The Winter's Tale (RSC Shakespeare) - Softcover

Shakespeare, William

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0812969197 ISBN 13: 9780812969191

Verlag: MODERN LIB, 2009

Inhaltsangabe

One of the last plays Shakespeare penned on his own, The Winter’s Tale is a transcendent work of death and rebirth, exploring irrational sexual jealousy, the redemptive world of nature, and the magical power of art.

Under the editorial supervision of Jonathan Bate and Eric Rasmussen, two of today’s most accomplished Shakespearean scholars, this Modern Library series incorporates definitive texts and authoritative notes from William Shakespeare: Complete Works. Each play includes an Introduction as well as an overview of Shakespeare’s theatrical career; commentary on past and current productions based on interviews with leading directors, actors, and designers; scene-by-scene analysis; key facts about the work; a chronology of Shakespeare’s life and times; and black-and-white illustrations.

Ideal for students, theater professionals, and general readers, these modern and accessible editions from the Royal Shakespeare Company set a new standard in Shakespearean literature for the twenty-first century.

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

William Shakespeare was born in Stratford-upon-Avon in April 1564, and his birth is traditionally celebrated on April 23. The facts of his life, known from surviving documents, are sparse. He was one of eight children born to John Shakespeare, a merchant of some standing in his community. William probably went to the King’s New School in Stratford, but he had no university education. In November 1582, at the age of eighteen, he married Anne Hathaway, eight years his senior, who was pregnant with their first child, Susanna. She was born on May 26, 1583. Twins, a boy, Hamnet ( who would die at age eleven), and a girl, Judith, were born in 1585. By 1592 Shakespeare had gone to London working as an actor and already known as a playwright. A rival dramatist, Robert Greene, referred to him as “an upstart crow, beautified with our feathers.” Shakespeare became a principal shareholder and playwright of the successful acting troupe, the Lord Chamberlain’s Men (later under James I, called the King’s Men). In 1599 the Lord Chamberlain’s Men built and occupied the Globe Theater in Southwark near the Thames River. Here many of Shakespeare’s plays were performed by the most famous actors of his time, including Richard Burbage, Will Kempe, and Robert Armin. In addition to his 37 plays, Shakespeare had a hand in others, including Sir Thomas More and The Two Noble Kinsmen, and he wrote poems, including Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece. His 154 sonnets were published, probably without his authorization, in 1609. In 1611 or 1612 he gave up his lodgings in London and devoted more and more time to retirement in Stratford, though he continued writing such plays as The Tempest and Henry VII until about 1613. He died on April 23 1616, and was buried in Holy Trinity Church, Stratford. No collected edition of his plays was published during his life-time, but in 1623 two members of his acting company, John Heminges and Henry Condell, put together the great collection now called the First Folio.

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Chapter One



Act 1 Scene 1 running scene 1

Enter Camillo and Archidamus

ARCHIDAMUS If you shall chance, Camillo, to visit Bohemia,

on the like occasion whereon my services are now on foot, you shall see, as I have said, great difference betwixt our Bohemia and your Sicilia.

CAMILLO I think this coming summer the King of Sicilia means to pay Bohemia the visitation which he justly owes him.

ARCHIDAMUS Wherein our entertainment shall shame us, we will be justified in our loves, for indeed-

CAMILLO Beseech you-

ARCHIDAMUS Verily, I speak it in the freedom of my knowledge: we cannot with such magnificence - in so rare - I know not what to say. We will give you sleepy drinks, that your senses, unintelligent of our insufficience, may, though they cannot praise us, as little accuse us.

CAMILLO You pay a great deal too dear for what's given freely.

ARCHIDAMUS Believe me, I speak as my understanding instructs me and as mine honesty puts it to utterance.

CAMILLO Sicilia cannot show himself over-kind to Bohemia. They were trained together in their childhoods and there rooted betwixt them then such an affection which cannot choose but branch now. Since their more mature dignities

and royal necessities made separation of their society,

their encounters, though not personal, have been royally attorneyed with interchange of gifts, letters, loving embassies, that they have seemed to be together, though absent, shook hands, as over a vast, and embraced, as it were, from the

ends of opposed winds. The heavens continue their loves.

ARCHIDAMUS I think there is not in the world either malice or matter to alter it. You have an unspeakable comfort of your young prince Mamillius: it is a gentleman of the greatest promise that ever came into my note.

CAMILLO I very well agree with you in the hopes of him: it is a gallant child; one that indeed physics the subject, makes old hearts fresh. They that went on crutches ere he was born desire yet their life to see him a man.

ARCHIDAMUS Would they else be content to die?

CAMILLO Yes; if there were no other excuse why they should desire to live.

ARCHIDAMUS If the king had no son, they would desire to live on crutches till he had one. Exeunt

Act 1 Scene 2 running scene 1 continues

Enter Leontes, Hermione, Mamillius, Polixenes, Camillo [and

Attendants]

POLIXENES Nine changes of the wat'ry star hath been

The shepherd's note since we have left our throne

Without a burden. Time as long again

Would be filled up, my brother, with our thanks.

And yet we should, for perpetuity,

Go hence in debt: and therefore, like a cipher,

Yet standing in rich place, I multiply

With one 'We thank you' many thousands moe

That go before it.

LEONTES Stay your thanks a while,

And pay them when you part.

POLIXENES Sir, that's tomorrow.

I am questioned by my fears of what may chance

Or breed upon our absence, that may blow

No sneaping winds at home, to make us say

'This is put forth too truly'. Besides, I have stayed

To tire your royalty.

LEONTES We are tougher, brother,

Than you can put us to't.

POLIXENES No longer stay.

LEONTES One sev'nnight longer.

POLIXENES Very sooth, tomorrow.

LEONTES We'll part the time between's then, and in that

I'll no gainsaying.

POLIXENES Press me not, beseech you, so.

There is no tongue that moves, none, none i'th'world

So soon as yours could win me. So it should now,

Were there necessity in your request, although

'Twere needful I denied it. My affairs

Do even drag me homeward, which to hinder

Were in your love a whip to me, my stay

To you a charge and trouble. To save both,

Farewell, our brother.

LEONTES Tongue-tied, our queen? Speak you.

HERMIONE I had thought, sir, to have held my peace until

You had drawn oaths from him not to stay. You, sir,

Charge him too coldly. Tell him you are sure

All in Bohemia's well: this satisfaction

The bygone day proclaimed. Say this to him,

He's beat from his best ward.

LEONTES Well said, Hermione.

HERMIONE To tell, he longs to see his son, were strong.

But let him say so then, and let him go.

But let him swear so, and he shall not stay,

We'll thwack him hence with distaffs.-

Yet of your royal presence I'll adventure To Polixenes

The borrow of a week. When at Bohemia

You take my lord, I'll give him my commission

To let him there a month behind the gest

Prefixed for's parting.- Yet, good deed, Leontes,

I love thee not a jar o'th'clock behind

What lady she her lord.- You'll stay?

POLIXENES No, madam.

HERMIONE Nay, but you will?

POLIXENES I may not, verily.

HERMIONE Verily?

You put me off with limber vows. But I,

Though you would seek t'unsphere the stars with oaths,

Should yet say 'Sir, no going.' Verily,

You shall not go; a lady's 'Verily' is

As potent as a lord's. Will you go yet?

Force me to keep you as a prisoner,

Not like a guest: so you shall pay your fees

When you depart, and save your thanks. How say you?

My prisoner? Or my guest? By your dread 'Verily',

One of them you shall be.

POLIXENES Your guest, then, madam.

To be your prisoner should import offending,

Which is for me less easy to commit

Than you to punish.

HERMIONE Not your jailer, then,

But your kind hostess. Come, I'll question you

Of my lord's tricks and yours when you were boys.

You were pretty lordings then?

POLIXENES We were, fair queen,

Two lads that thought there was no more behind

But such a day tomorrow as today,

And to be boy eternal.

HERMIONE Was not my lord

The verier wag o'th'two?

POLIXENES We were as twinned lambs that did frisk i'th'sun,

And bleat the one at th'other. What we changed

Was innocence for innocence. We knew not

The doctrine of ill-doing, nor dreamed

That any did. Had we pursued that life,

And our weak spirits ne'er been higher reared

With stronger blood, we should have answered heaven

Boldly 'Not guilty', the imposition cleared

Hereditary ours.

HERMIONE By this we gather

You have tripped since.

POLIXENES O, my most sacred lady,

Temptations have since then been born to's. For

In those unfledged days was my wife a girl;

Your precious self had then not crossed the eyes

Of my young play-fellow.

HERMIONE Grace to boot!

Of this make no conclusion, lest you say

Your queen and I are devils. Yet go on.

Th'offences we have made you do we'll answer,

If you first sinned with us, and that with us

You did continue fault, and that you slipped not

With any but with us.

LEONTES Is he won yet?

HERMIONE He'll stay, my lord.

LEONTES At my request he would not.- Aside?

Hermione, my dearest, thou never spok'st

To better purpose.

HERMIONE Never?

LEONTES Never, but once.

HERMIONE What? Have I twice said well? When was't before?

I prithee tell me. Cram's with praise, and make's

As fat as tame things. One good deed dying tongueless

Slaughters a thousand waiting upon that.

Our praises are our wages. You may ride's

With one soft kiss a thousand furlongs ere

With spur we heat an acre. But to th'goal:

My last good deed was to entreat his stay:

What was my first? It has an elder sister,

Or I mistake you - O, would her name were Grace!...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: MODERN LIB
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2009
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0812969197
• ISBN 13: 9780812969191
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 204
• Herausgeber: Bate Jonathan, Rasmussen Eric
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Buchbär; info@buchbaer.de; ; Weberstr. 67; Osnabrück; 49084; Deutschland