Favorite Furness illumination
Talk Shakespeare
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1DanMat
As you may know Horace Howard Furness was the editor on a famous variorum of Shakespeare's plays. Whenever I stumble upon something I can't quite figure out I try to consult the Furness editions (either on google books, internet archive, or a used copy I've been able to purchase). It will usually provide some fascinating piece of trivia or insightful perspective. Now these don't have to be a Furness gloss necessarily, there are plenty of other places to come across this sort of thing, but I think it would be fun to list some of the neater ones. Here's an example from Macbeth:
Her husband's to Aleppo gone, master o' the Tiger
Now there was an actual ship named the Tiger that sailed to Aleppo an account of which is given in Hakluyt by Ralph Fitch. It is also used in Twelfth Night, however Shakespeare probably isn't referring to the same ship.
Also, here is a good follow up I just found that gives a cogent explanation for that rat without a tail (and sieve) allusion the Witch makes two lines later:
(But in a sieve I'll thither sail,
And, like a rat without a tail,
I'll do, I'll do, and I'll do.)
http://homepages.tesco.net/~eandcthomp/macbeth.htm
Anyway (and I've gone on much too far with this example) other things to list might be scamels, or ghost characters, or sledded Polacks vs. sledded pole-axe, or whatever...
(It amazes me that teachers expect high school students to understand this stuff when it clearly needs a finetooth comb)
Her husband's to Aleppo gone, master o' the Tiger
Now there was an actual ship named the Tiger that sailed to Aleppo an account of which is given in Hakluyt by Ralph Fitch. It is also used in Twelfth Night, however Shakespeare probably isn't referring to the same ship.
Also, here is a good follow up I just found that gives a cogent explanation for that rat without a tail (and sieve) allusion the Witch makes two lines later:
(But in a sieve I'll thither sail,
And, like a rat without a tail,
I'll do, I'll do, and I'll do.)
http://homepages.tesco.net/~eandcthomp/macbeth.htm
Anyway (and I've gone on much too far with this example) other things to list might be scamels, or ghost characters, or sledded Polacks vs. sledded pole-axe, or whatever...
(It amazes me that teachers expect high school students to understand this stuff when it clearly needs a finetooth comb)
2moibibliomaniac
Are you familiar with Furness's comparison of the study of Shakespeare to good living? That was the topic of his address at the annual dinner of the Shakspere Society of Philadelphia in April, 1878. Furness begins: Mr. Chairman and Shakspere Brothers...
3DanMat
>2 moibibliomaniac:
A lovely Pickwickian oratory! It'd be nice to be part of a club like that IRL.
Thanks so much!
A lovely Pickwickian oratory! It'd be nice to be part of a club like that IRL.
Thanks so much!
4MMcM
A number of these have been appearing in the bargain shelves at a local used book store for $1 each and I too have tried to pick up the ones still in decent condition.
It's also interesting to see old criticism gathered together, rather than having to seek it out in its own individual editions. So you get a page of 18th century hating on Feste's song from Twelfth Night, which we now so associate with that character's performance, whether it's Ben Kingsley or Tommy Steele, across from a page with speculations on the etymology of tiny.
It's also interesting to see old criticism gathered together, rather than having to seek it out in its own individual editions. So you get a page of 18th century hating on Feste's song from Twelfth Night, which we now so associate with that character's performance, whether it's Ben Kingsley or Tommy Steele, across from a page with speculations on the etymology of tiny.
