Notes and Queries, Number 78, April 26, 1851: A Medium of Inter-communication for Literary Men, Artists, Antiquaries, Genealogists, etc.Various
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Notes and Queries, Number 78, April 26, 1851: A Medium of Inter-communication for Literary Men, Artists, Antiquaries, Genealogists, etc.
Various
Questions and answers -- Periodicals
I feel greatly obliged to your correspondent C. B. for the attention he has
bestowed on the question of Fletcher's connexion with _Henry VIII._, as it
is only through the concurrent judgments of those who think the subject
worthy of their full and impartial consideration, that we can hope to
arrive at the truth. His remarks (Vol. iii., p. 190.) are the more
valuable, as they coincide with a doubt in my own mind, which has, to a
great extent, ripened since I last communicated with you on the subject;
and, indeed, I have no need to hesitate in saying, that I had more
difficulty in coming to a conclusion with regard to the scene (Act III. Sc.
2.) in which the passages occur quoted by C. B., than with any other scene
in the whole play. The suggestions, that Shakspeare might have touched
scenes of which the mass had been written by Fletcher, is a point which I
had not overlooked, and which indeed, to some extent, might be said to
follow from the view I took of the relation of Shakspeare and Fletcher as
master and scholar. Yet this suggestion is especially valuable regarding
this scene, and may account for that which, without it, is not so easily
explained.
If, however, there be any lurking notion in your correspondent's mind, that
the scene in _Antony and Cleopatra_ (Act III. Sc. 1) referred to by X. Z.
(Vol. iii., p. 139.) is, judging from certain coincidences of expression,
an interpolation, and not by Shakspeare, I beg at once to be allowed to
express my total dissent from such a view. Whether, also, there may have
been any secondary allusion to some known event of the day, as X. Z.
supposes, and as is by no means improbable, I cannot say; but I protest
against its being said that the scene referred to is "totally unconnected
with what goes before, and what follows." Antony is the hero of the play;
and this scene shows the culminating point of Antony's fortunes, when his
very successes turn against him.
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