Shakespeare and Textual Theory

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There is no Shakespeare without text. Yet readers often do not realize that the words in the book they hold, like the dialogue they hear from the stage, has been revised, augmented and emended since Shakespeares lifetime. An essential resource for the history of Shakespeare on the page, Shakespeare and Textual Theory traces the explanatory underpinnings of these changes through the centuries. After providing an introduction to early modern printing practices, Suzanne Gossett describes the original quartos and folios as well as the first collected editions. Subsequent sections summarize the work of the New Bibliographers and the radical challenge to their technical analysis posed by poststructuralist theory, which undermined the presumed stability of author and text. Shakespeare and Textual Theory presents a balanced view of the current theoretical debates, which include the nature of the surviving texts we call Shakespeares; the relationship of the author Shakespeare and of authorial intentions to any of these texts; the extent and nature of Shakespeares collaboration with others; and the best or most desirable way to present the texts - in editions or performances. The book is illustrated throughout with examples showing how theoretical decisions affect the text of Shakespeares plays, and case studies of Hamlet and Pericles demonstrate how different theories complicate both text and meaning, whether a play survives in one version or several. The conclusion summarizes the many ways in which beliefs about Shakespeares texts have changed over the centuries.

Author Bio

Suzanne Gossett is Professor Emerita of English at Loyola University Chicago, USA. Her publications include essays on theatrical collaboration, Shakespeares late plays, and textual editing. She is a General Textual Editor of the Norton Shakespeare, 3rd edition, and a General Editor of Arden Early Modern Drama. She has edited many plays by Shakespeare and his contemporaries, including Pericles and Alls Well That Ends Well for the Arden Shakespeare, Middletons A Fair Quarrel for the Collected Middleton, and Beaumont and Fletchers Philaster for Arden Early Modern Drama. She is a past president of the Shakespeare Association of America and, together with Dympna Callaghan, she edited Shakespeare in Our Time in honor of the 2016 anniversary year.