OF HENRY THE FIFT WRITTEN BY 30 hgr WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. The Edition of 1623, newly Revised and Corrected, The New Shakspere Society BY N. TRÜBNER & CO., 57, 59, LUDGATE HILL, LONDON, E.C., 1880. INTRODUCTION. IN the following pages I have endeavoured to show how in the construction of Henry V. Shakspere dealt with the historical matter he derived from Holinshed. For this purpose the play has been compared, as far as possible, scene by scene, with the corresponding passages in the Chronicles, from which large extracts have been made, in order to enable the reader to judge more clearly of the extent of Shakspere's obligations, and the method of his work. Deviations from his authority have, when they occur, been pointed out and commented on. Shakspere did not, it appears to me, turn to any other historical source for his play, except perhaps in a few unimportant instances, which have been noticed in their places. The wooing scene in The Famous Victories of Henry V. has long been regarded as the prototype of the similar scene in Shakspere's play, and I have therefore devoted some space to their comparison. Although I do not profess to survey the events of Henry the Fifth's reign from the historian's point of view, yet in subordination to my chief design, the examination of Shakspere's debt to Holinshed,—I considered it might be interesting to trace in the notes to this Introduction the original sources from which the Chronicles themselves were compiled, and also to add such historical details as served to connect and illustrate my subject. Before proceeding to the comparison of Shakspere and Holinshed, some brief remarks on the editions and date of Henry V., the Globe Theatre and scenic arrangements in Elizabethan England, may be necessary. I. EDITIONS. The earliest is a Q: published in 1600, which Mr. Daniel has shown1 is not, as has been supposed, a first sketch, the Fo of 1623 giving Shakspere's revision of his work; but is printed from a surreptitious and defective copy, so that the F: must be regarded as containing the, only genuine text. The Q was reprinted in 1602 and 1680. 1 Henry V., Parallel Texts, ed. Nicholson, Introduction, pp. x.—xiv. C ii Editions and date of HENRY V. Its epic character. II. DATE. The date of Henry V. is fixed, by an allusion in the Prologue of Act V. ll. 29-34, to the expected triumphant return of the earl of Essex from Ireland. In March, 1599, a large force under the command of Essex, who had been made lord-deputy, was sent thither to subdue the revolt caused by Hugh O'Neal, earl of Tyrone. Shakspere would be likely to feel a special interest in this expedition, because the earl of Southampton, his friend and patron, accompanied it.1 Essex ended his campaign by a truce with O'Neal, and returned to England in September without having effected anything. III. SCENIC DIFFICULTIES. THE GLOBE THEATRE. One of the first things which strikes one in this play is the constant and almost painful solicitude of Shakspere to win his audience's indulgence for the poverty of the stage accessories. As these were probably neither better nor worse than those to which play-goers were then accustomed, one is led to speculate on the cause of his anxiety. I offer an explanation which Knight2 has suggested in answer to Schlegel's remark that Shakspere has not deemed it necessary to make the like apologies in his other historical plays. The epic character of Henry the Fifth's wars, while it impressed the poet with a sense of the inadequacy of outward shows in reviving the memory of such mighty deeds, yet encouraged him to call upon his audience to strive for the sort of passionate forgetfulness of the present, with which a Greek might listen to a rhapsodist chanting the epos of Achilles. Note the fiery earnestness of Shakspere's appeal to the imagination "O, do but think, Grapple your mind to sternage of this navy; And again : "Now we bear the king Toward Calais : grant him there; there seen, 1 Essex made him general of the horse, contrary, Camden says, to Elizabeth's instructions.-Annales Rerum Anglicarum et Hibernicarum, regnante Elizabetha, ed. Hearne, iii. 789, and 793. The queen was offended with Southampton for marrying without her leave, and expressly excepted him from promotion. 2 Pictorial Shakspere. Illustrations of Henry V. Act I. |