About Shakespeare and His Plays by G. F. BradbyReview by: H. B. C.The Review of English Studies, Vol. 3, No. 10 (Apr., 1927), p. 244Published by: Oxford University PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/508296 .
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R. E. S., VOL. 3, 1927 (N? 10, APRIL) R. E. S., VOL. 3, 1927 (N? 10, APRIL)
an adequate account of an episode which is of some interest, though its details are sordid. Very little is known of Bell except that he was of Corpus (Oxon.) and a zealous Protestant. His manuscript, which was written within a year of the visit, is in the King's Library, and was edited in Trans. Roy. H-ist. Soc., 1898; but Miss Seaton has corrected a great many mistakes made by the former editor in transcribing place-names. Bell was not an eye-witness of the journey, and though he seems to have been well informed the narrative has hardly any historical value. As a specimen of Eliza- bethan prose it is doubtless of some interest to experts, but it is as tedious as its brevity permits, and full of sentences which begin: " But as the sonne of Ixione," or the like. Miss Seaton's part is much more amusing, and as a whole the book is not unworthy of its admirable print and binding. It is a small quarto, the text in an old-style italic, the Introduction and notes in roman. My only criticism is that the names printed in capitals (following the MS., no doubt) are too loud-STOCKEHOLLOME fills half a line, and upsets the balance.
R. W. CHAPMAN.
About Shakespeare and his Plays. By G. F. BRADBY. Oxford University Press. Pp. 92. 2s. 6d. net.
THERE is more wisdom in Mr. G. F. Bradby's little book than in an average shelf of Shakespeareana. It aims at exposition, not at erudi- tion. It proceeds along familiar paths; but at the end the reader knows the high-roads of Shakespeare's career and the general con- tours of his mind and art. Mr. Bradby has a fine sense of proportion, a gift for focussing interest on essentials, and a way of summarily dismissing specious perversities which makes him as good at exposure as at exposition. For instance, the question on the lips of the anti- Stratfordians and at the root of all Baconian and other similar heresies, " Is it possible that a rustic could have written the greatest English plays ? " is disposed of finally, in two or three lines, as a meaningless question, since humanly speaking it is improbable that any sort of man should have written Shakespeare's plays-but the thing did happen, as Shakespeare's contemporaries sufficiently attest.
H. B. C.
an adequate account of an episode which is of some interest, though its details are sordid. Very little is known of Bell except that he was of Corpus (Oxon.) and a zealous Protestant. His manuscript, which was written within a year of the visit, is in the King's Library, and was edited in Trans. Roy. H-ist. Soc., 1898; but Miss Seaton has corrected a great many mistakes made by the former editor in transcribing place-names. Bell was not an eye-witness of the journey, and though he seems to have been well informed the narrative has hardly any historical value. As a specimen of Eliza- bethan prose it is doubtless of some interest to experts, but it is as tedious as its brevity permits, and full of sentences which begin: " But as the sonne of Ixione," or the like. Miss Seaton's part is much more amusing, and as a whole the book is not unworthy of its admirable print and binding. It is a small quarto, the text in an old-style italic, the Introduction and notes in roman. My only criticism is that the names printed in capitals (following the MS., no doubt) are too loud-STOCKEHOLLOME fills half a line, and upsets the balance.
R. W. CHAPMAN.
About Shakespeare and his Plays. By G. F. BRADBY. Oxford University Press. Pp. 92. 2s. 6d. net.
THERE is more wisdom in Mr. G. F. Bradby's little book than in an average shelf of Shakespeareana. It aims at exposition, not at erudi- tion. It proceeds along familiar paths; but at the end the reader knows the high-roads of Shakespeare's career and the general con- tours of his mind and art. Mr. Bradby has a fine sense of proportion, a gift for focussing interest on essentials, and a way of summarily dismissing specious perversities which makes him as good at exposure as at exposition. For instance, the question on the lips of the anti- Stratfordians and at the root of all Baconian and other similar heresies, " Is it possible that a rustic could have written the greatest English plays ? " is disposed of finally, in two or three lines, as a meaningless question, since humanly speaking it is improbable that any sort of man should have written Shakespeare's plays-but the thing did happen, as Shakespeare's contemporaries sufficiently attest.
H. B. C.
244 244
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