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The Works of Shakespeare: Richard III. Henry VIII. Troilus and Cressida
The Works of Shakespeare Richard III Henry VIII Troilus and Cressida Author:William Shakespeare Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: INTRODUCTION THE TRAGEDY OF KING RICHARD III. The earliest notice we have of this play is an entry in the Stationers' Register by Andrew Wise, dated Octobe... more »r 20, 1597, and running thus: " The Tragedy Of King Richard The Third with the death of the Duke of Clarence." The same 3fear was published a quarto pamphlet of forty-seven leaves, the tille-pagt reading as follows : " The Tragedy, of King Richard the Third : containing bis treacherous plots against his brother Clarence, the pitiful murder of his innocent nephews, his tyrannical usurpation, with the whole course of his detested life, and most deserved death : As it halh been lately acted by the Right Honourable the Lord Chamberlain his servants. At London: Printed by Valentine Simms for Andrew Wise, dwelling in Paul's Church-yard, at the sign of the Angel. 1597." In this edition the author's name was not given. The play was issued again in 1598, the title-page being the same, except the addition, — "By William Shakespeare," and the substitution of Thomas Creede for Valentine Simms. There was a third issue by the same publisher in 1602 : which, though merely a reprint of the former, claimed in the title-page to b.e ''newly augmented." By another entry at the Stationers', hearing date June 27, 1603, it appears that Wise transferred his righl in the play to Matthew Law, who published a fourth edition in 1605, and a fifth in 1613. Three other issues of the same text are also known to have been made in quarto, the several dates being 1624,1629, and 1634; and there is some reason to think that an edition was put forth in 1622, though no copy of that date is known to be extant. Of these eight editions, all except the first two purport to be "newly augmented;" which, as the text was the same in them all, would seem to infer tha...« less