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CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE

EDITED BY

C. F. TUCKER BROOKE

B.LITT. OXON.; INSTRUCTOR IN ENGLISH IN YALE UNIVERSITY

STANFOR

OXFORD

AT THE CLARENDON PRESS

OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS

AMEN HOUSE, E.C. 4

LONDON EDINBURGH GLASGOW
LEIPZIG NEW YORK TORONTO
MELBOURNE CAPETOWN BOMBAY
CALCUTTA MADRAS SHANGHAI

HUMPHREY MILFORD

PUBLISHER TO THE

UNIVERSITY

471370

Impression of 1929
First edition, 1910

Printed in Great Britain

PREFACE

THIS volume is designed to furnish the student and the general reader with a serviceable edition of Marlowe's accepted writings. The text reproduces faithfully, it is believed, that of the most reliable version of each work, except as regards punctuation and capitalization. In the latter particulars it appears inconsistent with the requirements of conscientious editing to retain such errors as are due to the carelessness of the original compositor or to the limitations of the printer's fount used, but in making these necessary minor changes the text has in no sense been 'modernized'. Unmeaning irregularities in punctuation and in the use of capitals have been normalized, where the comfort of the enlightened reader seemed absolutely to demand it, but always in accordance with Elizabethan rather than Victorian principles. In many cases intelligibility clearly required the substitution of a full stop for a probably accidental comma, or the reverse; and it appeared unnecessary that the reader should be annoyed. by such occasional, irregular spellings as 'tamburlaine ' and 'zenocrate', merely because the printer of the first edition of the play in question was presumably insufficiently provided with capital T's and Z's. No attempt has been made to introduce the modern symmetry and logical consistency in capitalization and pointing. Semicolons appear only in the rare cases where they are found in the old editions; the present-day distinctions between the uses of

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Every such deviation from the original has, however, been carefully noted by the editor and will be listed in the forthcoming editio major in an Appendix for the benefit of those who may wish to study the vagaries of Elizabethan typography. The matter does not in any way concern the appreciation of Marlowe.

commas and colons are not pressed too far; and the employment of the comma for elocutionary effect, to indicate a drop of the voice, has been retained. So, too, there has been no interference with the occasional practice of capitalizing common nouns or with the ordinary absence of capitals in proper adjectives. Errors in the division of lines have been corrected, but wherever the alteration amounts to much more than the mere substitution of a capital letter at the commencement of the line, the change is indicated in the critical apparatus. The long 's' is not retained, and black letter type is supplanted by roman. Words printed in roman in a black-letter setting are here given in italic. All further deviations from the editio princeps of each play or poem are recorded in the footnotes, which give also the variant readings of the other early editions, as well as a selection of the more valuable modern emendations.

The apparatus criticus is comparatively simple. Each separate division of the book is preceded by a list of sigla, enumerating chronologically first the early editions, which determine the text, and then the more modern versions, which possess in themselves no authority, and finally giving in alphabetical order the names and works of critics who have offered conjectural emendations. Bibliographical completeness is attempted in the case of the early editions alone. Only such modern reprints and critical writings are mentioned as there has been occasion to cite in the footnotes. The basis of the text is always the edition named first in the list of sigla, which, wherever the relative dates of editions can be ascertained, is the oldest except in the single case of the song of the Passionate Shepherd.

Certain well-known abbreviations are used throughout the critical apparatus: Conj. before the name of an editor or critic indicates that the change in question was merely suggested, without being introduced into the text. Add. means that the word or passage referred to was first inserted

by the editor whose name follows; when such new matter appears in the present text, it is enclosed in angular brackets. The abbreviation etc. after an editor's name signifies that the reading has been adopted in all later editions. Exc. stands for 'except '. The note' thirst Dyce to Bull.' means that the reading 'thirst' in place of 'thrust' appears in all the editions from that of Dyce to that of Bullen inclusive.

This volume contains the plays and poems which must at present be regarded as making up Marlowe's extant works. The epigrams of Sir John Davies and Chapman's continuation of Hero and Leander are also included because of their close historical connexion with genuine poems. For the purpose of distinction these non-Marlovian pieces are printed in small type, and the same device is used to mark the supplementary portions of Doctor Faustus first found in the editions of 1616 and 1663 respectively, though it is possible, and even probable, that a portion of the new matter of the 1616 version represents Marlowe's own work.

Two inconsiderable poems, printed by Dyce in his edition of Marlowe, have been omitted because the evidence in favour of their authenticity seems inadequate. A fourteenline Latin epitaph on Sir Roger Manwood († 1592) is written in manuscript on the back of the title-page of a copy1 of the 1629 edition of Hero and Leander, whence Dyce incorporated it on the ground that Manwood, who was of Kentish origin, may have been a patron of Marlowe, and that the unknown scribe in copying the epitaph into a work of Marlowe's (and Chapman's) meant to imply the former poet's authorship. This reasoning is on the face of it rather weak, and the fact that the book containing the epitaph was not in existence till thirty-six years after Marlowe's death might cast doubt on much stronger evidence.

Dyce also inserted into his edition a Dialogue in Verse,

'Last heard of in the possession of Colonel W. F. Prideaux of

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