Читать книгу The Shakespeare-Expositor - Thomas Keightley - Страница 21

Edition. Only in the folio, 1623.

Date. It appears from the MS. diary of Dr. Forman, that he saw this play performed at the Globe, May 15, 1611; it was also performed at Whitehall on the 5th of November following. Its exact date cannot be assigned; but the great probability is that it could not have been written earlier than 1610. I am disposed to regard it as anterior to The Tempest, which was probably the last play that ever Shakespeare wrote. When we consider the probable date of this play, we see how utterly untenable is the theory of some writers that it was an indirect apology for Anne Boleyn, and a direct compliment to her royal daughter. I may here observe that those ingenious persons who find allusions (except in a very few plain instances) to public events and public persons in Shakespeare's plays merely waste their own and their readers' time. Thus Sir Philip Sidney died the very year the poet came to London; and yet we are told that he is figured in Hamlet, a play not written till many years afterwards!

Origin. With the exception of the comic scenes—which as usual are wholly Shakespeare's own—it was founded on Green's popular novel of Pandosto, The Triumph of Time.