The Project Gutenberg eBook, A Study of Shakespeare, by Algernon Charles
Swinburne, Edited by Edmund Gosse

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Title: A Study of Shakespeare

Author: Algernon Charles Swinburne

Editor: Edmund Gosse

Release Date: August 1, 2005 [eBook #16412]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)

***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A STUDY OF SHAKESPEARE***

This eBook was prepared by Les Bowler.

A STUDY OF SHAKESPEARE
BY ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE.

PREFACE TO THIS EDITION

Begun in the winter of 1874, a first instalment of "A Study of
Shakespeare" appeared in the _Fortnightly Review_ for May 1875, and a
second in the number for June 1876, but the completed work was not issued
in book form until June 1880. In a letter to me (January 31, 1875),
Swinburne said:

"I am now at work on my long-designed essay or study on the metrical
progress or development of Shakespeare, as traceable by ear and _not_
by finger, and the general changes of tone and stages of mind
expressed or involved in this change or progress of style."

The book was produced at the moment when controversy with regard to the
internal evidence of composition in the writings attributed to
Shakespeare was raging high, and the amusing appendices were added at the
last moment that they might infuriate the pedants of the New Shakespeare
Society. They amply fulfilled that amiable purpose.

EDMUND GOSSE

September 1918

CONTENTS
A STUDY OF SHAKESPEARE
I. FIRST PERIOD: LYRIC AND FANTASTIC
II. SECOND PERIOD: COMIC AND HISTORIC
III. THIRD PERIOD: TRAGIC AND ROMANTIC
APPENDIX
I. NOTE ON THE HISTORICAL PLAY OF KING EDWARD III.
II. REPORT OF THE PROCEEDINGS ON THIS FIRST ANNIVERSARY SESSION OF THE
NEWEST SHAKESPEARE SOCIETY
III. ADDITIONS AND CORRECTIONS

A STUDY OF SHAKESPEARE.

I.

The greatest poet of our age has drawn a parallel of elaborate eloquence
between Shakespeare and the sea; and the likeness holds good in many
points of less significance than those which have been set down by the
master