This book chapter was published in the book, The Struggle for Shakespeare's Text
Twentieth-Century Editorial Theory and Practice [© Cambridge University Press]. The publisher's website is at: http://www.cambridge.org/

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The Text of Shakespeare's Hamlet

The Struggle for Shakespeare's Text: Twentieth-Century Editorial Theory and Practice

Introduction: reading W. W. Greg 1. The discovery of 'foul papers' 2. Redefining foul papers 3. Playhouse MSS: what bookkeepers did not do 4. Playhouse MSS: what bookkeepers did 5. Behind the stage/in the tiring house Conclusion The manuscripts Appendix A. Characteristics of Gregian 'foul papers' in playhouse texts Appendix B. Knight's placement of stage directions in Beleeue Appendix C. Physical evidence of dramatist-bookkeeper collaboration.

Early Modern Playhouse Manuscripts and the Editing of Shakespeare

ing, if possible, which of the two soliloquies is original or more authentic, and to explaining how the other version came to be included in the text. Scholars would not have limited their attention to text-critical studies of this one passage but would certainly have explored its connection to the larger work of which it forms a part. The question of which version best fits the style and structure of the play, its development, and the character of its protagonist would certainly have been considered and might well have been a key issue, if not the key issue, in Hamlet studies. 1 In fact, just such a divergence exists in one of the best-known and most celebrated works of the Sanskrit poetic canon, Māgha’s Śiśupālavadha (The Killing of Śiśupāla), written probably in the late-seventh or early-eighth century. At the key moment in the story, when the titular antagonist Śiśupāla directly challenges Kṛṣṇa, the poem’s divine hero, the work splits into two versions. In one version Śiśupāla’s speech, one of the most scathingly blasphemous tirades in the history of Sanskrit literature, derides Kṛṣṇa in no uncertain terms. In the other version his speech contains two simultaneous registers of meaning: one denounces Kṛṣṇa in similar terms, but the other actually praises him resoundingly as the Supreme God. It is hard to believe, but this total divergence has received virtually no scholarly attention. Many In the course of researching and writing this paper, we received help from many people in getting access to manuscripts and other unpublished materials, in the deciphering of difficult scripts, and in the assessment of our findings. In particular, we would like to thank Patrick Cummins, Siniruddha Dash, Victor D’Avella, Thibaut d’Hubert, Dragomir Dimitrov, Sascha Ebeling, Gerhard Ehlers, Anne Feldhaus, Juergen Hanneder, Harunaga Isaacson, Konrad Klaus, Edith McCrea, H. V. Nagaraja Rao, James Nye, Sheldon Pollock, Ajay Rao, and the staff of the

https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.7817/jameroriesoci.132.3.0427

To Be or Not to Be Śiśupāla: Which Version of the Key Speech in Māgha's Great Poem Did He Really Write?

T hypothetical process known as memorial reconstruction was developed in the twentieth century by Sir Walter W. Greg and the “New Bibliographers” to explain printed Renaissance playtexts identifi ed as “bad quartos.” Evidence cited to support the concept (if not the concept itself ) has been questioned, principally by Paul Werstine and Laurie E. Maguire.1 Arden Shakespeare editor Giorgio Melchiori replies that critics “intended to nullify all narratives by their predecessors. Theirs was not an alternative narrative. . . .” 2 However, Werstine and Maguire do specify other possible origins of these problematic publications relevant to the renewal in this essay of a hypothesis that New Bibliographers themselves discount. My analysis of the manuscript playtext John of Bordeaux,3 aptly described by Harry R. Hoppe as “a bad quarto that never reached print,” 4 indicates that it is transcribed from the stenographic recording of a stage performance. I compare this inference to prior scholarly opinion that the text is either a memorial reconstruction or a descendent transcription of authorized text and I discuss the implications of my fi ndings. Before shorthand can be fairly argued as a cause of any playtext, a history of the current opinion devaluing that method of transmission must be reviewed, beginning with a clarifi cation of the terminology. Early in Suspect Texts Maguire asserts that “memorial reconstruction” is synonymous to “bad quarto” (15), and to “reporting” (18), apparently in agreement with Fredson Bowers, whose thirteenth and fi nal listed class of Elizabethan printer’s copy is “memorial reconstruction of the text without direct transcriptional link with any manuscript derived from author’s autograph, in other words, the copy for a so-called ‘bad quarto.’ ” 5 But earlier in the century Greg had carefully defi ned “reporting,” listing six of its

Memorial Transmission, Shorthand, and John of Bordeaux

Among its most striking differences we could point out the following. It is a much shorter version, 2,220 lines, just over half as long as the Second Quarto (the longest textual version) or any modern critical edition. Variation in dialogue ranges from passages of total similitude, paraphrases, to fragments unique to the First Quarto (about 130 lines), together with a number of transpositions and echoes. Some characters bear different names, for instance, Corambis for Polonius, Montano for Reynaldo1, or Rossencraft and Gilderstone for Rosencrantz2 and Guilderstern. There are important structural differences, especially at two points where the line of action is markedly altered: 1) the soliloquy “ To be, or not to be” and the subsequent nunnery episode occur immediatly after Corambis plans to “ loose” his daughter to Hamlet3, and 2) after Ofelia has become mad, Horatio informs the queen of Hamlet’s return in a scene which is unique to the First Quarto. And finally, characterizations are different, especially the queen who in the closet scene unambiguously denies any complicity with the murder of Hamlet’s father and vows to assist his son in his revenge.

Additional excerpts

https://dialnet.unirioja.es/descarga/articulo/1979890.pdf

The Text of Shakespeare's Hamlet

Citations

The Struggle for Shakespeare's Text: Twentieth-Century Editorial Theory and Practice

Early Modern Playhouse Manuscripts and the Editing of Shakespeare

To Be or Not to Be Śiśupāla: Which Version of the Key Speech in Māgha's Great Poem Did He Really Write?

Memorial Transmission, Shorthand, and John of Bordeaux

Dramaturgy of the Acting Version of the First Quarto of Hamlet