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PREFACE

By ISRAEL GOLLANCZ, M.A.

THE FIRST EDITION

Timon of Athens was printed for the first time in the Folio of 1623; it occupies twenty-one pages, from 80 to 98 in the division of "Tragedies" (pages 81 and 82 being numbered twice over). "The Actor's Names" are given on the next page, a blank page follows, and then comes the play of Julius Cæsar, beginning a new sheet, marked kk instead of ii, and numbered 109. It is noteworthy that Troilus and Cressida would just have filled the space of pages 80-108, and judging from the fact that its second and third pages are numbered 79 1 and 80, one may perhaps safely assume that Timon took its place in the Folio. The text is one of the worst printed in the volume, and the famous crux "Vllorca" (III, iv, 113) may be regarded as typical of the many errors, resulting from carelessness or other causes.

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THE AUTHORSHIP OF THE PLOT

The doubtful authorship of a great part of the play accounts, in all probability, for the unsatisfactory state of the text; it is now generally agreed that Timon contains a good deal of non-Shakespearean alloy. The following pieces do not stand the test:-Act I, sc. i, 189end of the scene (? 249-265; 283-294); the whole of scene ii; Act II, sc. ii, 45-125; Act III, except sc. vi, 101–

1 Be it observed that the first page of Timon is really 78, not 80; the mistake was due to the numbering of the last page of Romeo and Juliet, which was marked 79 instead of 77.

118; Act IV, sc. ii, 30–50, (?) iii, 292–366, 409–425, 458-552; Act V, (?) sc. i, 1-62; ii; iii. Various attempts have been made to extract the ore from this "mineral of metals base," and, purged from grosser stuff, Shakespeare's Timon was issued by the New Shakespeare Society in the year 1874, embodying the labors of Mr. Fleay (vide also Shakespeare Manual, pp. 187–208).1

Various theories have been advanced as to the composition of Timon:-(i) that Shakespeare worked over an older drama, the remains of which are still to be found in the inferior portions of the play; 2 (ii) that Shakespeare and another author collaborated; (iii) that the play left unfinished by Shakespeare was hastily and carelessly completed by some playwright either (a) for stage-purposes or (b) for insertion in the First Folio; (iv) that the editors of the Folio could only obtain the parts of the principal actors, and the deficiencies had to be supplied from an earlier Timon,3 or by some second-rate dramatist; (v) that the combination of (i) and (iii) best satisfies all the difficulties.

The Fifth Act of the play gives, me judice, the best clue

1 "The play is, in its present state, unique among Shakespeare's for its languid, wearisome want of action. This renders it one of the least read of all his works. But this fault is entirely due to the passages which I assign to the second writer, not one of which adds anything to the development of the plot, for they are in every instance mere expansions of facts mentioned in the genuine parts of the play."

2 The Cambridge Editors seem to hold this view:-"The original play, on which Shakespeare worked, must have been written, for the most part, either in prose or in very irregular verse." Farmer first suggested this explanation; Knight followed Farmer, maintaining that "Timon was a play originally produced by an artist very inferior to Shakespeare, which probably retained possession of the stage for some time in its first form; that it has come down to us not wholly rewritten, but so far remodelled that entire scenes of Shakespeare have been substituted for entire scenes of the elder play," etc.

3 Elze, Delius, and others assign the earlier Timon to George Wilkins; Fleay believes "that Cyril Tourneur was the only person connected with the King's Company at this time who could have written the other part" of the play. All this is mere supposition.

to the solution of the problem. It certainly produces the impression of having been left roughly sketched by Shakespeare, whose touch is manifest in the more important speeches, especially those belonging to the character of Timon; but while the Third Scene is clearly not Shakespeare's, the four-lined epitaph in the Fourth Scene, the Shakespearean portion, combines two inconsistent couplets, and the combination could not have been intended by Shakespeare, though both were naturally in the rough unfinished MS.; the poet had evidently not made up his mind which of the two epitaphs to use, whether Timon's own, or that which, "commonly rehearsed," was not his, "but was made by the poet Callimachus." 1

In all probability Shakespeare's unfinished MS., containing the main parts of the play already written out, with the general plan merely outlined, was worked up after Shakespeare's death into the play we possess; it cannot be

1 In order that the reader should understand the weight of this piece of evidence, he should compare Act V. Sc. iv. ll. 70–73 with its original in North's Plutarch (Life of Antonius):—“He (Timon) died in the city of Hales, and was buried upon the sea-side. Now it chanced so that the sea getting in, it compassed his tomb round about, that no man could come to it; and upon the same was written this epitaph:

'Here lies a wretched corse of wretched soul bereft:

Seek not my name: a plague consume you wicked wretches left!'

"It is reported that Timon himself when he lived made this epitaph; for that which is commonly rehearsed was not his, but made by the poet Callimachus:

'Here lie I, Timon, who alive all living men did hate:

Pass by and curse thy fill: but pass, and stay not here thy gait.'

(The substitution of "wicked caitiffs" for "wicked wretches" suggests a comparison with Paynter's version of the epitaph, beginning "My wretched caitif days," etc.). It is not likely that lines 3, 4 in the previous scene (V. iii.) are intended for Timon's epitaph, though at first sight the rhyming couplet gives that impression. The speech is weak enough as it is, without adding to it the crowning absurdity of making the soldier first read the epitaph, and then proceed to take the character in wax, because he cannot read it.

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