Get even more from the Folger - The Folger SHAKESPEARE

1 Get even more from the FolgerYou can get your own copy of this text to keep. Purchase a full copyto get the text, plus explanatory notes, illustrations, and more. Buy a copyFolger SHAKESPEARE the Director of the Folger ShakespeareLibraryTextual IntroductionSynopsisCharacters in the Play PrologueACT 1 Scene 1 Scene 2 Scene 3 Scene 4 Scene 5 ACT 2 ChorusScene 1 Scene 2 Scene 3 Scene 4 Scene 5 Scene 6 ACT 3 Scene 1 Scene 2 Scene 3 Scene 4 Scene 5 ACT 4 Scene 1 Scene 2 Scene 3 Scene 4 Scene 5 ACT 5 Scene 1 Scene 2 Scene 3 ContentsMichael WitmoreDirector, Folger SHAKESPEARE LibraryIt is hard to imagine a world without SHAKESPEARE . Since theircomposition four hundred years ago, SHAKESPEARE s plays and poemshave traveled the globe, inviting those who see and read his works tomake them their of the New Folger Editions are part of this ongoing processof taking up SHAKESPEARE , finding our own thoughts and feelingsin language that strikes us as old or unusual and, for that very reason,new.

2 We still struggle to keep up with a writer who could think amile a minute, whose words paint pictures that shift like expertly edited texts are presented to the public as a resourcefor study, artistic adaptation, and enjoyment. By making the classictexts of the New Folger Editions available in electronic form as TheFolger SHAKESPEARE (formerly Folger Digital Texts), we place atrusted resource in the hands of anyone who wants New Folger Editions of SHAKESPEARE s plays, which are the basisfor the texts realized here in digital form, are special because of theirorigin. The Folger SHAKESPEARE Library in Washington, DC, is thesingle greatest documentary source of SHAKESPEARE s works. Anunparalleled collection of early modern books, manuscripts, andartwork connected to SHAKESPEARE , the Folger s holdings have beenconsulted extensively in the preparation of these texts.

3 The Editionsalso reflect the expertise gained through the regular performance ofShakespeare s works in the Folger s Elizabethan want to express my deep thanks to editors Barbara Mowat and PaulWerstine for creating these indispensable editions of SHAKESPEARE sworks, which incorporate the best of textual scholarship with arichness of commentary that is both inspired and engaging. Readerswho want to know more about SHAKESPEARE and his plays can followthe paths these distinguished scholars have tread by visiting theFolger either in-person or online, where a range of physical anddigital resources exists to supplement the material in these texts. Icommend to you these words, and hope that they the Director of the Folger ShakespeareLibraryUntil now, with the release of The Folger SHAKESPEARE (formerlyFolger Digital Texts), readers in search of a free online text ofShakespeare s plays had to be content primarily with using theMoby Text, which reproduces a late-nineteenth century version ofthe plays.

4 What is the difference? Many ordinary readers assume thatthere is a single text for the plays: what SHAKESPEARE wrote. ButShakespeare s plays were not published the way modern novels orplays are published today: as a single, authoritative text. In somecases, the plays have come down to us in multiple publishedversions, represented by various Quartos (Qq) and by the greatcollection put together by his colleagues in 1623, called the FirstFolio (F). There are, for example, three very different versions ofHamlet, two of King Lear, Henry V, Romeo and Juliet, and choose which version to use as their base text, and thenamend that text with words, lines or speech prefixes from the otherversions that, in their judgment, make for a better or more editorial decisions involve choices about whether anunfamiliar word could be understood in light of other writings of theperiod or whether it should be changed; decisions about words thatmade it into SHAKESPEARE s text by accident through four hundredyears of printings and misprinting; and even decisions based oncultural preference and taste.

5 When the Moby Text was created,for example, it was deemed improper and indecent for Mirandato chastise Caliban for having attempted to rape her. (See TheTempest, : Abhorred slave,/Which any print of goodness wilt nottake,/Being capable of all ill! I pitied ). All Shakespeareeditors at the time took the speech away from her and gave it to herfather, editors of the Moby SHAKESPEARE produced their text longbefore scholars fully understood the proper grounds on which tomake the thousands of decisions that SHAKESPEARE editors face. TheFolger Library SHAKESPEARE Editions, on which the FolgerShakespeare texts depend, make this editorial process as nearlytransparent as is possible, in contrast to older texts, like the Moby ,which hide editorial interventions. The reader of the FolgerShakespeare knows where the text has been altered because editorialinterventions are signaled by square brackets (for example, fromOthello: If she in chains of magic were not bound, ), half-squarebrackets (for example, from Henry V: With blood and sword andfire to win your right, ), or angle brackets (for example, fromTextual IntroductionBy Barbara Mowat and Paul WerstineHamlet: O farewell, honest soldier.)

6 Who hath relieved/you? ). Atany point in the text, you can hover your cursor over a bracket formore the Folger SHAKESPEARE texts are edited in accord withtwenty-first century knowledge about SHAKESPEARE s texts, the Folgerhere provides them to readers, scholars, teachers, actors, directors,and students, free of charge, confident of their quality as texts of theplays and pleased to be able to make this contribution to the studyand enjoyment of prologue of Romeo and Juliet calls the title characters star-crossed lovers and the stars do seem to conspire against theseyoung is a Montague, and Juliet a Capulet. Their families areenmeshed in a feud, but the moment they meet when Romeo andhis friends attend a party at Juliet s house in disguise the two fall inlove and quickly decide that they want to be friar secretly marries them, hoping to end the feud.

7 Romeo and hiscompanions almost immediately encounter Juliet s cousin Tybalt,who challenges Romeo. When Romeo refuses to fight, Romeo sfriend Mercutio accepts the challenge and is killed. Romeo then killsTybalt and is banished. He spends that night with Juliet and thenleaves for s father forces her into a marriage with Count Paris. To avoidthis marriage, Juliet takes a potion, given her by the friar, that makesher appear dead. The friar will send Romeo word to be at her familytomb when she awakes. The plan goes awry, and Romeo learnsinstead that she is dead. In the tomb, Romeo kills himself. Julietwakes, sees his body, and commits suicide. Their deaths appearfinally to end the , his fatherLADY MONTAGUE, his motherBENVOLIO, their kinsmanABRAM, a Montague servingmanBALTHASAR, Romeo s servingmanJULIETCAPULET, her fatherLADY CAPULET, her motherNURSE to JulietTYBALT, kinsman to the CapuletsPETRUCHIO, Tybalt s companionCapulet s CousinOther ServingmenESCALUS, Prince of VeronaPARIS, the Prince s kinsman and Juliet s suitorMERCUTIO, the Prince s kinsman and Romeo s friendParis PageFRIAR LAWRENCEFRIAR JOHNAPOTHECARYT hree or four CitizensThree MusiciansThree WatchmenCHORUSA ttendants, Maskers, Torchbearers, a Boy with a drum, Gentlemen,Gentlewomen, Tybalt s Page, in the PlayservingmenSAMPSONGREGORYPETERC horus Chorus.

8 Two households, both alike in dignity (In fair Verona, where we lay our scene), From ancient grudge break to new mutiny, Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean. From forth the fatal loins of these two foes A pair of star-crossed lovers take their life; Whose misadventured piteous overthrows Doth with their death bury their parents strife. The fearful passage of their death-marked love And the continuance of their parents rage, Which, but their children s end, naught could remove, Is now the two hours traffic of our stage; The which, if you with patient ears attend, What here shall miss, our toil shall strive to PROLOGUEFTLN 0001 FTLN 0002 FTLN 0003 FTLN 0004 FTLN 00055 FTLN 0006 FTLN 0007 FTLN 0008 FTLN 0009 FTLN 001010 FTLN 0011 FTLN 0012 FTLN 0013 FTLN 0014 SAMPSONGREGORYSAMPSONGREGORYSAMPSONGREGO RYSAMPSONGREGORYSAMPSONGREGORYSAMPSONGRE GORYSAMPSONE nter Sampson and Gregory, with swords and bucklers,of the house of Capulet.

9 Gregory, on my word we ll not carry coals. No, for then we should be colliers. I mean, an we be in choler, we ll draw. Ay, while you live, draw your neck out of collar. I strike quickly, being moved. But thou art not quickly moved to strike. A dog of the house of Montague moves me. To move is to stir, and to be valiant is to stand. Therefore if thou art moved thou runn st away. A dog of that house shall move me to stand. I will take the wall of any man or maid of Montague s. That shows thee a weak slave, for the weakest goes to the wall. Tis true, and therefore women, being the weaker vessels, are ever thrust to the wall. Therefore I will push Montague s men from the wall and thrust his maids to the wall. The quarrel is between our masters and us their men. Tis all one. I will show myself a tyrant. When I have fought with the men, I will be civil with the maids; I will cut off their 1 Scene 1 FTLN 0015 FTLN 0016 FTLN 0017 FTLN 0018 FTLN 00195 FTLN 0020 FTLN 0021 FTLN 0022 FTLN 0023 FTLN 002410 FTLN 0025 FTLN 0026 FTLN 0027 FTLN 0028 FTLN 002915 FTLN 0030 FTLN 0031 FTLN 0032 FTLN 0033 FTLN 003420 FTLN 0035 FTLN 0036 FTLN 0037 FTLN 003811 Romeo and JulietACT 1.

10 SC. 1 GREGORYSAMPSONGREGORYSAMPSONGREGORYSAMPS ONGREGORYSAMPSONGREGORYSAMPSONGREGORYSAM PSONHe bites his The heads of the maids? Ay, the heads of the maids, or their maidenheads. Take it in what sense thou wilt. They must take it in sense that feel it. Me they shall feel while I am able to stand, and tis known I am a pretty piece of flesh. Tis well thou art not fish; if thou hadst, thou hadst been poor-john. Draw thy tool. Here comes of the house of Abram with another Servingman. My naked weapon is out. Quarrel, I will back thee. How? Turn thy back and run? Fear me not. No, marry. I fear thee! Let us take the law of our sides; let them begin. I will frown as I pass by, and let them take it as they list. Nay, as they dare. I will bite my thumb at them, which is disgrace to them if they bear it. Do you bite your thumb at us, sir?