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The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 16.1953  Sunday, 27 November 2005

[1] 	From: 	Peter Miale <pmiale@sover.net>
	Date: 	Friday, 25 Nov 2005 16:14:21 -0500
	Subj: 	RE: SHK 16.1943 Modern Bowdlerizations

[2] 	From: 	Peter Holland <pholland@nd.edu>
	Date: 	Saturday, 26 Nov 2005 11:23:43 -0500
	Subj: 	Re: SHK 16.1943 Modern Bowdlerizations


[1]-----------------------------------------------------------------
From: 		Peter Miale <pmiale@sover.net>
Date: 		Friday, 25 Nov 2005 16:14:21 -0500
Subject: 16.1943 Modern Bowdlerizations
Comment: 	RE: SHK 16.1943 Modern Bowdlerizations

Shakespeare censorship, or pity the poor director.

 >n a virtually uncut Othello
 >Stratford Festival Canada 1979) Othello's famous speech building to his
 >suicide was not interrupted by the brief lines from Lodovico and
 >Gratiano, a standard adjustment.  In this instance, however, the two
 >interjections were not omitted to enhance the dramatic rhythm but
 >because, in a production that was to end its run with a series of
 >matinees for high school students, the director and her actors were
 >fearful of losing this climactic moment when Lodovico, in front of 2,000
 >teenagers, exclaimed: "O bloody period!" (5.2.357).

[2]-------------------------------------------------------------
From: 		Peter Holland <pholland@nd.edu>
Date: 		Saturday, 26 Nov 2005 11:23:43 -0500
Subject: 16.1943 Modern Bowdlerizations
Comment: 	Re: SHK 16.1943 Modern Bowdlerizations

The text of *Romeo and Juliet* we used in school (England, about 1961, 
public school [=private school for US SHAKSPEReans]) taught me an early 
lesson in scholarship and the energising virtues of the 'Note on the 
Text' at the start of an edition. It recorded that (the wording is not 
accurate but the sense certainly is) 'the text used in this edition is 
complete except for the excision of the following lines...' and 
following it with a brief list of references. I cannot have been the 
only one to have shot off to a complete Shakespeare, located the missing 
passages and then wondered what was obscene about poppering pears, etc.

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