-(Comp. also Contents.)

INTRODUCTION.

THE first attempt at investigating the sources whence Shakespeare
drew the plots of his dramas was made by Gerard Langbaine, who
gave some notes on the originals of most of our poet's plays in his
'Momus Triumphans: or the Plagiaries of the English Stage', 1688,1
and fuller notes in his scholarly work, 'An Account of the English
Dramatick Poets', printed 1691. The section on 'William Shakespear',
in the latter work, has been reprinted by the New Shakspere Society,
Ser. IV, 3, pp. 318-331. Langbaine's remarks are of considerable
interest to the student. The editors of Shakespeare of the eighteenth
century were no doubt all indebted to his notes. In 1753-4 Mrs.
Charlotte Lennox published a collection of alleged sources used by
the poet, under the title of 'Shakespear illustrated or the Novels and
Histories on which the Plays of Shakespear are founded, collected,
and translated, etc.', 3 vols. This work was the precursor of
'Shakespeare's Library' edited by Collier in 1843, and re-edited by
Hazlitt in 1875. The collection entitled 'Six old Plays on which
Shakespeare founded [some of his plays]', published by Nichols in
1779 at the suggestion of Steevens, is the forerunner of Part II. of
Collier-Hazlitt's 'Shakespeare's Library'. A work important for the
study of the old drama was Robert Dodsley's 'Select Collection of
Old English Plays', 12 vols., 1744. (The second edition prepared by
Isaac Reed appeared in 1780, the third by J. P. Collier in 1825, the
fourth comprehending 15 vols. by W. C. Hazlitt in 1874.)

The interest in Shakespeare had never ceased in England, but it was increased and deepened when the romantic movement set in towards the middle of the eighteenth century. Instead of the application

1 Dict. of N. Biogr. gives the date 1687.

of classical standards to Shakespeare, as had been done of old, we now notice the clear and definite endeavour to understand and explain historically the great dramatist. The more distiguished Shakespearean scholars of the latter part of that century, to whom many valuable remarks on the literary influences acting on Shakespeare are due, are Steevens, Malone, Capell, Reed, Douce, etc.

In Germany, where the study of Shakespeare was taken up with enthusiasm, the following work was of importance for source enquiries: Karl Simrock, 'Die Quellen des Shakspeare', Bonn 1870; the first edition having appeared in 1831.1

The nineteenth century, the century of clubs and companies, of alliances and federal unions, has seen the birth (and also the death) of numerous Shakespeare Societies. The study of Shakespeare generally, of the sources of his works, and of the old drama has been furthered especially by the Old and New Shakespeare Societies, now extinct, in England, and by the Deutsche Sh. Gesellschaft, still vigorously alive. The best Shakespearean scholars have been members of these societies.

The literature which has sprung up around the name of Shakespeare has swelled to an enormous extent. Months are necessary for general orientation and years for a full command of the subject. People sometimes forget that it is better to read Shakespeare himself than works about him. And, alas, so much dilettantism is rife. Let us insist on the ne multa sed multum.-Paucis opus est literis ad mentem bonam. Our and future generations will only be able to glean stalks on the field of Shakespearean research. The splendid harvest has been gathered into the barns. But there is enough work still to be done. The sheaves must be thrashed out. The chaff, of which there is but too much, has to be winnowed from the grain, and the corn to be sifted and prepared for use.

It is now time that we should collect, utilise, and summarize the results of the labours of other men. Some work of this kind has been done; witness Alexander Schmidt's Lexicon, Sidney Lee's Life of Shakespeare, Halliwell-Phillipps' Outlines, Dowden's Primer. Mr. Furness is editing a new variorum edition. He will never finish it. But his son, who has re-edited his 'Macbeth', will carry it on. Malone's variorum edition was ably utilised by Delius in his stereotyped

1 I ought to mention two essays of which I have availed myself, and which, I hope, I have now made superfluous, the one on 'Shakespeare's Library', the other on Shakspere's 'Classical Attainments', both of which appeared in 'Noctes Shaksperianae', published by the Winchester College Shaksp. Society, 1887.

edition of Shakespeare. We need another Delius to give us the gist of Furness's variorum edition. Other books are waiting to be written: A full Shakespeare - Bibliography; a scientific History of Elizabethan Literature; a carefully revised edition of Fleay's History of the Stage', which will honestly give its authorities, and state its guesses; an up to date edition of Simrock's 'Quellen'; and a revised edition of Collier-Hazlitt's 'Shakespeare's Library', which the German Shakespeare Society hopes to call into being before long. A working index to Arber's Transcript of the Stationers' Registers, and general indexes to the publications of the Shakespeare and Ballad Societies, are much needed.

1 I hear that a work of this kind is in preparation.-I may also mention, that Dr. Furnivall is editing, and Prof. Liddel printing, "Shakespeare in Old Spelling". This is the work which scholars will quote for scientific purposes. I am still obliged to quote the text of the Globe edition.