Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB
[graphic][subsumed][subsumed][subsumed][merged small][subsumed]

THE

WINTER'S TALE;

A PLAY,

IN. FIVE ACTS;

BY WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

AS PERFORMED AT THE

THEATRE ROYAL, DRURY LANE.

PRINTED UNDER THE AUTHORITY OF THE MANAGERS

FROM THE PROMPT BOOK.

WITH REMARKS

BY MRS. INCHBALD.

LONDON:

PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, HURST, REES, AND ORME,

PATERNOSTER ROW.

WILLIAM SAVAGE, PRINTER,

LONDON.

REMARKS.

Although the reader of the following play may have read it frequently, he will dwell upon many of its beauties with a new delight; and, if the work is wholly unknown to him, or its fable, incidents, and poetry, have been but slightly impressed upon his memory, he will sometimes be surprised into a degree of enthusiastic admiration!

The

Winter's Tale" was very successful at Drury Lane Theatre a few years ago; and yet, it seems to class among those dramas that charm more in perusal than in representation. The long absence from the scene of the two most important characters, Leontes and his wife, and the introduction of various other persons to fill their places, divert, in some measure, the attention of an audience; and they do not so feelingly unite all they see and all they hear into a single story, as he who, with the book in his hand, and neither his eye nor ear distracted, combines, and enjoys the whole grand variety.

Besides the improbability of exciting equal inte rest by the plot of this drama, in performance as in the closet; some of the poetry is less calculated for

« ZurückWeiter »