The complete works of John Gower, volume 2 : $b The English worksGower, John
General
The complete works of John Gower, volume 2 : $b The English works
Gower, John
Poetry
PAULI professed to follow Berthelette’s first edition with collation
throughout of MSS. Harl. 7184 and 3869, and occasional reference to
Harl. 3490 and the Stafford MS. It is almost impossible that this full
collation can really have been made, for by it nearly all Berthelette’s
errors might have been corrected, whereas we find them as a matter of
fact on every page of Pauli’s edition. As to the critical judgement
of the editor, it is enough to say that he regarded Harl. 7184 as a
better authority for the text and spelling than either Harl. 3869
or the Stafford MS. (being attracted apparently by the external
magnificence of the volume), and that he actually pronounced it to
be of the fourteenth cent. His diligence may be measured by the fact
that because Harl. 3490 stops short at viii. 3062* (in the middle of
a sentence), being left unfinished by the scribe, therefore Pauli’s
edition omits the remainder of this conclusion, 3063*-3114*[AL], though
he had the MS. in the Royal Library (R) within his reach, by means of
which he might have completed his copy. He is also seriously inaccurate
in the statements which he makes about the Stafford MS. as regards the
additional passages.
A certain number of the errors in Berthelette’s edition are corrected,
but very many remain, and in some cases further corruption has been
introduced by the editor, either from Harl. 7184 or otherwise. The
orthography has been ‘restored,’ but hardly with success.
MORLEY (1889) followed Pauli’s text, with conjectural alterations of
his own, and a few corrections from Berthelette, as i. 773. Often
the changes are quite wrong, e.g. Prol. 82, 608, i. 777, 1675 f.,
2957 f., the most extraordinary perhaps being iv. 2408 f. The editor
professes to omit iii. 142-338 and a few lines here and there in other
places. The omissions, however, are much more extensive than this
seems to imply. In the fourth book alone they are as follows, 401-408,
428-436, 443-506, 516-523, 1467-1475, 1490-1594, 2131-2182, 2754-2770,
2858-2862, 2883-2888, 3181-3302, and in some cases it is impossible
even to conjecture on what principle they are made.
THE PRESENT EDITION. The text follows the Bodleian Fairfax MS.
and every deviation from this is noted. The critical apparatus is
constructed upon the following principles.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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