The Arden Shakespeare is a long-running series of scholarly editions of the works of William Shakespeare. It presents fully edited modern-spelling editions of the plays and poems, with lengthy introductions and full commentaries. There have been three distinct series of The Arden Shakespeare over the past century, with the third series commencing in 1995 and concluding in January 2020.Arden Shakespeare Twitter account. Retrieved January 23, 2020 The fourth series is scheduled to commence publication in 2026.
Arden was the maiden name of Shakespeare's mother, Mary, but the primary reference of the enterprise's title is to the Forest of Arden, in which Shakespeare's As You Like It is set.Juliet Dusinberre, introduction to "As You Like It", Arden Shakespeare, Third Edition
First Series The first series was published by Methuen. Its first publication was Edward Dowden's edition of Hamlet, published in 1899.General Editors' Preference, The Tempest, Arden Shakespeare, 3rd Series, 1999 Over the next 25 years, the entire canon of Shakespeare was edited and published. The original editor of The Arden Shakespeare was William James Craig (1899–1906), succeeded by R. H. Case (1909–1944).Copyright page, "The Tempest", edited by Frank Kermode, Arden 2nd Series, 1954 The text of The Arden Shakespeare, First series, was based on the 1864 "Globe" or Cambridge edition of Shakespeare's Complete Works, edited by William George Clark and John Glover,General Preface, King Lear, The Arden Shakespeare, copyrighted 1917 as revised in 1891–93.General Editor's Preface by Una Ellis-Fermor, dated 1951, as printed in Macbeth, Arden Shakespeare, 2nd Series
The list of the first series is as follows: Editor Title Year of publication Edward Dowden Hamlet 1899 Edward Dowden Romeo and Juliet 1900 W. J. Craig King Lear 1901 Michael Macmillan Julius Caesar 1902 Morton Luce The Tempest 1902 Edward Dowden Cymbeline 1903 H. C. Hart Othello 1903 Herbert Arthur Evans Henry V 1904 W. Osbourne Brigstoke All's Well That Ends Well 1904 H. C. Hart Love's Labour's Lost 1904 H. C. Hart The Merry Wives of Windsor 1904 H. Bellyse Balldon Titus Andronicus 1904 Henry Cuningham A Midsummer Night's Dream 1905 H. C. Hart Measure for Measure 1905 K. Deighton Timon of Athens 1905 R. Warwick Bond The Taming of the Shrew 1905 Charles Knox Pooler The Merchant of Venice 1905 R. Warwick Bond Two Gentlemen of Verona 1906 Morton Luce Twelfth Night 1906 K. Deighton Troilus and Cressida 1906 R. H. Case Antony and Cleopatra 1906 K. Deighton Pericles 1907 Ivor B. John King John 1907 Henry Cuningham The Comedy of Errors 1907 A. Hamilton Thompson Richard III 1907 H. C. Hart 1 Henry VI 1909 H. C. Hart 2 Henry VI 1909 H. C. Hart 3 Henry VI 1910 Charles Knox Pooler Poems 1911 Henry Cuningham Macbeth 1912 Ivor B. John Richard II 1912 F. W. Moorman The Winter's Tale 1912 J. W. Holme As You Like It 1914 R. P. Cowl, A. E. Morgan 1 Henry IV 1914 Charles Knox Pooler Henry VIII 1915 Charles Knox Pooler Sonnets 1918 W. J. Craig Coriolanus 1922 R. P. Cowl 2 Henry IV 1923 Grace R. Trenery Much Ado About Nothing 1924
Second Series The second series began in 1946, with a new group of editors freshly re-editing the plays, and was completed in the 1980s, though the Sonnets never appeared. It was published by Methuen in both hardback and paperback. Later issues of the paperbacks featured cover art by the Brotherhood of Ruralists. The second series was edited by Una Ellis-Fermor (1946–58); Harold F. Brooks (1952–82), Harold Jenkins (1958–82) and Brian Morris (1975–82).Copyright page, "Macbeth", edited by Kenneth Muir, Arden 2nd Series, printed 1994 Unlike the first series, where each volume was based on the same textual source (The Globe Shakespeare), the individual editors of each volume of the second series were responsible for editing the text of the play in that edition.GenPref2
+Editions in the second series Editor Title Year Notes Kenneth Muir Macbeth 1951 Richard David Love's Labour's Lost 1951 Kenneth Muir King Lear 1952 J.C. Maxwell Titus Andronicus 1953 Frank Kermode The Tempest 1954 Reprinted with revisions in 1957. M. R. Ridley Antony and Cleopatra 1954 The introduction by Case from the First Series was reprinted. J.H. Walter Henry V 1954 E. A. J. Honigmann King John 1954 John Russell Brown The Merchant of Venice 1955 T. S. Dorsch Julius Caesar 1955 J. M. Nosworthy Cymbeline 1955 Peter Ure Richard II 1956 Andrew S. Cairncross 2 Henry VI 1957 R. A. Foakes Henry VIII 1957 H. J. Oliver Timon of Athens 1959 M.R. Ridley Othello 1959 G. K. Hunter All's Well That Ends Well 1959 A. R. Humphreys 1 Henry IV 1960 F. T. Prince The Poems 1960 Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece Andrew S. Cairncross 1 Henry VI 1962 R. A. Foakes Comedy of Errors 1962 F. D. Hoeniger Pericles 1963 J. H. P. Pafford The Winter's Tale 1963 Andrew S. Cairncross 3 Henry VI 1964 J. W. Lever Measure for Measure 1964 A. R. Humphreys 2 Henry IV 1966 Clifford Leech Two Gentlemen of Verona 1969 H. J. Oliver The Merry Wives of Windsor 1971 Agnes Latham As You Like It 1975 J. M. Lothian and Thomas W. Craik Twelfth Night 1975 Philip Brockbank Coriolanus 1976 Harold F. Brooks A Midsummer Night's Dream 1979 Brian Gibbons Romeo and Juliet 1980 A. R. Humphreys Much Ado About Nothing 1981 Anthony Hammond Richard III 1981 Brian Morris The Taming of the Shrew 1981 K. J. Palmer Troilus and Cressida 1982 Harold Jenkins Hamlet 1982
Third Series The third series of The Arden Shakespeare began to be edited during the 1980s, with publication starting in 1995 and concluding in 2020. The general editors for this series were Richard Proudfoot; Ann Thompson of King's College London; David Scott Kastan of Yale University; and H. R. Woudhuysen of the University of Oxford.
The first editions in this series were published by Routledge, before moving to Thomson. They then moved to Cengage Learning. In December 2008, the series returned to Methuen, becoming part of Methuen Drama, its original publisher. From February 2013, the titles appeared under the Bloomsbury imprint.See "Coriolanus", Arden Shakespeare, Third Series (published February 2013)
The editions in the third series were published very much in line with the traditions established by The Arden Shakespeare; however, editions in this series tended to be thicker than those of the first and second series, with more explanatory notes and much longer introductions. One unusual aspect of this series was its edition of Hamlet, which presents the play in two separate volumes. The first, released in 2006, contained an edited text of the Second Quarto (1604–05), with passages found only in the First Folio included in an appendix,Preface, "Hamlet", Arden 3rd Series while the supplementary second volume, released a year later, contained both the text of the First Quarto (sometimes called the "bad" quarto) of 1603, and of the First Folio of 1623."Hamlet, the Texts of 1603 and 1623", Arden Shakespeare, 3rd Series. Other plays with "bad" quartos have them reproduced via photographs of each leaf of a surviving copy rather than deal with each textual anomaly on an individual basis.
Editions Due to the long period of time over which the series was published, several editions of the third series were re-issued in revised editions, from 2010 to 2018. Eight editions were reissued in revised form. Some contained minor revisions in later printings, such as Henry V,xxi but are not so noted on the title page. Editions that were revised are marked with the year of revised publication in the 'Year' column.
+Editions in the third series Title Year Editor Notes King Henry V 1995 (r. 1997Bloomsbury 11th printing (2017) p. xxi) Contains a complete photo facsimile of Q. Antony and Cleopatra 1995 Titus Andronicus 1995 (r. 2018) Othello 1996 (r. 2016) Ayanna Thompson contributed a new introduction to the 2016 revised edition. The Two Noble Kinsmen 1996 (r. 2015) The play is attributed to Shakespeare and John Fletcher on the title page. King Lear 1997 Contrary to the editors' decision to publish the three versions of Hamlet as three separate texts, Foakes' edition of King Lear is based upon a conflation of the quarto and folio texts of the tragedy, disregarding the practice established by the Oxford Shakespeare of treating them as two separate texts. Shakespeare's Sonnets 1997 (r. 2010) Contains every poetic work included in the original Shakespeare's Sonnets quarto of 1609—that is, 154 sonnets, plus the narrative poem A Lover's Complaint (a work the authorship of which is often disputed). Troilus and Cressida 1998 (r. 2015) Love's Labour's Lost 1998 Julius Caesar 1998 King Henry VI Part 2 1999 The Merry Wives of Windsor 1999 Contains a complete photo facsimile of Q. The Tempest 1999 (r. 2011) King Henry VI Part 1 2000 King Henry VIII 2000 The play is attributed to Shakespeare and John Fletcher on the title page. King Henry VI Part 3 2001 King Richard II 2002 King Henry IV Part 1 2002 The Two Gentlemen of Verona 2004 Pericles, Prince of Tyre 2004 The play is attributed to Shakespeare and George Wilkins on the title page. Much Ado About Nothing 2005 (r. 2016) Hamlet 2006 (r. 2016) Contains the Q2 (1604) text. Hamlet: The Texts of 1603 and 1623 2007 Contains the Q1 (1603) and FF (1623) text. A supplementary volume to the main edition (above) based on Q2 (1604). As You Like It 2006 Shakespeare's Poems 2007 Contains Shakespeare's two major narrative poems—Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece—as well as his metaphysical poem The Phoenix and the Turtle, plus several shorter works attributed to Shakespeare. Twelfth Night 2008 Timon of Athens 2008 The play is attributed to Shakespeare and Thomas Middleton on the title page. King Richard III 2009 The Taming of the Shrew 2010 Contains a complete photo facsimile of The Taming of a Shrew. The Winter's Tale 2010 The Merchant of Venice 2011 Romeo and Juliet 2012 Coriolanus 2013 Macbeth 2015 King Henry IV Part 2 2016 The Comedy of Errors 2016 Cymbeline 2017 A Midsummer Night's Dream 2017 King John 2018 All's Well That Ends Well 2018 Measure for Measure 2020Bloomsbury Publishing Website. Retrieved January 23, 2020.
Apocrypha The third series was also notable for publishing single-volume editions of certain plays that traditionally form part of the so-called Shakespeare Apocrypha, but for which there is considered good evidence of Shakespeare having at least been co-author. Three apocryphal plays were published in this manner. Double Falsehood, edited by Brean Hammond (2010) Sir Thomas More, edited by John Jowett (2011) King Edward III, edited by Richard Proudfoot and Nicola Bennett (2017)Bloomsbury Publishing Website. Retrieved April 6, 2017.
Fourth Series In March 2015, Bloomsbury Academic named Peter Holland of the University of Notre Dame, Zachary Lesser of the University of Pennsylvania, and Tiffany Stern of the University of Birmingham's Shakespeare Institute as general editors of The Arden Shakespeare fourth series.Deliyannides, Andrew. "Peter Holland Named General Editor of The Arden Shakespeare", University of Notre Dame, March 3, 2015. The fourth series commenced publication in 2026 with the following volume editors announced: