Notes for lines 0-1017 ed. Bernice W. Kliman
| 124+1 { Bar. I thinke it be no other, but enso;} | 1.1.108 |
|---|
1765 john1
john1
124+1-124+18 Johnson (ed. 1765): “These, and all other lines printed in the Italick letter, throughout this play, are omitted in the folio edition of 1623. The omissions leave the play sometimes better and sometimes worse, and seem made for the sake of abbreviation.”
1773 v1773
v1773 = john1
124+1-124+18
1778 v1778
v1778 = john1 +
124+1-124+18 Steevens (ed. 1778), “It may be worth while to observe, that the title-pages of the first [i.e. second] quartos in 1604 and 1605, declare this play to be enlarged to almost as much againe as it was, according to the true and perfect coppy”
1785 v1785
v1785 = v1778
124+1-124+18
1787 ann
ann = v1785
124+1-124+18
1790 mal
mal = v1785 +
124+1-124+18 Malone (ed. 1790): “This and the following seventeen lines are omitted in the folio. As I shall throughout this play always mention what lines are omitted in that copy, I have not thought it necessary to follow Dr. Johnson in distinguishing the omitted lines by including them within crotchets. Malone.”
1793 v1793
v1793 = v1785 +
124+1-124+18 Steevens (ed. 1793): “Perhaps therefore many of its absurdities, as well as beauties arose from the quantity added after it was first written. Our poet might have been more attentive to the amplification than the coherence of his fable.
“The degree of credit due to the title-page that styles the MS. from which the quartols, 1604 and 1605 were printed, the true and perfect copy, may also be disputable. I cannot help supposing this publication to contain all [Sh.] rejected, as well as all he supplied. By restorations like the former, conteding booksellers or theatres might have gained some temporary advantage over each other, which at this distance of time is not to be understood. The patience of our ancestors, exceeded our own, could it have out-lasted the tragedy of Hamlet as it is now printed; for it must have occupied almost five hours in representation. If, however, it was too much dilated in the ancient stage, it is as injudiciously contracted on the modern one. Steevens.”
Ed. note: Garrick had communicated to Steevens his intent to boldly cut the 4th and 5th acts, omitting the gravedigger scene and others. Steevens had approved in theory but did not like the result, and evidently wrote anonymous reviews attacking his “friend’s” work.
1803 v1803
v1803 = v1793
124+1-124+18
1813 v1813
v1813 = v1803
124+1-124+18
1819 cald1
cald1 ≈ v1813
124+1-124+18 Caldecott (ed. 1819): “The passages included in brackets are throughout the work taken from Mr. Steevens’s edition of the quarto. In that edition the title page of this play in 1611 (there had been two preceeding, one in 1604, and another in 1605) states, that it had been enlarged to almost double its original size. It also appears, that in their folio of 1623, the player editors made many retrenchments. Splendid passages, not contributing to the action of the drama, and not admitted latterly in representation, they have not adequately appreciated; and the coherence of the dialogue and fable may in consequence be sometimes found to have suffered. Johnson says, their omissions sometimes leave it better, and sometimes worse, and seem only made for the purpose of abbreviation.”
1821 v1821
v1821 = v1813
124+1-124+18
1826 sing1
sing1: standard
124+1-124+18 Singer (ed. 1826): “All the lines within crotchets in this play are omitted in the folio of 1623. The title-pages of the first quartos in 1604 and 1605 declare this play to be ‘enlarged to almost as much againe as it was, according to the true and perfect copie.’”
1839 knt1
knt1
124+1-124+18 Knight (ed. 1839): “The eighteen lines in brackets are found in quarto (B) [Q2], but are omitted in the folio. It is probable that Shakspere suppressed this magnificent description of the omens which preceded the fall of ‘the mightiest Julius,’ after he had written ‘Julius Caesar.’ In that noble play we have a description greatly resembling this, especially in the lines which we print in italics:— ‘There is one within, Besides the things that we have heard and seen, Recounts most horrid sight seen by the watch, A lioness hath whelped in the streets; And graves have yawn’d and yielded up their dead: Fierce fiery warriors fight upon the clouds, In ranks, and squadrons, and right form of war, Which drizzled blood upon the Capitol: The nose of battle hurtled in the air; Horses do neigh, and dying men did groan; And ghosts did shriek and squeal about the streets.’” [JC 2.2.14ff (1001ff)
1843 knt2
knt2 = knt1
124+1-124+18
1844 verp
verp ≈ knt2 without attribution by name
124+1-124+18 Verplanck (ed. 1844): “This and the seventeen following lines are not in the folio, nor is any trace of them to be found in the earliest quarto. It has been probably conjectured that the poet suppressed this passage in representation, after he had written Julius Caesar, where he had used similar imagery.”
1854 del2
del2 ≈ verp without attribution
124+1-124+18 Delius (ed. 1854): “Diese folgenden 18 Zeilen fehlen in der Fol., wahrscheinlich weil sie wie ähnliche bloss beschreibenden Inhalts auch bei den Aufführungen des Dramas weggelassen wurden.” [These eighteen lines are not in the Folio, apparently because they were cut in performance.
1856 hud1
hud1
124+1-124+18
1856 sing2
sing2 = sing1
124+1-124+18
1870 Abbott
Abbott
124+1 be] Abbott (§ 298): Be, Beest, &c. was used in A.S. (beon) generally in a future sense. Hence, since the future and subjunctive are closely connected in meaning, be assumed an exclusively subjunctive use; and this was so common, that we not merely find ‘if it be’ [[which might represent the proper inflected subjunctive of be]], but also ‘if thou beest,’ where the indicative is used subjunctively. . . . (§ 299). Be in questions and independent sentences. So, as a rule, it will be found that be is used with some notion of doubt, question, thought, &c. (a) in questions, and (b) after verbs of thinking. . . . “ [quotes 124+1]. Be expresses more doubt than is after a verb of thinking. . . . Very significant is this difference in the speech of the doubtful Othello— ‘I think my wife be honest, and think she is not.’ [Oth. 3.3.384 (2030)].”
Abbott
124+1 but] Abbott (§ 127): “But in the sense of except frequently follows negative comparatives, where we should use than.” (§ 128): but “passes naturally from ‘except’ to ‘only. . . .”
1873 rug2
rug2 = Abbott
124+1 be] Moberly (ed. 1873): “Mr. Abbott (§ 299) shows that the oblique subjunctive implies a doubtful assertion. This he well illustrates by [Oth. and he quotes].”
1877 v1877
v1877 = knt; Hunter [124+6-124+13] (adding to Lucan “lib. i”)
124+1-124+18
v1877= Abbott § 299 (minus xrefs)
124+1 be]
1878 rlf1
rlf1= Abbott § 299
124+1 be] Rolfe (ed. 1878) “expresses more doubt than is after a verb of thinking.” Rolfe mentions but does not include “striking examples.”
1888 macl
macl
124+1-124+18 Maclachlan (ed. 1888) believes that the entire passage has to do with terrestrial matters. See his note on 124+10-124+11
1890 irv2
irv2: standard highlighting + regret the lines occur only in Qq
124+1-124+18
1903 rlf3
rlf3 = rlf1, Abbott without attribution, minus (ref. to examples)
124+1 be]
1912 dtn3
dtn3
124+1 Deighton (ed. 1912): “I think that this and no other must, as you say, be the cause of all this bustle.”
dtn3: Abbott § 299
124+1 be]
dtn3 ≈ Abbott § 127 without attribution
124+1 but] Deighton (ed. 1912): “used in its exceptive sense.”
1929 trav
trav
124+1 Travers (ed. 1929): “The whole stiff, cautious, and, at the same time, wordy line is curiously in the style of the preceding speech. ” [See his n. 97-124.]
trav
124+1 be]
Travers (ed. 1929): “subjunctive, insisting that it is only a ‘
thought,’ an opinion.
trav
124+1 enso]
Travers (ed. 1929):
Even is mostly “clipped in early editions.”
1934 Wilson
Wilson MSH
124+1 Wilson (1934, pp. 22-32) makes much of the neatness of most of F1’s cuts from Q2 (as he sees them). He assumes they are to save time and to conserve the actor playing Hamlet. He concedes that some cuts result from careless omission, for example 240b-240+2,
1934 Wilson
Wilson MSH
124+1-124+18; 621+1-621+22 Wilson (1934, p. 25) notes that both segments precede the entrance of the ghost. Though these Q2-only lines may seem digressive, they serve the purpose of distracting audience attention with lines in a “minor key . . . to lull the minds of his audience to rest and so startle them the more with his apparition.”
124+1 621+1
1934 cam3
cam3: MSH 25, 168.
124+1-124+18
1938 parc
parc
124+1-124+18 Parrott & Craig (ed. 1938) note that Q2 lines cut in F often have a crux within them. They consider untenable the idea that Sh. added the lines for readers, with ref. to their intro. p. 44: there they simply deny the idea that Sh. wrote a version of the play for a reading audience: too many of his plays are almost as long as Q2 Ham. and he never published any during his life (unlike some other dramatists of his day).
1938 parc
parc
124+1 enso] Parrott & Craig (ed. 1938) think that enso, which they modify to e’en so, could represent either Sh.’s spelling or a printer’s error.
1939 kit2
kit2 contra knt without attribution
124+1-124+18 Kittredge (ed. 1939): “In the Quartos but not in the Folios. Some think that Shakespeare omitted these splendid lines in revising the play because he had in the meantime written Julius Caesar; but that is not reason. Their omission seems to be merely a ‘cut.’ Whether such cuts were made by Shakespeare or not we have no means of knowing.”
1939 kit2
kit2 contra Abbott
124+1 be] Kittredge (ed. 1939): “The subjunctive in indirect discourse—an ancient construction. The be does not express any special doubt in the speaker’s mind.”
1947 cln2
cln2
124+1-124+18 Rylands (ed. 1947) indicates the om. in F1 and presumes a cut.
1982 ard2
ard2 ≈ Wilson MSH without attribution
124+1-124+18; 621+1-621+22 Jenkins (ed. 1982): These discursive passages before the ghost appears serve as contrasts—heightening the dramatic effect of the ghost’s appearance.
1985 cam4
cam4
124+1-124+18 Edwards (ed. 1985) thinks that the passage had been marked for deletion in the ms. for Q2. The garbled 124+10-124+11 is for him further proof that the speech was never finished satisfactorally and was therefore cut.
1987 oxf4
oxf4
124+1-124+18 Hibbard (ed. 1987) notes that the Q2-only passage does not advance the action and if it were meant as an advertisement for JC, it would be pointless when that play was not in the repertory.
2006 ard3q2
ard3q2: cam4; oxf4; Gilder
124+1-124+18 Thompson & Taylor (ed. 2006): “These lines are printed only in Q2; F-favouring editors such as Edwards and Hibbard argue that Shakespeare intended to delete them, the former on the grounds that this ’is not a strong or necessary speech’, the latter arguing that ’they do not advance the action in any way’ and were merely intended as an advertisement for Shakespeare’s own Julius Caesar. That play, probably written just before Hamlet in 1599, makes considerable use of the supernatural omens and occurrences related here (see [2483 CN], and Daniell, 87-8). Gielgud, however, makes the point that if these lines are cut the second appearance of the Ghost follows too quickly after the first and fails to surprise the audience (see Gilder, 36).”
2007 Wilson
Wilson
124+1 - 124+18 Wilson (2007, p. 237) finds in this passage significance in its absence from Q1 and F1; 124+5 says that “something distressing has entered peripheral vision with the Jacobean Quarto . . . . And this irritation, topical allusions to the king and his Oldenburg relatives imply, is the ’swinish’ [621+3] reality of the new Stuart monarchy, with those ’heavy-headed revels’ [621+1] . . . .”
124+1 124+5 124+18 621+1 621+3
