A Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 3
Various
English
We will print you a perfectly bound paperback of your selected title and send it to you at your nominated address
Below is a summary of A Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 3
Proofreaders
A COLLECTION OF OLD ENGLISH PLAYS; VOL. III
In Four Volumes
Edited by
A.H. BULLEN
1882-1889.
CONTENTS:
Preface
Sir Gyles Goosecappe
The Wisdome of Dr. Dodypoll
The Distracted Emperor
The Tryall of Chevalry
Footnotes
PREFACE.
I have not been able to give in the present volume the unpublished play
of Heywood's to which I referred in the Preface to Vol. I. When I came
to transcribe the play, I found myself baffled by the villanous scrawl.
But I hope that, with the assistance of some expert in old handwriting,
I may succeed in procuring an accurate transcript of the piece for the
fourth volume.
One of the plays here presented to the reader is printed for the first
time, and the others have not been reprinted. I desire to thank ALFRED
HENRY HUTH, Esq., for the loan of books from his magnificent collection.
It is pleasant to acknowledge an obligation when the favour has been
bestowed courteously and ungrudgingly. To my friend F.G. FLEAY, Esq., I
cannnot adequately express my gratitude for the great trouble that he
has taken in reading all the proof-sheets, and for his many valuable
suggestions. Portions of the former volume were not seen by him in the
proof, and to this cause must be attributed the presence of some slight
but annoying misprints. One serious fault, not a misprint, occurs in the
first scene of the first Act of _Barnavelt's Tragedy_ (p. 213). In the
margin of the corrected proof, opposite the lines,
"And you shall find that the desire of glory
Was the last frailty wise men ere putt of,"
I wrote
"That last infirmity of noble minds,"
a [mis]quotation from _Lycidas_. The words were written in pencil and
enclosed in brackets. I was merely drawing Mr. FLEAY'S attention to the
similarity of expression between Milton's words and the playwright's;
but by some unlucky chance my marginal pencilling was imported into the
text. I now implore the reader to expunge the line. On p. 116, l. 12 (in
the same volume), for _with_ read _witt_; p. 125 l. 2, for _He_ read
_Ile_; p. 128, l. 18, for _pardue_ read _perdue_; p. 232, for _Is_ read
_In_; p. 272, l. 3, for _baste_ read _haste_; p. 336, l. 6, the speaker
should evidently be not _Do_. (the reading of the MS.) but _Sis_., and
_noble Sir Richard_ should be _noble Sir Francis_; p. 422, l. 12, del.
comma between _Gaston_ and _Paris_. Some literal errors may, perhaps,
still have escaped me, but such words as _anottomye_ for _anatomy_, or
_dietie_ for _deity_ must not be classed as misprints. They are
recognised though erroneous forms, and instances of their occurrence
will be given in the Index to Vol. IV.
5, WILLOW ROAD, HAMPSTEAD, N.W.
January 24, 1884.
INTRODUCTION TO SIR GYLES GOOSECAPPE.
This clever, though somewhat tedious, comedy was published anonymously
in 1606. There is no known dramatic writer of that date to whom it could
be assigned with any great degree of probability. The comic portion
shows clearly the influence of Ben Jonson, and there is much to remind
one of Lyly's court-comedies. In the serious scenes the philosophising
and moralising, at one time expressed in language of inarticulate
obscurity and at another attaining clear and dignified utterance,
suggest a study of Chapman. The unknown writer might have taken as his
motto a passage in the dedication of Ovid's _Banquet of Sense_:--
Back