Читать книгу The Shakespeare-Expositor - Thomas Keightley - Страница 9

Edition. Only in the folio, 1623.

Date. As it is mentioned by Meres it must be anterior to 1598. It was probably Shakespeare's first original piece. From the plain allusion (III. 2) to the civil war in France, it must have been written before February 1594, in which year Henry IV. was crowned. I have shown above that it could not have been acted earlier than 1593.

Origin. It is manifestly founded on the Menæchmi of Plautus; but Shakespeare hardly went to the original. He may have merely got an account of that piece from some learned friend; and there was a piece named The Historie of Error, which was played at Hampton Court before the Queen, on New Year's day 1576–77, which may have been formed on the Menæchmi. The proper title of this play seems to have been simply Errors, and The Comedy of Errors is like The Tragedy of Macbeth, &c.