The Case for the First Folio For centuries, editors of Shakespeare's plays have conflated different published editions (
quartos and folios) in an attempt to create one true text as the writer intended. In this essay (.pdf file) Jonathan Bate, one of the editors of
The RSC Shakespeare makes the case that in fact what they're doing is editing together different drafts of the play originated by the bard at different times in his life attempting to make better dramatic sense. Essentially that none of the texts you studied at school are what Shakespeare intended to be performed at all.
[more inside]
posted by feelinglistless
on Jan 25, 2008 -
29 comments
'Literature of fact' The high wall which seperates fact and fiction has a small door in it through which people can step. A piece which discusses how someone writing a supposed eyewitness account of an event always tends to fictionalise, even unconciously, in order to make the subject interesting, the idea being that just because a book is in that section, it might not actually be completely non-fiction.
posted by feelinglistless
on Nov 16, 2002 -
12 comments
Must people who work in book shops have an English Literature degree? "At Foyles, the book-lover's bookshop, I approach the counter with a copy of James Joyce's Ulysses. "I bought this book the other day," I say, "and I want my money back. It's full of typing errors and there's no punctuation." But who dumbed down first, the readership or the book trade? Also, I notice Books
etc isn't included, perhaps because the clerks in that chain have to write little reviews of all the books they read, which are then put on the edges of the shelves ...
posted by feelinglistless
on May 7, 2002 -
39 comments
