VENUS AND ADONIS. Preface. Early Editions. "Venus and Adonis" was first printed in Quarto, in 1593, with the following title-page:— VENVS AND ADONIS Vilia miretur vulgus ; mihi flauus Apollo PRINTER'S DEVICE : An anchor with the motto Anchora spe LONDON: Imprinted by Richard Field, and are to be sold at 1593. The text of "Venus and Adonis " is remarkable for its accuracy, and there can be little doubt that the poet himself superintended the printing of the poem, and was responsible for the wording of the title-page. A significant fact is Shakespeare's choice of the printer: Richard Field was the son of Henry Field, a tanner of Stratfordon-Avon; he was apprenticed to a printer in London in the year 1579, and took up his freedom in 1587. Amongst his earliest enterprises was a beautiful edition of Ovid's Metamorphoses, 1589. In 1592, Shakespeare's father, at Stratford, was engaged in appraising Henry Field's goods; in 1593, in London, Richard Field was engaged in printing William Shakespeare's first poem: the copyright was registered by the printer, for himself, on April the 18th. The publisher of the first three editions was Field's friend, John Harrison. The popularity of the poem is attested by the issue of no less than twelve subsequent editions between 1593 and 1636;* of some of these editions only single copies have come down to us, and it is probable that some editions have been thumbed out of existence. The famous Isham unique copy of the 1599 issue was by mere chance discovered in 1867; † similarly, evidence may be found of other editions, more especially between the years 1596 and 1599, 1602 and 1627. Date of Composition. Shakespeare, in his Dedication to the Earl of Southampton, describes the poem of 1594; 1596; 1599; (?) 1600; 1602 (British Museum); 1602 (Bodleian); 1617; 1620; 1627; 1630; (?) 1630; 1636. + Cp. Charles Edmond's reprint of his precious "find," 1870. A fac-simile of the First Edition is among Dr. Furnivall's Quarto Fac-similes (No. 12). The Earl of Southampton was at this time about twenty; he was born October 6, 1573; his father died in 1581; at the age of twelve he entered St. John's College, Cambridge. Entered at Gray's Inn, London, 1589. He rose in the Queen's favour, but his love for Elizabeth Vernon (Essex's cousin) lost him the Queen's interest, in 1595. He married Elizabeth Vernon in 1598. (A full biography is given in Massey's Shakespeare's Sonnets.) Chettle was probably alluding to Southampton when, in his Kind Heart's Dream (1592) he refers "to divers of worship" who report Shakespeare's "uprightness of dealing," and his "facetious grace in writing." "Venus and Adonis " as the " first heir of my invention "; some critics, taking these words in their absolutely literal sense, refer the composition of the piece to the poet's younger days at Stratford-on-Avon, but there is little to be adduced in favour of this view, and there is no need to strain the words to bear this meaning. By the term "invention" Shakespeare probably implied lyrical or epic poetry, as opposed to dramatic writings; and with reference to the latter it must be remembered that no Shakespearian play had as yet been printed.* Venus and Adonis must be taken in close connection with such poems as Lodge's Glaucus and Scilla, and Marlowe's Hero and Leander; to the former of these small "classical epics" (1589) Shakespeare's poem seems to have been indebted for its versification, as perhaps also for much of its characteristic tone and diction.t Marlowe's * Shakespeare's "affectionate love of nature and natural objects," his many vivid pictures of country life, as evidenced in Venus and Adonis, are dwelt upon by those in favour of assigning an earlier date to the poem; they point specially to the famous hunted hare; the eagle turning on her prey; the description of the horse; the signs of weather, and the closing in of the day, etc. It must be borne in mind that the theme of the poem lent itself to the introduction of these rural reminiscences, which throughout Shakespeare's career, and more especially in his early plays, exercised their attraction; many links might be pointed out connecting Venus and Adonis and Midsummer Night's Dream. The following is a typical example of Lodge's verse:"He that hath seen the sweet Arcadian boy Wiping the purple from his forced wound, His pretty tears betokening his annoy, His sighs, his cries, his falling on the ground, The echoes ringing from the rocks his fall, The trees with tears reporting of his thrall," etc. An interesting problem is whether Shakespeare at first attempted a sonnet-sequence on the subject, and subsequently rejected that form in favour of the less monumental six-line stanza (vide Passionate Pilgrim, iv. v. ix.). |