NOTES AND QUERIES:
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FOB
LITEEAEY MEN, GENEEAL EEADEES, ETC.
"When found, make a note of. w CAPTAIN CUTTLE.
PRICE FOUKPENCE.
No. 245. QgSS] SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 5, 1908.
.
Yearly Subscription, 20. 6d. post free,
THE
NATIONAL
SHAKESPEARE
MEMORIAL.
THE exact form in which the nation's desire finally and fittingly to commemorate Shakespeare's supreme genius in
London, the city of his dramatic triumphs, shall assume enduring shape in " brick and stone " is fair ground for
deep consideration. No consideration is required, however, to grasp the simple fact that Shakespeare's genius has
built its own memorial in the stupendous edifice of his Works.
It has none the less remained a fact that until the present year no edition of
" The works of Shakespeare as himself did write, Spelled as he spelled, and spoken as he spoke,"
has been generally available in England.
To remedy this crying scandal, and generally to bring " his works exactly as he wrote them," together with " the sources from which this man of the people fashioned not the masterpiece of a people's dramatic literature, but the supreme expression of the world's literature," that veteran scholar Dr. F. J. Furnivall, D.Litt., seconded by Prof. I. Gollancz, LittD., Mr. Sidney Lee, Mr. W. W. Grey, Prof. Boas, Prof. P. G. Thomas, Mr. W. H. D. Bouse, Mr. Morton- Luce, Mr. H. . Hart, Mr. Tucker Brooke, and Mr. F. W. Clarke, has arranged with Messrs. Chatto & Windus to issue :
THE SHAKESPEARE LIBRARY.
The Shakespeare Library has been conceived on a scale which promises to make it the noblest Shakespeare Memorial of all time, for the Library aims at bringing home to every class, and to every age, within the English-speaking community the full understanding of the endless heritage of which the poet has made them his immortal heirs. The first section, The Old Spelling Shakespeare, as its title implies, has its text as nearly as possible in the exact form 'in which it left Shakespeare's own hand. In the second section, The Shakespeare Classics, is issued a series of reprints embodying the Romances, Novels, and Plays used by Shakespeare as the originals or direct sources of his plays. In the third section, The Lamb Shakespeare for Young People, based on Mary and Charles Lamb's Tales from Shakespeare, an attempt is made to insert skilfully within the setting of prose those scenes and passages from the Play with which the young reader should quite early become acquainted. In the concluding section under the title of Shakespeare's England will be grouped a series of Volumes illustrative of the life of England in Shakespeare's time, together with a new and most comprehensive anthology The Book of Elizabethan Verse.
Even this brief note readily shows the scale upon which the Library has been conceived. Unfortunately such a work cannot be wholly divorced from financial considerations ; but the price of every item has been placed as low as is consistent with the stable scholarship, sound paper, good printing, and good binding in which The Shakespeare Library nas been worthily dressed.
Any person may, however, buy The Shakespeare Library on easy terms by undertaking to purchase the entire set of volumes one by one as issued. Such orders will be received by any Bookseller.
A postcard will bring you the full Prospectus, post free.
Address : The " Shakespeare Department," Messrs. CHATTO & WINDUS, 111, St. Martin's Lane, London, W.C.
