Page images
PDF
EPUB

*

*

24. Much-ado about Nothing, 1600. 25. As you like it, 1600. 26. Merry Wives of Windfor, 1601. 27. King Henry VIII. 1601. 28. Life and Death of Lord Cromwell, 1602. 29. Troilus and Creffida, 1602. 30. * Meafure for Meafure, 1603. 31. Cymbeline, 1604. * 32. The London Prodigal, 1605. 33. King Lear, 1605. 24. *Macbeth, 1606. 35. The Taming of the Shrew, 1606. 36. Julius Cæfar, 1607. 37. A Yorkshire Tragedy, 1608. 38. * Anthony and Cleopatra, 1608. 39. Coriolanus, 1609. 1610. 41. Othello, 1611.

43.

Twelfth Night, 1614.'

*

40. Timon of Athens, * 42. The Tempeft, 1612.

We must not follow this ingenious Writer through every part of his elaborate enquiry,-in which we find much curious criticifm interfperfed with a number of entertaining anecdotes:but we cannot take our leave of Mr. Malone, without prefenting a fpecimen or two of his manner of treating the fubject. We fhall produce his account of Titus Andronicus and Macbeth.

In what year our Author began to write for the stage, or which was his first performance, has not been hitherto ascertained. And indeed we have fo few lights to direct our enquiries, that any speculation on this fubject may appear an idle expence of time. But the method which has been already marked out, requires that fuch facts fhould be mentioned as may serve in any manner to elucidate these points.

Shakspeare was born on the 23d of April 1564, and was probably married in, or before September 1582; his eldeft daughter Sufanna having been baptifed on the 26th of May 1583. At what time he left Warwickshire, or was firft employed in the play-house, tradition doth not inform us. However, as his fon Samuel and his daughter Judith were baptifed at Stratford Feb. 2, 1584-5, we may prefume that he had not left the country at that time.

He could not have wanted an eafy introduction to the theatre, for Thomas Green, a celebrated comedian, was his townsman, and, probably, his relation; and Michael Drayton was likewife born in Warwickshire: the latter was nearly of his own age, and both were in fome degree of reputation soon after the year 1590: If I were to indulge a conjecture, the middle of the year 1591 I should name as the era when our Author commenced a writer for the stage; at which time he was somewhat more than twenty-feven years of age. The reasons that induce me to fix on that period are thefe: In Webbe's Difcourfe of English Poetry, published in 1586, we meet with the names of moft of the celebrated poets of that time, particularly thofe of George Whetstone and Antony Munday, who were dramatic writers; but we find no trace of our Author, or any of his

C 2

works.

works. Three years afterwards Puttenham printed his Art of English Poefy; and in that work alfo we look in vain for the name of Shakspeare. Sir John Harrington, in his Apologic for Poetry, prefixed to the Tranflation of Ariofto (which was entered in the Stationers' books, Feb. 26, 1590-1, in which year it was printed), takes occafion to speak of the theatre, and mentions fome of the celebrated dramas of that time; but fays not a word of Shakspeare or any of his plays. If even Love's Labour Loft had then appeared, which was probably his firft dramatic compofition, is it imaginable that Harrington fhould have mentioned the Cambridge Pedantius, and The Play of the Cards (which laft he tells us was a London comedy), and have paffed by, unnoticed, the new prodigy of the dramatic world?

However, that Shakspeare had commenced a writer for the ftage, and even excited the jealoufy of his contemporaries, before Sept. 1592, is now decifively proved by a paffage, extracted by Mr. Tyrwhitt from Robert Greene's Groatsworth of Wit bought with a Million of Repentance*, in which there is an evident allufion to our Author's name, as well as to one of his plays.

[ocr errors]

The paffage to which this obfervation refers is too curious to be omitted; and we fhall present our Readers with Mr. Tyrwhitt's own account of it. Though the objections which have been raised to the genuineness of the three plays of Henry VIth have been fully confidered and answered by Dr. Johnfon, it may not be amifs to add here, from a contemporary writer, a paffage which not only points at Shakspeare as the author of them, but alfo fhews, that however meanly we may now think of them, in comparifon with his later productions, they had, at the time of their appearance, a fufficient degree of excellence to alarm the jealoufy of the older play-wrights. The paffage, to which I refer, is in a pamphlet entitled Greene's Great faworth of Witte, fuppofed to have been written by that voluminous author Robert Greene, M. A. and faid in the title page to be publifhed at his dying request; probably about 1592. The conclufion of this piece is an addrefs to his brother-poets, to diffuade them from writing any more for the ftage, on account of the ill-treatment which they were used to receive from the players. "Trust them not (fays he), for there is an upftart crow beautified with our feathers, that with his Tygres Head wrapt in a Player's Hyde, fuppofes that he is as well able to bombafte out a blancke verfe as the best of you; and being an abfolute Johannes Fac-totum, is in his own conceit the only SHAKE SCENE in the countrey." There can be no doubt, I think, that Shakspeare is alluded to by the expreffion Shake-fcene, or that his Tygres Head wrapt in a Player's Hyde is a parody upon the following line of York's fpeech to Margaret, in Third Part of Henry VI. Act I. Scene 4th.

"Oh Tygres Heart wrapt in a Woman's Hide !"

[Vol. vi. p. 566.]

[ocr errors]

At what time foever he became acquainted with the theatre, we may prefume that he had not compofed his first play long before it was acted; for being early encumbered with a young family, and not in very affluent circumstances, it is improbable that he should have fuffered it to lie in his closet, without endeavouring to derive from it fome profit; and in the miferable ftate of the drama in those days, the meaneft of his genuine plays must have been a valuable acquifition, and would hardly, have been refufed by any of the managers of our ancient

theatres.

• Titus Andronicus appears to have been acted before any other play attributed to Shakspeare: and, therefore, as it hath been admitted into all the editions of his works, whoever might have been the writer of it, it is entitled to the first place in this general lift of his dramas. From Ben Jonfon's induction to Bartholomew Fair 1614, we learn that Andronicus had been exhibited twenty-five or thirty years before; that is, at the lowest computation, in 1589: or, taking a middle period (which is perhaps more juft), in 1587. In our Author's dedication of Venus and Adonis to lord Southampton, in 1593, he tells us, as Mr. Steevens hath obferved, that that poem was "the firft Heir of his Invention," and if we were fure that it was published immediately, or foon after it was written, it would at once prove Titus Andronicus not to be the production of Shakspeare, and nearly ascertain the time when he commenced a dramatic wri

But we do not know what interval might have elapfed between the compofition and the publication of that poem. There is indeed a paffage in the dedication already mentioned; which, if there were not fuch decifive evidence on the other fide, might induce us to think that he had not written in 1593 any piece of more dignity than a love-poem; or at leaft any on which he himself fet a value. "If (fays he to his noble patron) your honour, feem but pleafed, I account myfelf highly praised; and vow to take advantage of all idle hours till I have honoured with fome graver labour."

you

A book entitled "A Noble Roman Hiflory of Titus Andronicus" (without any Author's name) was entered at Stationers Hall, Feb. 6, 1593-4. This I fuppofe to have been the play as it was printed in that year, and acted (according to Langbaine, who alone appears to have feen the first edition) by the fervants of the earls of Pembroke, Derby, and Effex.

'Mr. Pope thought that Titus Andronicus was not written by Shakspeare; becaufe Ben Jonfon ipoke flightingly of it while Shakspeare was yet living. This argument perhaps will not bear a very strict examination. If it were allowed to have any validity, many of our Author's genuine productions must be excluded from his works; for Ben has ridiculed feveral of his

[blocks in formation]

dramas in the fame piece in which he hath mentioned Andronicus with contempt.

It has been faid, that Francis Meres, who, in 1598, enumerated this among our Author's plays, might have been misled by a title page: but we may prefume, that he was informed, or deceived, by fome other means; for Shakspeare's name is not in the title-page of that in 1611; and therefore we may conclude, it was not in the title-page of the edition of 1594, of which the other was probably a re-impreflion.

However (notwithstanding the authority of Meres), the high antiquity of the piece, its entry on the Stationers books, without the name of the writer, the regularity of the verfification, the diffimilitude of the ftyle from that of thofe plays which were undoubtedly compofed by our Author, and the tradition mentioned by Ravenfcroft, at a period when some of his contemporaries had not been long dead [viz. "that he had been told by fome, anciently converfant with the stage, that Andronicus was not originally Shakspeare's, but brought by a private author to be acted, and that he only gave some maftertouches to one or two of the principal parts or characters.”]— thefe circumstances render it highly improbable, that this play fhould have been the compofition of Shakspeare.'

Thefe remarks are acute and judicious, and conclude much against the authenticity of this play and yet, in fpite of evidence internal and external, a certain painful collator of particles and commas hath, through an old pair of fpectacles, which Tom Hearne had thrown afide as good for nothing, difcovered beauties and excellencies in Titus Andronicus, which had hitherto been invisible to mortal fight. On this wonderful difcovery, Mr. Malone indulges himself in a little pleasantry: for which we refer to the book.

Concerning the date of Macbeth, Mr. Malone offers the following ingenious conjectures.

From a book entitled Rex Platonicus, cited by Dr. Farmer, we learn, that King James, when he vifited Oxford in 1605, was addreffed by three ftudents of St. John's College, who perfonated the three Weird Sifters; and recited a fhort dramatic poem, founded on the prediction of thofe Sybils (as the Author calls them), relative to Banquo, and Macbeth.

Dr. Farmer is of opinion, that this little piece preceded Shakspeare's play; a fuppofition which is ftrengthened by the filence of the Author of Rex Platonicus, who, if Macbeth had then appeared on the ftage, would probably have mentioned fomething of it. It fhould likewife be remembered, that there fubfifted, at that time, a fpirit of oppofition between the regular players and the academics of the two Universities; the latter of whom frequently acted plays both in Latin and English, and

feem

feem to have piqued themselves on the fuperiority of their exhibitions to thofe of the eftablished theatres. Wishing, probably, to manifeft this fuperiority to the Royal Pedant, it is not likely, that they would chufe for a collegiate interlude, a fubject which had already appeared on the public ftage, with all the embellishments that the magic hand of Shakspeare could beftow.

This tragedy contains an allufion to the union of the three kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland, under one fovereign, and alfo, to the cure of the King's-Evil by the Royal touch [A&t IV. Scene I, II.]; but in what year that pretended power was affumed by King James I. is uncertain. Macbeth was not entered on the Stationers books, nor printed, till 1623.

At the time when Macbeth was fuppofed to have been written, the fubject, it is probable, was confidered as a topic the most likely to conciliate the favour of the court. In the additions to Warner's Albion's England, which were firft printed in 1606, the ftory of the Three Fairies or Weird Elves, as he calls them, is fhortly told; and King James's defcent from Banquo carefully deduced.

Ben Jonfon, a few years afterwards, paid his court to his Majefty, by his Masque of Queens, prefented at Whitehall, Feb. 12, 1609, in which he hath given a minute detail of all the magic rites that are recorded by King James, in his book of Demonologie, or by any other author ancient or modern.

'Mr. Steevens hath lately difcovered a MS. play, entitled the WITCH, written by Thomas Middleton, which renders it queftionable, whether Shakspeare was not indebted to that author for the first hint of the magic introduced in this tragedy. -The fongs beginning Come away, &c. and Black fpirits, &c. being found at full length in Middleton's play, while only the two first words of them are printed in Macbeth, favour the fuppofition, that Middleton's piece preceded that of Shakspeare, the latter, it should feem, thinking it unneceffary to fet down verses which were probably well known, and perhaps then in the poffeffion of the managers of the Globe Theatre. The high reputation of Shakspeare's performances likewife ftrengthens this conjecture; for it is very improbable, that Middleton, or any other poet of that time, fhould have ventured into those regions of fiction, in which our Author had already expatiated.' Mr. Steevens hath produced fome curious extracts from this old play, which, we are informed, will be published entire, for the fatisfaction of the intelligent readers of Shakspeare.'

By the very numerous quotations from old plays, ballads, hiftories, and romances, which Mr. Steevens hath produced, to illuftrate fome obfcure paffages in Shakspeare, a hafty and fuperficial critic might be tempted to question his peculiar, and almoft unrivalled claim to originality; or if he were not so prefumptuous

C4

« PreviousContinue »