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SHAKESPEARE’S ROMAN PLAYS
AND THEIR BACKGROUND

MACMILLAN AND CO., Limited

LONDON · BOMBAY · CALCUTTA
MELBOURNE

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY

NEW YORK · BOSTON · CHICAGO
ATLANTA · SAN FRANCISCO

THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd.

TORONTO


SHAKESPEARE’S
ROMAN PLAYS
AND THEIR BACKGROUND

BY

M. W. MacCallum

M.A., Hon. LL.D., Glasgow

PROFESSOR OF MODERN LITERATURE IN
THE UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY

MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED
ST. MARTIN’S STREET, LONDON
1910

GLASGOW: PRINTED AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS
BY ROBERT MACLEHOSE AND CO. LTD.


TO
D. M. M·C.

“De Leev is Allens op de Welt,
Un de is blot bi di.”


PREFACE

Shakespeare’s Roman plays may be regarded as forming a group bythemselves, less because they make use of practically the sameauthority and deal with similar subjects, than because they follow thesame method of treatment, and that method is to a great extent peculiarto themselves. They have points of contact with the English histories,they have points of contact with the free tragedies, but they are notquite on a line with either class. It seems, therefore, possible anddesirable to discuss them separately.

In doing so I have tried to keep myself abreast of the literatureon the subject; which is no easy task when one lives at so great adistance from European libraries, and can go home only on hurried andinfrequent visits. I hope, however, that there is no serious gap in thelist of authorities I have consulted.

The particular obligations of which I am conscious I have indicatedin detail. I should like, however, to acknowledge how much I owethroughout to the late F. A. T. Kreyssig, to my mind one of the sanestand most suggestive expositors that Shakespeare has ever had. I amthe more pleased to avow my indebtedness, that at present in GermanyKreyssig is hardly receiving the learned, and in England has neverreceived the popular, recognition that is his due. It is strange thatwhile Ulrici’s metaphysical lucubrations and Gervinus’s somewhat[Pg viii]ponderous commentaries found their translators and their public,Kreyssig’s purely humane and literary appreciations were passed over.I once began to translate them myself, but “habent sua fata libelli,”the time had gone by. It is almost exactly half a century ago since hislectures were first published; and now there is so much that he wouldwish to omit, alter, or amplify, that it would be unfair to presentthem after this lapse of years for the first time to the Englishpublic. All the same he has not lost his value, and precisely indealing with the English and the Roman histories he seems to me to beat his best.

One is naturally led from a consideration of the plays to aconsideration of their background; their antecedents in the drama, andtheir sources, direct and indirect.

The previous treatment of Roman subjects in Latin, French, and English,is of some interest, apart from the possible connection of this orthat tra

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