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Foul Papers, Compositor B, and the Speech-Prefixes
Of All's Well that Ends Well
by
Fredson Bowers
About All's Well that Ends Well Sir Walter Greg wrote, "There can, of course, be no doubt that behind F lie the author's foul papers."[1] This conclusion was based in some part on the preservation of what Greg took to be authorial stage-directions and even of a memorandum like 'Parolles and Lafew stay behind, commenting of this wedding' (I.iii [TLN 1089-90]), various inadequate entrance directions and numerous omitted exits, but chiefly the wide variety of designations in the speech-prefixes for the Countess, Bertram, the two French Lords, and in part for Lafeu. Greg considered but rejected the possibility that some intermediary agent might have come between Jaggard's compositors and Shakespeare's holograph papers. He remarked, it is true, that "Some long dashes in the printed text and some broken lines suggest cuts or alterations, and in occasional inconsequences and contradictions and in imperfectly assimilated chunks of prose it is easy to find evidence of botching. No Shakespearian spellings have been noted and the text is in worse form than we should expect from Jaggard's compositors working on an autograph manuscript."[2]
Obviously Greg is right that Shakespeare's foul papers lie behind this play. Whether they were holograph or had been literally transcribed is basically undemonstrable but the available evidence suggests strongly that the play was set direct from a manuscript in Shakespeare's autograph. J. Dover Wilson's evidence in the New Cambridge edition (pp. 103 ff.) for transcription is as faulty as his evidence for a late revision of an early play by another hand, and it can be safely disregarded. In every respect the textual difficulties and anomalies are consistent with those to be expected from compositors tackling a manuscript that could be called 'working papers.' The manuscript contained at least one revised passage, several additions, and very likely a quantity of verbal alteration whether during or after inscription. All evidence that can be reconstructed for non-prompt theatrical transcripts such as lie behind the Folio texts of Julius Caesar and Twelfth Night, for example, indicates that they were designed to normalize just such irregularities as the highly variable forms of speech-prefixes that are preserved in All's Well.[4] That anything approaching 'Shakespearian spellings' are hidden by the overlaid texture of the three Folio compositors is not surprising as late as 1623. It is easier to believe in the concealment of Shakespeare's orthographical
In addition to the now discarded hypothesis of a scribal transcript, the shadow of a book-keeper's markings interfering with the text, possibly in a serious manner, has hung over this play. Sir Edmund Chambers thought that "the book-keeper has possibly added the letters G. and E. to the 1. and 2. by which the author discriminated the brothers Dumain, who are indifferently described . . . as Lords, Captains, or Frenchmen, and are apparently also the Gentlemen of iii.2. The Letters may indicate the names of actors; Gough and Ecclestone have been guessed at."[5] Again, G. K. Hunter analyzing the evidence points out the weaknesses of the hypothesis for intervention and argues plausibly that the initials are Shakespeare's own means of identification.[6] The old-fashioned idea that a book-keeper would annotate Shakespeare's foul papers and cut them in preparation for direct transcription into a prompt-book is inherently improbable for plays of this, or perhaps any date, instead of working over a clean intermediate transcript made for the purpose; moreover, the evidence for cutting and other such preparation is weak in the extreme. However, it seems likely that the manuscript received a minimal 'editing' for publication. If Jaggard's copy was indeed the working papers, as seems to be assured, it is not certain that the act division would have been written in by Shakespeare. Since a compositorial division of the acts, given the order of printing the pages, is quite impossible to argue for, the implication follows that whoever prepared the
As indicative of working papers, the stage-directions betray the author's hand not only in their occasional descriptive cast, despite their generally businesslike nature, but also in their failure always to agree with the text. Description is present in the much-discussed 'memorandum' in II.iii Parolles and Lafew stay behind, commenting of this wedding (1089-90)[7] and in such directions as II.i (594-596) Enter the King with divers yong Lords, taking leave for the Florentine warre . . ., the odd III.vi (1730-31) Enter Count Rossillion and the Frenchmen, as at first,[8] or IV.ii (2016-17) Enter Bertram and the Maide called Diana.[9] Some directions are precise about minor persons, such as V.i (2592-93) Enter Hellen, Widdow, and Diana, with two Attendants, but some are vague about characters who would need to be specified in the prompt-book, as
Various directions do not agree with the text and would need to be set right in any preparation of the prompt-book. In II.iii (944) the direction reads Enter 3 or 4 Lords, but the following dialogue requires four lords for Helena to pass over before she chooses Bertram. According to a possible interpretation of Helena's 'Where are my other men?' in II.iv (1366), the Clown or some other attendant should have been designated as entering with her at 1325 although she alone is mentioned.[10] The familiar difficulty of the direction in III.i (1446-47) Enter Hellen and two Gentlemen when these are in facts Lords G and E (assigned the speech-prefixes French G. and French E.) needs no remark here. In IV.iii (2181) the text reads Enter a Messenger, but this is Bertram's servant who had accompanied him from Paris to Florence (1491-92, and the prefix Ser. at 2183) and he has no function as a messenger. In V.iii (2876) Parolles is listed in the entrance direction with the Widow and Diana but he does not in fact appear until his properly noted entrance at 2960. At least sixteen exits are not marked, only four of these at the ends of scenes where the omission is of no great concern. No directions are present for
Various internal inconsistencies exist that might or might not have been adjusted on review. The time scheme by no means permits Helena to have arrived in Florence on her way to Saint Jacques, to have performed the bed trick that very night, but on the same night to be reported dead at Saint Jacques as testified by the Rector's report. Lords G and E arrived in Florence in III.i and in III.ii appear in Rousillon on their way back to Florence from a visit to Paris. In Rousillon they receive a letter from the Countess to Bertram. Inexplicably the letter is not delivered when they meet Bertram in Florence and plan the exposure of Parolles; and this letter is in fact not mentioned as delivered until IV.iii (2108-11) and then on some vague occasion difficult to reconstruct. It is at least arguable that the gentle Astringer in V.i (2601) to whom Helena delivers a letter to the King disappears from the plot thereafter, for it is reasonably clear that the Gentleman in V.iii who delivers Diana's petition to the King at 2842 is not he, and this petition seems to have taken the place of Helena's letter which so far as we know is never received by the King. In V.iii (2924-25) the King speaks to Diana, 'Me thought you saide | You saw one heere in Court could witnesse it' (her intimacy with Bertram), to which Diana responds, 'I did my Lord'; but she has said nothing of the sort.[11] Whether or not these anomalies would have been worked over before production—and they are no more than the normal Shakespearean carelessnesses also observable in plays in copy more highly developed for the theater—the directions would have needed sharpening, correction, and addition for acting, and the faulty speech-prefixes at 615, 2190, 2233, and between 2227 and 2384 (perhaps even to 2417 in the manuscript) would have required correction. And Helen's broken speech at 169 might have been observed and a transition introduced.
The variable speech-prefixes constitute the chief evidence, perhaps, for the belief that All's Well that Ends Well was set from Shakespeare's working papers. Bertram's prefixes may be forms of Rossillion or of Bertram, and once he is Count. The Countess may be Mother, Countess, Old Countess, Lady, or Old Lady. Lafeu is generally Lafew but in II.i he starts as Lord Lafew though then changing to Lafew; and in III.iii he is Old Lafew, once Old Lord (perhaps a misreading of an abbreviation for Old Lafew), but before the end of the scene he has reverted to Lafew.
McKerrow suggested that in Romeo and Juliet a case could be made for some variation in prefixes to derive from the function of a character in a given scene: for example, Lady Capulet could be Mother in relation to Juliet, Wife in relation to her husband, and Lady Capulet as mistress of her household.[12] But in All's Well Shakespeare's variety of nomenclature both within stage-directions and speech-prefixes seems to have resulted more from writing the scenes at different times than from any immediate association of the descriptive prefix with the function of the character. It is true, however, that the First Soldier's prefix changes within IV.1 to Interpreter as he assumes his new function and that in III.vi, IV.i, IV.iii (but not in III.i) the two French Lords in their military capacity become Captain G and Captain E though reverting to Lords in V.ii back at court. It is also true that in I.i the Countess for the only time is Mother in direction and in prefixes, reflecting her chief function in the scene in relation to Bertram. But later there is nothing in the scenes in which she appears as Lady or as Old Lady to warrant any functional difference from the usual Countesse; nor indeed do any of Lafeu's functions account for his variations between Lafew, Lord Lafew, and Old Lafew. The best case, then, is for the Countess as Mother in the opening scene. What might seem to be an even stronger case for the shift of the Frenchmen to Captain is made slightly uncertain, perhaps, by some question whether originally Shakespeare had intended these military characters to be the two Lords.
Any study of the compositorial treatment of speech-prefixes with a view to determining what specific forms, or variations, of prefixes were present in the manuscript copy, and what were compositorial and without authority, must take account of two somewhat associated guidelines. The first is that one may assume (other evidence wanting) that a dramatist wrote his working papers in a generally seriatim order of scenes, or if the manuscript were not holograph that a scribe would certainly copy the sheets in order. Thus authorial forms and variations in prefixes should be roughly chronological in their positions. However, when the
That compositors (including Compositor B) could be influenced by copy even in minor matters of the abbreviation of prefixes was demonstrated some years ago by Professor Brents Stirling, who most ingeniously identified not only the revised section of the duplicate announcement of Portia's death in Julius Caesar IV.iii but also a revised section, or addition, in the conspirators' first conference in II.i with Brutus.[13] His evidence was exact. Throughout the play both Compositors A and B invariably held to the expanded prefix Cassi. for Cassius. But in these two sections the form changes to Cass. for Compositor A and Cas. for Compositor B. The inevitable inference is that the standard form of prefix in the underlying scribal manuscript had been carefully chosen as Cassi. in order to distinguish him from Cœs. (readily confused with Cas.) and from Cask. for Casca, but that the revised parts of the manuscript in a different hand more carelessly read Cas. or Cass.[14] and that this shorter form was faithfully followed by the two compositors.
The bibliographical evidence based on the order of typesetting is the same as that which proves useful in All's Well. The first page of Julius Caesar that Compositor A set was sig. kk3v in which at TLN 711 Cassius by name heads a group entrance and, speaking immediately at
Compositor B worked on sig. kk4r while A was setting kk3v, this also being B's first introduction to the play. No entrance for Cassius is on this page; hence B must have followed copy Cas. or Cass. when he set Cass. as the prefix in text that continued II.i after A's catchword on kk3v. Hence in copy taken to be in the same revised form as A's, B set the same shorter form of the prefix. When in his order of setting B next encountered Cassius it was in III.i on kk5v where Cassius is part of a group entrance opening the scene and speaks first a dozen lines later, at 1215, where he is Cassi. and so continues until the second revision in the play in IV.iii. In this latter scene the explanation of strangeness, as in II.i, will not work, for B set sig. ll3v (within IV.iii) with the prefix Cassi., continued with the same tag on ll4r (which also began V.i), and on ll4v. He next set ll3r. In the first column the regular prefix is Cassi, but after the entrance of the Poet (2108) a few lines down in column b the first prefix in the column shifts to Cas. (Cass. once at 2159), this text containing the revised version of the announcement of Portia's death. When on ll3v (set earlier) the regular form of the manuscript returns, containing the undeleted second announcement, the prefix is the usual Cassi. always set from this manuscript. Between the two columns on ll3r no question could have arisen in B's mind that he was dealing with a different character from the familiar Cassius. Hence at this point B must have followed copy in the shorter form of the prefix, influenced by the variant form in a part of the manuscript written in a different hand even though this meant his abandoning the established Cassi. prefix. On kk3v-4r the fidelity in both compositors is readily explained by the strangeness of the character and the copy-prefix at the start of typesetting, but not on ll3r apparently.
This example illustrates that Compositor B—at least on the evidence of Julius Caesar—may be studied in All's Well with some general confidence that he would not be likely to go against copy except perhaps in mechanical matters of abbreviation to justify a line or, possibly, in the establishment of a favorite short form of the same prefix instead of a longer form.
Evidence for compositorial fidelity to copy may be found, in fact, on
On at least one observable occasion a compositor (in this case B) was influenced, seemingly, by the preliminary stage-direction to go against what was probably the copy-prefix. In III.ii (sig. X1) the opening direction reads Enter Countesse and Clowne and the initial prefix (1402) is Count., followed by a second Count. (1406); but beginning with 1422 she is Lad. and so continues in the shortened form La. for the rest of the scene. Because Lady as prefix had already appeared (following Countesse
The possibility must be examined, also, whether in V.iii the opening direction could have influenced the following speech-prefixes. In this direction on sig. X6 the Countess is old Lady (2695), the same identification that had appeared in a direction in IV.v at 2481 on sig. X5, followed by the speech-prefixes La. On X6 in V.iii after the direction at 2695 she speaks soon after at 2701 and is given the prefix Old La. On X6v at 2799 (no further direction intervening) and again at 2872 the same prefix appears. At first sight one could take it that the distance is short enough so that the prefix at 2701 could have influenced that at 2799 and that, in turn, have affected 2872. However, between X6r and X6v Compositor B had withdrawn from the Folio to set some amount of text in another book, the extent of which is unknown. It is only natural to believe that B would probably not have kept in mind during this interval what in fact was a unique prefix for the Countess. Obviously, it is simpler to conjecture that the reason why B set Old La. when he returned to X6v after an interval between it and X6r was that he was following copy. No exception could be taken to this conclusion were it not that the Countess' only remaining speech, which occurs at 2919 in sig. Y1, has the prefix Coun., which must almost certainly be a copy-form.[19] Whether this variant is an authorial aberration or whether Coun. had been the copy-prefix earlier in the scene on X6 and X6v, changed by Compositor B, is a question not to be tackled in isolation, for another anomaly in speech-prefixes
Whether by accident or design, despite the widely varying identifications of Bertram in the stage-directions as Count Rossillion, Rossillion, Count, and Bertram, Compositor B throughout quire X (1375-2913) with but one exception invariably assigns him the prefix Bertram, usually in the form Ber. This decision, if decision it were,[20] might even have been made somewhat earlier, since the common prefix begins, in fact, in II.v (1269-1370) on B's sig. V6v, where the direction is also Bertram. The history of this prefix is interesting. Printing of the play started with the two simultaneously set pages V3v (by Compositor D) and V4 (by Compositor C). Bertram does not appear on sig. V3v except in the stage-direction for II.i where he is confused by D as two characters, 'Count, Rosse', an error that indicates clearly the form of the abbreviation in the manuscript. Compositor C set twenty-three lines of type on V4 before he came to a speech by Bertram, which he prefixed as Rossill. twice (626, 630) before reducing it to Ross. (649) with one short Ros. in a tight line preceding it (637). Given the form of the manuscript abbreviation Rosse in the direction as interpreted by D when he subsequently came to complete his page V3v, one may readily conjecture that C's initial two settings of Rossill. could not have derived from the direction (if he had consulted it on the same sheet of manuscript) and hence that they reproduce copy.
Bertram does not appear in the two pages of the outer forme set by C and D. When after a delay Compositor B took over the exclusive setting of the play with V2:5v, he started with V2 but encountered Bertram for the first time on V5v where there was no stage-direction to give him a clue. Here the prefixes in the dialogue with the King are Ber. It would seem most probable that in these prefixes B was following copy, for he had no other hint as to Bertram's identity except within the text, and that he would change the Ross. prefix in the manuscript (if it had been so written) when he started Bertram's prefixes at 1005 because in 1003 the King had called him Bertram is scarcely credible. Only after completing V5v did B turn to V2v where for the first time in B's experience Bertram is so identified in a stage-direction (as Bertram at 262) and is given the prefixes Ber. again. Since Ber. had already occurred without identification on V5v, there is no reason to take it that B was doing any-thing but following copy on V2v. In the opening direction for II.iii on the next page V5 the form is Enter Count but the single prefix for Bertram on this page is Ros. (901), again presumably from copy since at this
Given this history it is difficult to explain the conflicting evidence in sigs. Y1 and Y1v (2914-3078) set in seriatim order in formes with pages of Twelfth Night after a considerable delay during which B had set various quires in the Histories. When he came to these pages B would long since have forgotten whatever forms of prefixes he had decided on earlier in the play. The text of Y1 starting with 2914 continues V.iii in mid-speech. On X6v, as throughout quire X, the sole prefix form had been Ber. with the exception of an aberrant Count. at 2412 on X5 in IV.iii.[21] However, in this continuous text abruptly on Y1 at 2930, followed at 3046 on Y1v, the prefixes change to Ros. Since Ros. had been one of the two prefixes for Bertram in quire V, the normal inference would be that starting in quire V and continuing in quire X Compositor B had got in the habit of setting Ber. for Bertram regardless of the copy-prefix, which was perhaps a mixture of Ber. and Ross. according to scene. General evidence suggests that when a compositor started to set a new play on $3v:4, usually well within the text, he was likely to follow the copy-prefixes at least until the characters were established in his mind. If B had behaved in the same manner, on returning as something of a stranger to complete the play after the lapse of several weeks, he also would have been likely to follow copy. This appears to be the only reasonable explanation for the change in prefix from Ber. to Ros. in continuous text but separated into two distinct bibliographical units.[22]
The case would be comparatively simple, therefore, were it not for another change in prefix. In this scene V.iii on X6 and X6v the few speeches by the Countess had been prefixed by Old La., a descriptive
In such a dilemma no certainty is possible since all evidence is wanting and only speculation can take its place. The one hard fact is that the prefixes on Y1 must be copy-forms since no consultation seems to have taken place with previously printed sheets. This being so, there are difficulties either in assuming that the shift to Ros. is significant but that to Coun. is not, or that both are significant. One possibility suggests itself which as a speculation would resolve the problem. We know from other evidence that when Shakespeare revised the text, as in I.iii between the entrance of Helena at 450 and the end of the discussion with the Countess about her status as daughter at 512, he could adopt different prefixes: the Countess is Cou. in the original scene but Old Cou. in the revision, for example. Correspondingly, when he left off writing a scene and returned to it at a later time, he might also adopt different prefixes, as conjectured to be the explanation for the shift in prefix from Old Laf. in II.iii to Laf. after the curious memorandum to himself that Shakespeare seems to have written, Parolles and Lafew stay behind, commenting of this wedding (1089-90), marking a break in the writing of the scene.[25] If such a break, or revision, appeared in V.iii, we should have a
In the order of setting, Lafeu is first encountered on V4, set by Compositor C, where he is L. Laf. twice at the foot of the first column (662, 664) after an entrance as Lafew, but he shifts to Laf. in the second column, more likely a compositorial than an authorial shortening, perhaps. He next appears, in the order of setting, on B's V5v where at 997 he is Ol. Lord. He does not speak again until 1091 after he has been named Lafew in the memorandum stage-direction at 1089-90, and then he is Laf. for the rest of the page and in all text thereafter. However, as set, after the switch on V5v from Ol. Laf. (Ol. Lord is apparently a misreading by B on his first setting of a Lafeu prefix) to Laf., B went on to V2v where at 262 Lafeu enters as Lafew but is mute. Sig. V5 follows, in which after the Lafew of the entrance at 892 the first speech at 893 is prefixed Ol. Laf., this form continuing on the page seventeen more times, the last at 991. Thus when, in the order of the manuscript although not of the setting, Ol. Laf. at 991 is followed by Ol. Lord at 997 on the next page, there can be no doubt of the copy-form in this scene between 893 and 997, especially since Ol. Laf. differs from the immediately preceding direction at 892.[27] However, when he shifts to Laf. later in the scene, signs exist that the difference was present in the copy and that the change at that point is not a case of arbitrary compositorial shortening. Some evidence is present that Shakespeare himself often used the shorter Laf. form as well as Ol. Laf. For instance, on V1v where B is cautiously following the copy-prefixes on the first page of the play, Lafeu is Laf. (11 ff.) although Lord Lafew in the opening direction. Moreover, the fact that, as in quire X, he remains Laf. in the bibliographically discrete pages Y1 and Y1v (set after a considerable delay from X) also suggests the copy-form there, especially
This is not the place to go into the intricacies of the prefixes for the two French Lords.[28] That the major distinctions in their forms such as 1. Lord G, Lord G, French G, and Captain G are authorial seems practically demonstrable since the stage-directions could have exercised small influence, usually identifying them merely as Frenchmen. It is at least arguable that Shakespeare's first intention was to distinguish them merely as 1. Lord and 2. Lord, for on their introduction in I.ii they are not identified among the divers Attendants (239) although speaking in the scene, nor are they for the second time identified among the divers yong Lords who are taking leave of the King in II.i (594), although again they are speakers. In I.ii on V2v set by B they are 1. Lo. G and 2. Lo. E except for the slip L. 2. E at 315. In II.i the first and only prefix set by Compositor D, on sig. V3v, is Lord G for G's first speech. Simultaneously, but setting from a sheet of the manuscript that very likely contained D's first prefix, Compositor C was continuing the scene with V4; in fact, his prefixes would have been set before D came to the start of II.i and G's first speech. Compositor C first set L. G but then 1 Lo. G and 2. Lo. E until in G's last speech (646) he is Lo. G. Both compositors, then, omitted the numerical designation in the initial prefix of their setting under circumstances that should indicate they were following copy both with and without the number, just as B must be assumed to have followed the manuscript in I.ii, set later. The numeral form with initial appears only once more, in the prefix I. Lord E in the first speech of IV.i (1913), uninfluenced by the immediately preceding stage-direction Enter one of the Frenchmen, although in the remainder of the scene he is Lo. E. Whatever the initials G and E signify (names, like George and Edward?), it is at least arguable that they were substitutes invented during the writing of the play for characters who had originally been denominated simply as 1. Lord and 2. Lord, the initials being added irregularly in the early scenes with or without displacement of the numerals. The 1. Lord example
There are three occurrences when the compositors copy what appears to be a manuscript repetition of a prefix within the same speech. The first of these is particularly significant because a change in the form of the repeated prefix appears to mark the beginning of a Shakespearean addition which accounts for the repetition. This occurs in I.iii at TLN 451 where after Helena's entrance at 450 the Countess' speech preceding the entrance continues without interruption but with a second prefix, changed in its form to Old Cou. from Cou. at 443, the start of the speech. This marks an addition from 451 (or 450) to 512 before the original text resumes with the prefixes Cou. at 513.[29]
However, the second and third examples appear to be related and they are troublesome. In II.ii the Clown has boasted that he has an answer to fit any question, and he begs the Countess to test him: 'Aske mee if I am a Courtier, it shall doe you no harme to learne' (859-860). To this the Countess returns, in a speech prefixed Lady., 'To be young againe if we could: I will bee a foole in question, hoping to bee the wiser by your answer.' With this speech Compositor C concludes sig. V4v and his stint in the play. The last word of the speech is divided 'an-|swer.' so that only the second syllable forms the last text-line of the column; then in the line below—the direction-line—C set the speech-prefix Lady. as the catchword. When after a delay in work on the Folio Compositor B took over the typesetting, he set sigs. V2, V5v, V2v, and only then came to V5 and the continuation of C's text. The first line on V5 is 'La. I pray you sir, are you a Courtier?' The temptation exists to suggest some bibliographical
The conjecture that nothing is missing here owing to faulty compositorial marking of copy at the page's end may be strengthened by the parallel case that occurs in II.iv on V6. Here Parolles has been worsted by the Clown in an exchange, and with affected tolerance remarks, 'Go too, thou art a wittie foole, I have found thee.' To this the Clown has two consecutive replies (1243-47) each prefixed by Clo. In the first he enquires, 'Did you finde me in your selfe sir, or were you taught to finde me?' In the second, immediately succeeding and with no intervening reply from Parolles, he adds (with repeated prefix), 'The search sir was profitable, and much Foole may you find in you, even to the worlds pleasure, and the encrease of laughter.' Editorial opinion has tended to conjecture a lost line or so by Parolles between the Clown's two speeches,[31]
The conclusions that may be drawn from this study would have more general interest if further investigation were to show that the characteristics of copy as reflected in the typesetting of this play could be paralleled elsewhere in the Folio, including other work by Compositor B. It is true that the copy for All's Well—if it were indeed Shakespeare's own foul papers as seems almost certain—is not of a kind commonly found in the Folio, for evidence is accumulating that Sir Walter Greg's frequent assignment of foul papers as Jaggard's copy has been too liberal. Indeed, insofar as the evidence of this text bears on other Folio plays, it is a natural inference that uniformity of speech-prefixes, especially, is more likely to indicate the smoothing effects of a scribe transcribing Shakespeare's papers than it does any substantial interference of the compositors with variable authorial copy, if that was what they were setting. The marked differences between the varied prefixes of All's Well and the uniform ones of such a play as Julius Caesar can represent only the distinction between authorial working papers and a scribal transcript.[32]
If in All's Well the evidence has been correctly interpreted for what the compositors did with their copy, the strongest indication is present that the compositors were completely conservative in the treatment of names and titles in the stage-directions and that copy was followed in these respects with fidelity. Similarly, in the speech-prefixes there is every
It is true that two levelling influences may occasionally be detected during the course of typesetting. The first is for the compositor to feel a slight tug toward setting prefixes in the form of the name or title in the immediately preceding stage-direction. In III.ii where the direction reads Countesse Compositor B, not Shakespeare, may have been responsible for the two immediately following prefixes of Count. before reverting to the copy's La. There are indications that in some part under the influence of copy, in some part affected by stage-directions, B came to set the prefix Ber. uniformly although the copy might have been a mixture of Ross. and Ber. Certainly on sig. X6v in V.iii this seems to be the best explanation for the appearance of Ber. as prefix at the foot of the second column although on the evidence of the continuation of the scene on sig. Y1 Shakespeare was likely to have written the prefixes as Ross. or Ros. after the entrance on X6v of the Widow and Diana. Nevertheless, Compositor B appears to have followed with fidelity the divagations of the prefixes for Lords G and E, and his interference with variants in more readily apprehensible characters is much less than might have been expected from a workman who on his record was likely in other respects to deal with his copy somewhat too firmly. Statistics about the incidence of his wanderings from copy in the text cannot be applied to directions and prefixes.
The second tendency associated with this minor drift toward uniformity is a general compositorial preference for short forms of prefixes over longer ones when some detail in the long one is not necessary for identification. For instance, in II.i after Enter Lafew Compositor C twice set L. Laf. before going over to the invariable short Laf. The shorter the prefix the fewer ems a compositor needs to set; but perhaps as important in setting dramatic verse, the fewer problems he may make for himself in justifying long lines. Yet the history of the number of times that long forms like 1. Lord G were set, or Ol. Laf., in All's Well indicates that author as well as compositor may be responsible for many shifts from long to short forms. Although in the order of typesetting B had composed II.iii with its Ol. Laf. prefixes after a Lafew direction, it seems probable that when later he set I.i in which the prefix is Laf. after the direction Lord Lafew, he could as readily have been following copy as not, given the care he seems to have shown elsewhere in the forms of this first scene.
Notes
The Shakespeare First Folio (1955), p. 353. Greg was writing in direct reference to J. Dover Wilson's early New Cambridge volume (1929), p. 103, which held that the corruption in the text "frequently suggests the carelessness of some hasty transcriber. Our notes will reveal a number of errors—verbal transpositions and the like—which seem easier to attribute to a copyist than to a compositor. . . . In any case, we can hardly doubt the existence of a hasty transcriber." This view is no longer held.
Ibid. In fact, the dashes seem to have nothing to do with any cuts or alterations, and the only broken line of consequence—Helena's 'Not my virginity yet:' (I.i [169])—is as assignable to an original defect or incomplete inscription in the manuscript as to a copyist (or compositor). The value of the evidence for the lack of 'Shakespearian spellings' is difficult to assess. It is appropriate to remark here, however, that analysis of the spelling by Compositors A and B of two inserts in Julius Caesar in a different hand from that of the regular manuscript has revealed little or nothing to indicate what was demonstrably a change in the copy except for different abbreviations in the speech-prefixes faithfully followed both by A and by B in the revised section of the duplicate announcement of Portia's death and in the first conference of Brutus and the conspirators, for which see Brents Stirling, "Julius Caesar in Revision," Shakespeare Quarterly, 13 (1962), 187-205. As for the errors in the text, Greg's point that these are more numerous than should be expected from compositors working on an autograph manuscript might be valid if the manuscript had been Shakespeare's fair copy (a doubtful assumption for any play); but if it were his 'foul papers,' then various errors could be expected owing to the difficulties of setting from a reworked draft manuscript.
Greg seems to be referring to J. Dover Wilson's early New Cambridge volume (1929), p. 103: "Here as there [Measure for Measure], for instance, the 'corruption frequently suggests the carelessness of some hasty transcriber' [footnote to p. 97 of the New Cambridge MM]. Our notes will reveal a number of errors—verbal transpositions and the like—which seem easier to attribute to a copyist than to a compositor. . . . In any case, we can hardly doubt the existence of a hasty transcriber." Wilson proved to be correct that the copy for Measure for Measure was a scribal transcript, since it was later established that the scribe Ralph Crane was responsible. But that Crane made any extra-hasty copy is not apparent; and it is quite definite that the parallels that Wilson saw between the printer's copy for the two plays are false, for Crane could have had nothing to do with All's Well. Greg's final point that some of the play's 'sententious fustian' might be attributed to a scribe is uncharacteristic of his usual sensible thinking and cannot be taken seriously.
The significance of these variable prefixes as evidence for foul-papers copy as against a transcript was first pointed out by R. B. McKerrow, "The Elizabethan Printer and Dramatic Manuscripts," R.E.S., 11 (1935), 459-465. His interpretation has never been seriously challenged.
William Shakespeare, 1 (1930), 450. Chambers continues that he suspects in the Gentleman astringer of V.i. that Shakespeare wrote 'Gentle<man> Usher' and that the book-keeper added over it the initial 'T' of an actor to create the misreading in the Folio. He also brings up the question (repeated by Greg from him) of the dashes at I.i (55) and I.iii (477), the two short lines at III.v (1650-51), and the abrupt change of subject at I.i (179) as possibly indicating cuts. If the dashes do indeed mark cuts (and there is no real evidence that they do), they could as readily be Shakespeare's as the book-keeper's. The short lines at 1650-51 are resolvable into regular pentameters. Only the break at 179 is evidence of possible disruption, but it could be authorial as well. In short, in these respects no need exists to conjecture interference with the text by a book-keeper.
New Arden, pp. xv-xvii. However, the present writer disagrees with Professor Hunter's assignments of error in these speech-prefixes, as will be illustrated below. The meaning of G. and of E. as identification devices is problematic. One might guess, however, that in Shakespeare's mind they could have referred to two Christian names for the characters (such as George and Edward), that is, if from the start Shakespeare had conceived of these two lords as brothers, something that we shall never know and perhaps a doubtful proposition to advance with any confidence.
All references are to the TLN (through-line-numbers) as marked in the Norton facsimile of the First Folio edited by C. J. K. Hinman (1968). The description of the printing is drawn from Hinman, The Printing and Proof-Reading of the First Folio of Shakespeare, 2 (1963), 457-470, 481-482. On the evidence then available, Dr. Hinman assigned sigs. V3 and V3v (pp. 233-234) to Compositor A, whereas I accept the attribution of these two pages to Compositor D made on more refined evidence by Trevor Howard-Hill, "The Compositors of Shakespeare's Folio Comedies," Studies in Bibliography, 26 (1973), 61-106.
The intention no doubt is to refer back to the scene of Bertram and the French Lords at II.i. There is no need to suppose that this direction was intended to cancel or to modify that calling them two Gentlemen at 1446.
The phrase the Maide called Diana may just possibly have some reference to a difficulty about her name while the play was being worked on. The rather pointless lines of IV.ii (2019-20) 'Ber. They told me that your name was Fontybell. | Dia. No my good Lord, Diana' that follow this direction may refer to some change of mind about Diana's name and even to some material cut or revised out of the manuscript as printed. The direction for III.v (1603-5) that first introduces Diana contains, in itself, a possible revisory problem: 'Enter old Widdow of Florence, her daughter, Violenta and Mariana, with other Citizens.' It is a toss-up whether Violenta is a ghost character (that she is not a mute is very likely shown by 1724 since the Matron is Mariana and the gentle Maide is presumably Diana) or whether the comma is misplaced and Diana was originally named Violenta.
At the end of II.iv when Bertram is bidding farewell to Helena, the Folio reads: 'Ber. I pray you stay not, but in hast to horse. | Hel. I shall not breake your bidding, good my Lord: | Where are my other men? Monsieur, farwell. Exit' (1364-66). Modern editors except for the New Arden follow Theobald ii in transposing the punctuation to read 'men, Monsieur?' and assigning the line as addressed by Bertram to Parolles, Bertram then continuing with 1367 which has his prefix Ber. However, in 1491 we learn that Bertram has traveled to Florence with Parolles and only one servant, and we have seen this servant at 2181-86. Thus it is not very likely that Bertram broke off his farewell to Helena in order to inquire of Parolles about 'my other men'. Indeed, the only defence of the emendation would be the two examples of an apparently misplaced insertion in IV.iii (2226, 2245) in which the beginning of one speech is appended to the end of the preceding. However, these come so close together as to seem to be special cases and they are not repeated elsewhere in the play so far as can be observed. Moreover, in both places the sense is quite obviously disrupted, something that is by no means true for Helena's speech once the difficulty of the 'other men' is solved by giving her an attendant to address, who should enter with her at 1325. The sequence of acquiescence to Bertram, the preparation for her departure, and a polite farewell to Parolles is so normal that emendation appears to be ill-advised, for it involves not only the transfer of the line to Bertram but also the radical alteration of its punctuation to conform to the changed assignment. In this respect, particularly, emendation requires more than the hypothesis that Compositor B mistook the position of a marginal addition. All that is needed to flesh out Helen's line is a mute attendant. The word 'other' seems to prevent a hypothesis that she could call the question off-stage.
This remark plus Helena's letter to the King, if delivered in secret, could lead to the fantasy that throughout V.iii the King knew all the facts, but the action says otherwise.
Given B's leaning toward maximally abbreviated forms of prefixes elsewhere, it could be argued that A's Cass. form was that of the copy, particularly since on one occasion B himself set a Cass. prefix. On the other hand, given the order of setting, this hypothesis requires B to have abbreviated to Cas. the Cass. of the manuscript on his very first setting of the prefix, with no guide in the directions as to the name of the character. (In All's Well the same sort of reduction may have occurred with B's setting of Ros. for possible copy Ross.) On the other hand, if Cas. were thought to be the copy-form, A's first Cass. could be conjecturally explained as the influence of the immediately preceding stage-direction in which Cassius heads the group entrance. It would then follow that having established the fuller form, A stuck to it for the rest of his stint on the same Folio page. If as I like to believe the revised manuscript copy was actually Shakespeare's autograph, the possibility exists that both Cas. and Cass. were present in the copy, in which case one or other compositor would then have established his own form. However, on the evidence of All's Well the odds may favor the fuller Cass. in the manuscript and B's abbreviation.
C's treatment of the standard Hell. prefix for Helena, which he might reduce to Hel. although admitting Hell., is another indication that, like B, he preferred short forms.
Actually, in this case the anomalous catchword of a speech-prefix may suggest that C had set it from copy, for it marks not a new speech by the Countess but a continuation, and hence it seems to reflect some disruption or abnormality in the copy repeated by the compositor more than it resembles an adopted speech-prefix altered from copy.
Compositor B made his first acquaintance with Lafeu when he set V5v, heading it with Ol. Lord. It seems simpler to conjecture that he mistook a copy prefix like Ol. L., Ol. La., or even Old Laf., since he had never seen the name Lafew, than that at this bibliographical juncture Shakespeare had written a variant prefix. Since in 994, the immediately preceding speech, the prefix is 4. Lord, B would be bound to interpret any L abbreviation as Lord.
The stage-direction in some plays could affect the future form of prefixes when a character's first speech followed immediately after his entrance and the name in the direction took the place of the prefix. In such a case if the compositor supplied the prefix missing in the copy, it would almost inevitably be in the form of the direction. However, such a speculation does not seem appropriate here, for the substitution of direction for prefix is ordinarily associated with single entrances where there could be no ambiguity, but in III.ii the Clown enters with the Countess.
The facts are as follows. In I.i on sig. V1v the Countess is his Mother in the opening direction (2) and Mo. in speech-prefixes (4 ff.). On V2v-3 in I.iii she is Countesse in the direction (328) and Coun. or Cou. in the prefixes (329 ff.) save for a stretch of revision in the copy where between 451 and 494 opening V3-3v she is Old Cou. before reverting to Cou. at 514. Next in II.ii on V4v she is Countesse in the direction (824) but Lady or La. in the prefixes (825 ff.) on V4v-5. In III.ii on X1 she is Countesse in the direction (1401), Count. in the prefixes that follow at 1402 and 1406, but then Lad. or La. on X1-1v. In III.iv after Countesse in the direction (1555) on X1v she is La. In IV.v on X5 the direction is old Lady (2481) and the prefixes La. (2489 ff.) on X5-5v. Finally, in V.iii she is again old Lady in the direction (2695) on X6 but Old La. in prefixes (2701 ff.) on X6-6v except for her only speech on sig. Y1, where she is given the tag Coun. (2919).
Unfortunately, when B took over with sheet V2.5 he set all the rest of the play. If the practice of other compositors could have been observed during the last three acts, we should know more about B's degree of normalization in this play.
This can scarcely be anything else but a manuscript form since it is uninfluenced by any adjacent stage-direction. That it is aberrant is clear because of the confusion it could create with Coun. or Cou. used earlier for the Countess.
That B might look over earlier set pages (if available) to make sure that he was following established prefix forms cannot be entertained in view of his change from the forms of the immediately preceding pages. He would have needed to go back to V2v to find Cou. and Ber., with Ros. in its complementary page V5. The evidence suggests that he followed copy without considering the possibility that the prefix for Ros. had been normalized to another form. Of course, it is likely that the sheets were stored and consultation would have been difficult. The case differs from that between the inner and outer formes of X1:6.
The New Arden edition has the only discussion to date of bibliographical reasons for certain of the changes. Although at the time Hinman's study was not in being and thus the editor, G. K. Hunter, could not be aware of the fact that a serious delay occurred between B's setting of quire X and pages Y1-1v, he shrewdly recognized that something in the bibliographical division of the text by quires would account for the changes in the prefixes for the Countess and Bertram between X and Y.
Any such hypothesis would require B on returning to set X6v after the delay to have consulted X6r in the opposite printed forme to align his speech-prefixes. This is not an impossible hypothesis: in contrast to the probable storage of sheets of the Folio after X by the time B returned to set Y, the partly printed sheet X1:6 in its inner forme would have been available. Even so, such a hypothesis requires two stages: first, the influence of the stage-direction on the first prefix and then the consultation that established the form of the second prefix even though copy may have differed in both instances.
These and other sections of the play suspected of being revisions or the breaking-off points of writing are analyzed in my "Shakespeare at Work: The Foul Papers of All's Well that Ends Well," forthcoming in 1980 in a festschrift honoring Professor Dame Helen Gardner's seventieth birthday to be published by the Oxford University Press, a study that also takes up the vexed question of the prefixes of the two French Lords G and E.
That it is a so-called 'mass entry' is unlikely, for evidence does not exist that this was a Shakespearean convention. It is possible but not perhaps probable that the false entrance marks another memorandum for later action.
In the New Arden edition, p. xii, fn. 3, G. K. Hunter assumes that Ol. Laf. on V5 and Ol. Lord on V5v derive in order from Ol. L. in copy. But such precision of reconstruction is not possible on the evidence, for the setting of V5v before V5 quite alters the picture. It is true that when B first encountered the prefix on V5v he could have misinterpreted Ol. L. and set Ol. Lord; but the same could have been true with the prefix Ol. Laf., which was probably that of the copy: at this point never having set a prefix for Lafeu he could have no notion of the character's name. Ol. Laf. in copy, therefore, would have meant nothing to him, and under the influence of 4. Lord in the prefix in the line above, the L would have suggested Lord regardless of the following letters. It is a small point, also, but a survey of the copy prefixes suggests that Shakespeare was more inclined to abbreviate the first element in a two-part prefix, like L. Laf. or L. G., or even Ol. Lady, than the second, although there are exceptions such as what may have been the copy Old Cou.
The authority and the proper identification of these two characters throughout the play are considered at length in my "Shakespeare at Work," for which see fn. 25 above.
This revision in the text is analyzed in my "Shakespeare at Work," for which see the reference in fn. 25 above. It should be remarked that in this case because of Helena's intervening entrance the fact of the repeated prefix is not the major evidence for a revision but instead the change in the form of the prefix associated with its repetition and continued throughout the addition, only to revert to the initial form when the compositor carried on with the original text. Indeed, simple repetition of a tag like this is occasionally found in dramatic texts when a character continues a speech after the entrance of another person, especially if the continuation is thereupon addressed to the newly entered character. Moreover, because of the occasional convention that the name of an entrance direction could stand for the prefix when the entering character immediately speaks, it may have been that a repetition of the tag for the original speaker was useful to remove any ambiguity about the speaker of such lines after the interruption of an entrance. Thus in I.iii the alteration in form at 451 for a sequence of Old Cou. prefixes intervening in a sequence of Cou. forms that later resume is the essential evidence for addition.
No reason exists to suppose that C, completing V4v, would obey any mark in the manuscript for cast-off copy so rigidly as to end his page in mid-speech (even though at the end of a sentence) and to set as catchword a repeated speech-prefix for what would be the continuation over-page. Indeed, since copy from V4 was being set forward in the quire, there is a possibility that it had not been cast off at all until V6v was reached and quire X had to be worked on. That C could have inserted Lady. as prefix at the end of the page as a note to the next compositor of the form which the prefix should take is mere fantasy, especially since it would necessarily involve the hypothesis that though C had set Lady as his prefixes on V4v, the manuscript had read Cou.
Editors have taken it that the sequence of speech-prefixes for the Clown at 1243 and 1245 signifies that some reply of Parolles has dropped out. That a gap of some sort existed seems clear, but slight desperation may be evident in the New Arden's alternative explanation, "it is possible to keep F text assuming only that the clown pauses and, presuming Parolles' answer, replies to that." As remarked, two such prefixes are not unknown in some plays if a stage-direction intervenes between the parts of a single speech and the person entering is thereupon addressed; but this is not the situation in All's Well: no direction occurs here nor is it likely that one has been lost. (Sisson's expedient, followed by Evans, of having Parolles shake his head between the speeches is not satisfactory and would not call for a direction, anyway. Moreover, the customary requirement of a change of address is wanting.) Editors endeavoring to fill the gap with some supposed answer from Parolles have not offered any suggestion that carries conviction as the generator of the Clown's 'The search sir was profitable'. The New Cambridge conjecture 'Parolles. In myself.' is about as much as can be done, but carries no conviction. It is moot, then, whether a line or so by Parolles has dropped out or where there is another explanation for the anomaly. Since the second speech hinges on the first, it is possible to guess that the second was a marginal addition in the manuscript, although one must confess that the duplicated speech-prefix could be more easily explained if the second speech had been the original and the first, with its prefix, had been inserted. Nevertheless, if the Countess' duplicated prefix in 861-863 does indeed result from an addition, then the hypothesis can be advanced here as well. The continuity of the two speeches read as one is not ideal, but sufficient.
In Julius Caesar, as remarked, the scribe carefully thought out the problem of the speech-prefixes and to avoid ambiguity he settled on Cassi. for Cassius and Cask. for Casca and thus prevented possible confusion with the other and with Cœs. for Caesar.
The various eccentric spellings that have been labeled 'Shakespearean' are notably absent from All's Well; but the smoothing here is not surprising when one considers that compositors in 1622-23 were dealing with an old-fashioned manuscript written two decades earlier. The Folio All's Well is not the Second Quarto of Hamlet.
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