Hamlet, William Shakespeare
Hamlet - Arden Shakespeare : Second Series - Paperback (The Arden Shakespeare) - William Shakespeare, ed Harold Jenkins, Arden; 2 edition, 585 pages (August 2001). ISBN:1903436672
| Title & Author: | Hamlet William Shakespeare |
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Hamlet, Shakespeare's most famous play, was written and produced between the years 1599 and 1601. The precise date of writing is unknown. The Arden Hamlet reveals its level of detail by providing thirteen pages simply on the dating of the play.
Hamlet, i.e. the text of the play, is contained in 260 pages, with about half of each page taken up by short notes of exemplary terseness and precision. The other 325 pages consist of a superb critical and historical introduction, and longer notes at the back of the book (many of which are essays on the major themes of Hamlet).
Hamlet, like all Shakespeare's works, is a difficult play and the reader can only benefit from the voluminous notes. The introduction illustrates how the editor created a trustworthy text by showing its relation to Quarto and Folio sources. In particular, it relates how Dover Wilson established that the Second Quarto was the most authoritative. The notes draw on four centuries of scholarship with contributions from dozens of famous literary figures--including James Boswell, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and Alexander Pope. Harold Jenkins also gives the reader the origins of many of Shakespeare's lines in Plato, Montaigne, Chaucer and others.
- The Arden Hamlet by William Shakespeare is the most respected volume of the world's greatest play.