Notes for lines 2023-2950 ed. Frank N. Clary
| 2896 And like the kind life-rendring {Pelican} <Politician>, | 4.5.147 |
|---|
1778 v1778
v1778: Interlude of Nature analogue
2896 life-rendring pelican] Steevens (ed. 1778): “So, in the ancient Interlude of Nature, bl. l. no date: ‘Who taught the cok hys watche-howres to observe, And syng of corage wyth shryll throte on hye? Who taught the pellycan her tender hart to carve?—For she nolde suffer her byrdys to dye?’
“It is almost needless to add that this account of the bird is entirely fabulous. Steevens.”
1791- rann
rann
2896 life-rendring] Rann (ed. 1791-): “that sacrifices it’s own life for the support of it’s offspring.”
1803 v1803
v1803 = v1793 +
2896 life-rendring pelican] Steevens (ed. 1803): “Again, in the old play of King Leir, 1605: ‘I am as kind as is the pelican, That kils itselfe, to save her young ones lives.’ Steevens.”
1826 sing1
sing1
2896 pelican] Singer (ed. 1826): “The fabulous bird is not unfrequently made use of for purposes of practical illustration by our elder poets: Shakspeare has again referred to it in R2 [2.1.126 (770)]. and in Lr. [3.4.76 (1857)]:—’Twas this flesh begot these pelican daughters.’ In the old play of King Leir, 1605, it is also used, but in a different sense:—‘I am as kind as is the pelican, That kills itself to save her young ones’ lives.’”
1832 cald2
cald2 = cald1 +
2896 pelican] Dr. Sherwen (apud ed. 1832): “It is not often that the grossest fables obtain currency without some foundation, or at least semblance of truth; and so by the pelican’s dropping upon its breast its lower bill to enable its young to take from its capacious pouch, lined with a fine flesh-coloured skin, this appearance is, on feeding them, given. Dr. Sherwen.”
1839 knt1 (nd)
knt1
2896 pelican] Knight (ed. [1839] nd): ”In architectural ornaments, or monumental sculptures, and in old books of fables and emblems, the pelican is always represented as an eagle. As an ornament in the ecclesiastical structures of the middle ages, it is of frequent occurrence, and is generally found as a pendant from the point in which the groinings of the roof intersect each other, or as a principal decoration in the carved seats of stalls. Of the former, there is a beautiful example in the church at Harfleur; and of the latter, there are several very good ones in St. Mary’s College, Winchester. Amongst old books of emblems there is one on which Sh. himself might have looked, containing the subjoined representation. It is entitled, ‘A Choice of Emblemes and other Devices, by Geffrey Whitney, 1586.’ Beneath the cut are the following lines:—‘The pelican, for to revive her younge, Doth pierce her brest, and geve them of her blood. Then searche your breste, and as you have with tonge With penne proceede to doe our countrie good: Your zeal is great, your learning is profounde, Then help our wantes, with that you doe abounde.’”
1856 hud1 (1851-6)
hud1 ≈ knt1 (incl. Whitney)without attribution
2896 pelican Hudson (ed. 1851-6): “The pelican is a fabulous bird, often referred to by the old poets for illustrations. It was also much used as a significant ornament in Mediæval church architecture, the pelican being represented as an eagle. And old book, entitled ‘A Choice of Emblems and other Devices, by Geffrey Whitney, 1586,’ contains a picture of an eagle on her nest, tearing open her breast to feed her young: beneath, are the following lines: ‘The pelican, for to revive her younge, Doth pierce her brest, and gave them of her blood: Then searche your brest, and, as you have with tongue, With penne proceede to doe our countrie good.’ H.”
1857 fieb
fieb: v1778 (Interlude analogue)
2896 Pelican] Fiebig (ed. 1857): “The Pelican is supposed to admit its young to suck blood from its breast. Steevens quotes from the ancient Interlude of Nature, no date: ‘Who taught the cok hys watche-houres to observe,/And syng of corage wyth shryll throte on hye?/Who taught the pellycan her tender hart to carve?/For she nolde suffer her byrdys to dye?’ It is almost needless to add that this account of the bird is entirely fabulous.”
1862 cham
cham: contra F1 + magenta underlined
2896 life-rendring pelican] Carruthers & Chambers (ed. 1862): ”The folio has politician—a ludicrous misprint. The fable that the pelican nourishes her young with her blood, was popular with the old writers and artists, who introduced it into books of emblems, as ‘a mystic lesson of maternal love.’”
1872 hud2
hud2 = hud1 minus “beneath . . . good.”
1872 cln1
cln1: Tro. //
2895 thus wide] Clark and Wright (ed. 1872): “With appropriate gesture. See Tro. (3.3.167 (2020)].”
cln1: sing1 (R2 , KL //s), Rushton
2896 pelican] Clark and Wright (ed. 1872): “The allusion is to the well-known fable of the pelican piercing her own breast to feed her young. In R2 [2.1.126 (770)], and Lr. [3.4.76 (1857)], the young pelicans are represented as piercing their mother’s breast to drink her blood, an illustration of filial impiety, not parental love. But Rushton, Shakespeare’s Euphuism, p. 9, quotes from Lyly’s Euphues and his England: ‘the Pelicane who stricketh blood out of hir owne bodye to do others good’ (p. 341, ed. Arber).”
1875 Ingleby
Ingleby: xref.
2896 life-rendring Pelican] Ingleby (1875, p.123): “If . . . we had but the first folio, we should be called upon to explain or amend the following passage in Hamlet [quotes 2895-7].
“Such a crux as ‘Life-rend’ring Politician’ would have been as appetising and entertaining as the last; and the game would naturally have been quickened by the fact, that when Hamlet was first indited Politician, occurring once, however, in this play (‘the Pate of a Politician,’ [5.1.79] (3270)], was an insolens verbum, which we now believe to have been first used by George Puttenham in 1589, if he were the author (which he probably was ) of The Arte of English Poesie. The misprint is an unusual expansion of the original word. It is most unlikely that Pelican (the word of the quarto editions) was (as some have asserted) a difficulty with the old compositor: on the contrary, we may be pretty sure that he set up Polician, and that a pedantic ‘reader’ of the house improved upon this, converting it into Politician.”
1877 neil
neil: Batman analogue
2896 life-rendring Pelican] Neil (ed. 1877): “’The pelican loveth too much her children. For when the children bee taught and begine to waxe hoare, they smite the father and mother in the face; wherefore the mother smiteth them againe and slaieth them. And the third daye the mother smiteth herselfe in her side, that the blood runneth out, and sheddeth that hot blood uppon the bodies of hir children. And by virtue of the bloode the birdes that were before dead, quicken againe’—Stephen Batman upon Bartholome his Booke De Proprietatibus Rerum, 1582, fol. 186b.”
1878 rlf1
rlf1: cald (Sherwen), Rushton (Lyly analogue); R2, Lr. //s
2896 Pelican] Rolfe (ed. 1878): “Caldecott quotes Dr. Sherwen: ‘By the pelican’s dropping upon its breast its lower bill, lined with a fine flesh-coloured skin, this appearance is, on feeding them, given.’ Rushton cites Lyly, Euphues: ‘he Pelicane, who stricketh bloud out of hir owne bodye to do others good.’ For other allusions to the same fable, see R2 [2.1.126 (770)] and Lr. [3.4.76 (1857)].”
1881 hud3
hud3 = hud2 minus “It was also . . . eagle.”
1885 macd
macd
2896 Pelican] MacDonald (ed. 1885): “Politician] A curious misprint: may we not suspect a somewhat dull joker among the compositors?”
1890 irv2
irv2: v1877 (Dr. Sherwen), cln1 (R3 , Lr. //s) + magenta underlined
2896 pelican]
Symons (Irving & Marshall, ed. 1890): “The belief in this curious fable about the
pelican was very wide-spread. Compare Basilius Valentinus, A Practick Treatise, together with the XII. Keys and Appendix of the Great Stone of the Ancient Philosophers, 1676: ‘And in its own Essence is so full of blood (he is speaking of ‘the Rose of our Masters . . . . wherewith all Metals wanting heat may be revived’), as is the
Pelican, when she wounded her own breast, and without prejudice to her body, nourisheth and feedeth many young ones with her own blood’ (p. 241). Dr. Sherwen (quoted by
Furness, Variorum Ed, p. 342) explains the origin of the superstition by ‘the pelican’s dropping upon its breast its lower bill to enable its young to take from its capacious pouch, lined with a fine flesh-coloured skin.’ In
R2 [2.1.126 (770], and King
Lr. [3.4.76 (1857)], Shakespeare uses the same illustration, but in a contrary sense.
F1 has a very comic misprint of Politician for pelican. I can fancy that, had not the Qq. preserved the true reading, commentators would have been found to defend the reading of F. 1 even on grounds of sentiment. Might not the politician become a beautiful illustration of the patriot, feeding his country with his own blood? It is still not too late for a German editor to take up the point.”
Here Symons takes a rare swipe at Shakespeare’s German editors/commentators.
1891 dtn
dtn: R2 //
2896 life-rendring Pelican] Deighton (ed. 1891): “from allowing its young to take fish out of its pouch, the pelican was popularly believed to nourish them on its life-blood; cp. R2 [2.1.126 (770)], ‘That blood already, like the pelican, Hast thou tapp’d out and drunkenly caroused.’”
1899 ard1
ard1: Browne analogue; ≈ rlf1 (R2, Lr. //s)
2896 pelican] Dowden (ed. 1899): “Sir Thomas Browne in Vulgar Errors, V, chap. i. discusses ‘the picture of the Pelican opening her breast with her bill, and feeding her young ones with the blood distilled from her.’ Allusions occur in R2. [2.1.126 (770)], and Lr.[ 3.4.76 (1857].”
1903 p&c
p&c ≈ fieb (Interlude of Nature analogue); ≈ sing (Leir analogue)
2896 Pelican] Porter & clarke (ed. 1903): “As the context shows and Q2 confirms, a misprint [in F1] for pelican, described in ‘Euphues and his England’ as a bird ‘that striketh bloud out of his owne bodye to do others good.’ The ancient ‘Interlude of Nature’ asks: ‘Who taught the pellycan her tender hart to carve? – For she nolde suffer hir byrdys to dye?’ And the old chronicle of ‘Leire’ (1605) has: Kind as is the pelican That kils itselfe to save her young ones lives’.”
1903 rlf3
rlf3 = rlf1 for Pelican
1904 ver
ver ≈ sing (R2, Lr. //s; King Leir and his Three Daughters analogue)
2896 the . . . rendring Pelican] Verity (ed. 1904): “alluding to the belief that the pelican feeds its young with blood from its own breast; cf. R2 [2.1.126([770)], and Lr. [3.4.76 (1857)], where the King calls Goneril and Regan his ‘pelican daughters’ because they have treated him much as the young pelicans are fabled to treat their parent.
“In the old play of King Leir and his Three Daughters (1594) Leir says of himself: ‘I am as kind as is the Pelican, That kils it selfe, to saue her young ones liues.’”
1931 crg1
crg1≈ dtn minus R2 //
2896 Pelican] Craig (ed. 1931): “reference to the belief that the pelican feeds its young with its own blood.”
1937 pen1
pen1 ≈ crg1
2896 Pelican] Harrison (ed. 1937): “The pelican was supposed to feed its young with its own blood.”
1939 kit2
kit2: Medwell, Mabbe, Edward III analogues; Lauchert
2896 Pelican] Kittredge (ed. 1939): “The mother pelican was supposed to draw blood from her own breast to feed her young. Cf. Henry Medwell, Nature (ed. Brandl, Quellen, p. 76): ‘Who taught the pellican her tender hart to carue For she nolde suffer her byrdys to dye;’ Mabbe, Celestina (ed. Tudor Translations, pp. 89, 90): ‘The Pellicane, with her beake breaketh up her owne brest, that she may give her very bowels and intrals to her young ones to eat’; Edward III, iii, 110-113 (ed. Brooke, Shakespeare Apocrypha, p. 90): ‘A Pellican, my Lord, Wounding her bosome with her crooked beak, That so her young ones may be fed With drops of blood that issue from her hart.’ See Lauchert, Geschichte des Physiologus, 1889, pp. 8, 169-171, 211.”
1942 n&h
n&h ≈ crg1
2896 pelican] Neilson & Hill (ed. 1942): “The female pelican was believed to feed its own blood to its young.”
1957 pel1
pel1 ≈ n&h
2896 life-rend’ring] Farnham (ed. 1957): “yielding (because the mother pelican supposedly took blood from her breast with her bill to feed her young).”
1958 mun
mun ≈ crg1 + magenta underlined
2896 Pelican,] Munro (ed. 1958): “The passage refers to the fable that the Pelican fed her young from the blood of her own breast. See Phipson, 285; Phin, 211 f.”
1974 evns1
evns1 ≈ crg1
2896 Pelican] Evans (ed. 1974): “the female pelican was believed to draw blood from her own breast to nourish her young.”
1980 pen2
pen2 ≈ evns1 + magenta underlined
2896 life-rendring] Spencer (ed. 1980): “giving life to its young. The pelican was supposed to feed its young with the blood that flowed from self-inflicted wounds upon its breast. No one, as far as I can discover, has yet suggested that Laertes, with his arms stretched out in the form of a cross and with the blood flowing from this wounded breast, is a Christ figure. Yet the religious metaphor seems clear: Laertes’s image of himself feeding his father’s friends with his own blood is offensive bombast, typical of the man.”
1982 ard2
ard2
2896 kind] Jenkins (ed. 1982): “showing natural feeling for its ‘kind’.”
ard2 ≈ evns1; ≈ ard1 (Lr., R2 //); xref.
2896 pelican] Jenkins (ed. 1982): “In traditional fable the pelican feeds its young from its own breast, in some versions reviving them from seeming death (cf. life-rend’ring). According as it applied to parent or child the same fable may illustrate self-sacrifice or [Lr 3.4.76 (1857)]; R2 [2.1.126 (770)] heartlessness. The extravagance of the image here is no doubt meant to characterize Laertes’s ‘emphasis’ and ‘rant’ (cf. [3450, 3481]).”
1984 chal
chal ≈ evns1
2896 Pelican] Wilkes (ed. 1984): “believed to feed its young with blood from its own breast.”
1988 bev2
bev2 ≈ chal
2896 Pelican] Bevington (ed. 1988): “(Refers to the belief that the female pelican fed its young with its own blood).”
1993 dent
dent ≈ bev2 + magenta underlined
2896 life rendring Pelican] Andrews (ed. 1993): “Laertes alludes to the bestiary fable about the mother Pelican who, in order to preserve her starving offspring, feeds them blood or her own breast. An emblem of self-sacrifice, the Pelican was a popular medieval symbol for a Christ-like ruler’s devotion to the well-being of his commonwealth.”
2006 ard3q2
ard3q2
2896-7 kind. . . blood] Thompson & Taylor (ed. 2006): “The pelican was supposed to pierce its own breast with its bill and feed its young on its own blood.”
2896