"Leaden Contemplation":
           Ambiguous Evidence of Revision
             in Q1 Love's Labour's Lost
 
                  Kenneth B. Steele
                University of Toronto
           
 
Shakespeare Association of America 1991 Annual Meeting
(Vancouver) Seminar 1: "Shakespeare's Quartos: Text,
Performance, Memory."
 
[This text file has been prepared from a Microsoft Word
for Windows file, and has regrettably been stripped of
all formatting codes, including italic, superscript, and
boldface.  The footnotes and bibliography have been
appended, but the Appendices have not.  These footnotes,
indicated with square brackets, often form an important
part of the text, and should be read with it.
 
This paper is exploratory rather than conclusive,
offering suggestions, pointing out theoretical
difficulties, and raising questions for which I genuinely
hope others can supply answers.  Because the paper arises
from my thesis research, comments and suggestions are
particularly welcome.  ]
 
[1.]
 
 
Intratextual Revision
 
      Sparked by the compelling example of Q1/F1 King
Lear, scholarly attention has recently been focused on
the evidence for authorial revision in Shakespeare's
multi-text plays.[2]  The current ascendency of
performance criticism - the now widespread recognition
that Shakespeare's own priority was most certainly the
stage and not the study - has facilitated the acceptance
of these revision studies, many of which examine the
theatrical implications of alternate texts in terms of
modified staging, pacing, or dramatic effect.  The
anti-theatrical bias of much traditional scholarship, and
the editorial fallacy of a definitive text,[3] have both
been struck a mortal blow by this partnership, and the
change is as healthy as the results have been
enlightening.  The class of "bad" quartos is being
re-examined, and Shakespeareans effectively have twice
as much territory to explore as ever before.  The study
of Shakespeare as an actor and playwright should not,
however, completely displace the study of Shakespeare as
a poet, particularly in his early work: the multi-
text plays are not the only texts which Shakespeare may
have revised.
 
      Quite literally less dramatic than the intertextual
evidence of the multi-text plays, is the subtler
intratextual evidence of authorial process found
primarily in the "foul paper" texts.  Here, "fossilized"
evidence of revision abounds,[4] including repetitions,
redundancies, ambiguities, contradictions, inconsistent
speech prefixes, and even what appear to be alternate
drafts of entire speeches.  These clues suggest currente
calamo corrections, marginal and interlinear additions,
and second thoughts during or shortly after composition
- with authority considerably less controversial than the
intertextual variants, which cannot be so readily
placed chronologically, and which cannot be attributed to
Shakespeare with much certainty at all.  The implications
of intratextual revisions are generally more poetic than
dramatic: often the variants have few ramifications for
performance or the overall interpretation of the play,
but they offer tantalizing glimpses of the very process
of composition, demonstrating Shakespeare's self-critical
faculties in action and indeed bringing us "as close as
we can ever come to Shakespeare at work."[5]  Many of
these intratextual fossils are exceedingly brief, and the
alternative readings they offer sometimes seem
indifferent - but E.A.J. Honigmann's warning is worth
noting: calling variants "indifferent" is using "a word
which can as aptly describe the beholder as the thing
observed."[6]  Authorial second thoughts often highlight
first attempts which were somehow unsatisfactory, and
through a process of critical triangulation, we may be
able to determine the direction of change, and
extrapolate Shakespeare's ultimate poetic aims.
 
      It must be recognized, however, that both
intertextual and intratextual revision are purely
hypothetical constructs based upon observable phenomena
and patterns; no completely irrefutable proof of
Shakespearean revision can ever be established without
authorial manuscripts or testimony, neither of which is
likely to be forthcoming.  The surviving textual evidence
provides an incomplete set of clues which are often
tenuous, usually ambiguous, and occasionally self-
contradictory.  Even when intertextual variants appear
deliberate, rather than accidental, the author is only
one of many possible intervening agents, including
scribes, compositors, censors, book-keepers, players,
and unidentified playwrights hired to "mend" plays for
revival.[7]  Intratextual evidence is considerably less
controversial, because currente calamo corrections, false
starts, and second shots are presumably authorial, and
presumably products of the initial act of literary
creation.  The conventional explanation for the
reduplications in Love's Labour's Lost, and elsewhere, is
that Shakespeare marked his first drafts for deletion
with some form of theatrical bracket and proceeded
immediately to his second draft, the foul papers were
used as copy in the printing house, and the deletion was
somehow overlooked or misunderstood,  resulting in the
printing of both drafts.  This theory is one possible
explanation for these reduplications, but the evidence is
ambiguous: repetition with variation can be a deliberate
authorial strategy (as it most certainly is throughout
Love's Labour's Lost); alternate versions of speeches or
scenes may be rough papers towards an effect which would
be finalized only in performance (as perhaps, for
example, the duplicate dawn speeches spoken by Romeo at
the end of 2.2, and Friar Lawrence at the opening of 2.3
in Romeo & Juliet Q2 - D4v); and compositors or
proofreaders could conceivably have made such a mess
of a passage that two "drafts" of essentially the same
material could stand in type where only one appeared in
the manuscript copy.  There can also be no certainty as
to which of two consecutive "drafts" actually came first,
nor as to which Shakespeare ultimately may have
preferred.  All of these alternative theories and
uncertainties must be kept in balance, through a sort of
Keatsian "negative capability," in any exploration of
either variety of Shakespearean revision.
 
 
Lyrical Foul Papers and Shakespeare "the Poet"
 
      It is hardly surprising that fossil revisions are
found most prominently in those Shakespearean texts
deemed to be printed from "foul paper" copy, because such
false starts, currente calamo corrections, and
consecutive drafts have always been taken as strong
evidence of an underlying authorial manuscript, usually
in some form preceding fair copy.  This logic is
dangerously circular, however, because these textual
clues are ambiguous until the nature of the printer's
copy has been determined: in "prompt copy" texts, or the
much-maligned "bad" quartos, similar textual phenomena
are often dismissed as playhouse interpolation, textual
corruption, memorial error, or crude approximation.[8]
This paper sets about to explore the ambiguity of the
evidence in the least-contested Shakespearean "foul
paper" text of all: Q1 Love's Labour's Lost (1598).  The
objective is not to challenge the "foul paper"
designation, but to demonstrate the ambiguities in even
the best-established evidence for revision, and perhaps
to raise some questions worthy of consideration.
 
      Although the presence of fossil revisions in "foul
paper" texts is unsurprising, it is striking that the
majority of the Shakespearean examples are concentrated
in four texts with very similar printing histories: the
"good" quartos of Titus Andronicus (1594), Love's
Labour's Lost (1598), Romeo & Juliet (1599), and A
Midsummer Night's Dream (1600).[9]  Although printed over
six years, these two comedies and two tragedies were all
composed within three years of each other - between 1592
and 1595, during and after London's worst plague, and
probably at much the same time that Shakespeare wrote
most of his non-dramatic poetry: Venus & Adonis (1592-3),
The Rape of Lucrece (1593-4), and the earliest Sonnets
(1593-1603).[10]  Intricate thematic and poetic links
connect Titus Andronicus with the Rape of Lucrece, the
Sonnets with Love's Labour's Lost, and Romeo & Juliet
with A Midsummer Night's Dream.  The four plays are all
inherently lyrical, distinctly rhetorical, and
self-consciously "poetic," making greater use of verse
and rhyme than most of the canon, and even presenting
that most undramatic of forms, the sonnet, onstage.[11]
Apparently, during this formative period Shakespeare's
artistic focus tended toward dramatic poetry, rather than
poetic drama: the surviving textual evidence seems to
suggest that in revision the early Shakespeare tinkered
with the prosody and rhetoric of his plays, whereas he
later engaged in wholesale "theatrical" revision of
the major tragedies, such as Hamlet, Othello, King Lear,
and Troilus & Cressida.
 
 
"Polynomials" in Love's Labour's Lost [12]
 
      The title page of Q1 Love's Labour's Lost seems to
announce its value as a record of Shakespearean revision
when it declares itself "Newly corrected and augmented |
By W. Shakespere."[13]  This quarto is perhaps the
least-disputed example of a Shakespearean text printed
from authorial holograph, although it remains manifestly
uncertain whether the text preserves second thoughts from
the original process of composition (as E.K. Chambers and
W.W. Greg argue), or revision for later revival or
occasional performance (as John Dover Wilson and Richard
David assert).[14]  The text preserves a veritable
smorgasbord of textual treasures, from false starts to
"ghost" characters to factual confusions and
contradictions.[15]  Speech prefixes are almost always
inconsistent, often ambiguous, and occasionally missing
altogether.[16]  Furthermore, the play is saturated with
what Randall McLeod has somewhat whimsically labelled
"polynomials": characters with more than one designation
in speech prefixes and stage directions.[17]  In fact,
only a handful of characters are consistently identified
in Q1: the three lords of Navarre, Boyet, and three minor
characters (Marcade of 5.2, the "Lord" of 2.1, and the
Forester of 4.1).  The speech prefixes for all other
characters vacillate between a number of alternatives,
and while this is not necessarily incompatible with
prompt copy,[18] it does suggest underlying holograph
copy, and seems to reveal a great deal about
Shakespeare's composition of the play - although often
the evidence is decidedly ambiguous.[19]
 
      For example, Dull, Costard, Armado, Nathaniel, and
Holofernes are more often than not identified by their
functions in Q1 speech prefixes: Constable, Clown,
Braggart, Curate, and Pedant.[20]  In the first scene,
Dull and Costard are initially identified by function,
but when they introduce themselves in dialogue, their
speech prefixes briefly change to "Antho." and "Cost."
With only four exceptions (3.1.143, 3.1.145, 4.2.142, and
4.3.196), Costard is thereafter always "Clowne," a total
of 78 times.  (Dull tends to be either "Const." or
"Dull." - which may be in itself a functional
designation.)  In their first scene (4.2), Nathaniel and
Holofernes are identified almost entirely by name,
although with some tendency to forgo "Holo." for "Ped.";
in contrast, both 5.1 and 5.3 label the Curate, Pedant,
Braggart, Page, and Clown exclusively by function.
Perhaps the speech prefixes in 4.2 tend toward proper
names because the characters are being introduced for the
first time, but clearly also because of the dialogue
itself - Holofernes and Nathaniel volley addresses back
and forth like a tennis match:
 
      Curat.Nath. Truely M. Holofernes, the epythithes
      are sweetly varried like a scholler at the least...
 
                                    (4.2.8-9; Q1 D4r)
 
      Holo.  Sir Nathaniel, haud credo.
 
                                      (4.2.11; Q1 D4v)
 
      Holo.  Sir Nathaniel, will you heare an extemporall
      Epytaph on the death of the Deare...
 
                                      (4.2.49-50; Q1 E1r)
 
      Nath.  Perge, good M. Holofernes perge, so it shall
      please you to abrogate squirilitie.
 
                                      (4.2.52-3; Q1 E1r)
 
      Ped.  Sir Holofernes, this Berowne is one of the
      Votaries with the King ...
 
                                      (4.2.134-5; Q1 E2r)
 
      Ped.  ... But to return to the Verses, Did they
      please you sir Nathaniel?
 
                                      (4.2.147-8; Q1  E2r)
 
This intensity of name-dropping is not repeated;
Nathaniel is never named in dialogue again, and
Holofernes is named only once more, at 5.1.107.[21]  The
evidence suggests (always assuming that the Q1 speech
prefixes reflect Shakespeare's manuscript) that he vastly
preferred function names for a surprising number of
characters, including Holofernes, Nathaniel, Armado,
Moth, Dull, and even Costard - with the exception of
those lines in which they identify themselves or each
other by name.[22]
 
      Elsewhere, however, variations in Armado's speech
prefixes seem to indicate an underlying irregularity in
the copy.  In 3.1, the "Braggart" and his "Boy" are so
identified, consistently, until 3.1.66, at which they
promptly become "Armado" and his "Page" for the remaining
112 lines for which they are on stage (with the solitary
exception of "Boy." at 3.1.102).  Significantly, this
discontinuity in speech prefixes is matched by a
discontinuity in content: in the first section of the
scene, Armado and Moth are engaging in a lengthy duologue
on the subject of love; their prefixes change the moment
Moth returns with Costard - in what is essentially a new
and independent episode.  The simultaneity of the shift
in content and in labels significantly increases the
likelihood that the origin of the variation was
Shakespeare himself, rather than a scribe or compositor.
It seems at least possible that the separate and
essentially detachable episode with Costard was written
separately, either as an afterthought or an earlier
thought for another (or undecided) context.  The
decisive change in speech prefixes suggests that, at the
very least, some time elapsed between the composition of
the first and second sections of the scene: perhaps only
a short break in sequential writing, but perhaps
something more significant.
 
      Although "Ferdinand K. of Nauar" enters in the
play's initial direction (1.1.0sd; Q1 A2r), he is
identified as simply "Ferd." or "Fer." throughout the
scene.  In 2.1, Boyet and the Princess have already
referred to him as "Nauar" three times before he enters
as "Nauar" (at 2.1.7, 22, and 81), and Boyet's final line
once the Duke is onstage is "Heere comes Nauar" (2.1.89;
Q1 C1r).  It would seem that the foreigners' natural and
repeated use of his geographical title influences his
speech prefixes throughout the scene: the Duke is
consistently "Nau." in speech prefixes - except for lines
2.1.127-175, where he is "Fer." once again.  These 48
lines interrupt the flirting stichomythia of Berowne and
Katherine[23] to discuss politics: the matter of
Aquitaine and a hundred thousand crowns.  Nothing about
the Duke's formal and confrontational manner could
possibly suggest that the more intimate prefix, "Fer.,"
reflects his function here; more likely, it may indicate
that these lines were written separately (either earlier
or later - perhaps chronologically closer to the
composition of 1.1), and were then inserted into 2.1.
Notably, the Duke is suddenly "Nau." again in his exit
line, which
peaceably ignores the disagreement of the preceding
lines: "Thy owne wish wish I thee in euery place"
(2.1.177; Q1 C2v).  And then, just as suddenly, Berowne
is engaging Rosaline in a battle of wit.  Did Shakespeare
originally write a scene in which Berowne went directly
from Katherine to Rosaline, and then insert the material
on Aquitaine?  Or was one bout of stichomythia part of
the insertion, perhaps intended to replace the other?
Berowne's dialogue with Katherine ends with "Nay then
will I be gon" (2.1.126; Q1 C1v), just as he leaves
Rosaline with "I cannot stay thankes-giuing" (2.1.191; Q1
C2v): both seem equally good exit lines.  In view of the
other revisions to Berowne's part, discussed in detail
below, this possibility merits some consideration.
 
      Just as the Duke's first entrance direction is
distinctly different from his speech prefixes throughout
1.1 (perhaps because of some later annotation, authorial
or otherwise), so the Princess of France is proleptically
identified as "Queene" when she first speaks to Boyet in
2.1 (2.1.13), but is consistently "Princess" throughout
the rest of the scene, and indeed for the first half of
the play.[24]  At 4.1.1, however, the "Princess" suddenly
becomes "Queen," and she retains this title, without
exception, for the remainder of the play.
Simultaneously, the newly-minted Queen transforms the
Duke into a King, coyly enough by questioning his
identity: she asks, "Was that the king that spurd his
horse so hard[?]" (4.1.1; Q1 D2r; emphasis mine).  Prior
to this line, the Duke has been many things, but he has
never been "King."  From this point on, for the last two
acts of the play, both the Duke and the Princess are
identified as King and Queen in all of their speech
prefixes, and many times in the dialogue (in fact, the
word "Duke" does not occur at all after 2.1, although the
Princess is still occasionally called "Princess" as late
as 5.2).
 
      The consistent change in the speech prefixes of the
Duke and the Princess, accompanied as it is by somewhat
less consistent changes in the dialogue, argues against
mere compositorial or scribal error or meddling, and
suggests an authorial cause.  If the death of the King of
France, announced by Marcade in 5.2, was not firm in
Shakespeare's mind until the composition of the last two
acts, the inevitability of the Princess' inheritance may
then have been reflected in her speech prefixes, and by
association the Duke may have become her match, in both
romance and rank.  The fact, however, that the Princess
is named ambivalently in later dialogue, while the "King"
is not, would suggest the reverse: that the Duke's
transformation was not secondary, but primary, and that
the Princess/Queen was renamed in his wake.  Perhaps the
"King/Queen" material more directly reflects some lost
source, or an earlier draft which Shakespeare "Newly
corrected and augmented."  Certainly, by Act 4 the
political details of 2.1 have been long forgotten;
perhaps Shakespeare was no longer paying close attention
to the titles of his primary characters.  The
discontinuity in these character designations might also
indicate a discontinuity in Shakespeare's manuscript, and
possibly in the process of composition.  Perhaps in
combination with additional research and a wider variety
of evidence, it will be possible to draw firmer
conclusions.
 
      The ladies of France are variously named, numbered,
titled, and unidentified throughout the text, in ways
which may reflect the inner workings of Shakespeare's
mind in composition, and shed light on the process of
composition and revision in the play.  When they first
appear, in 2.1, the ladies of France are identified
simply as "1. Lady," "2. Lad.," "3. Lad.," or even simply
"Lad." (when Lady 1 is speaking in continuing dialogue).
Shakespeare has neither named nor distinguished their
characters, as they respond to the Princess' query about
the lords of Navarre.  Suddenly, however, Berowne enters
into private discussion with one of the ladies, whose
speech prefixes become "Kather.," although neither he nor
the audience obtains her name until 2.1.208.[25]
Likewise, a second lady is identified as "Ros." the
moment Berowne begins sparring with her at 2.1.179,
although Dumaine and the audience are told her name only
at 2.1.193.  It seems reasonable to theorize that the
ladies of France, particularly Rosaline and Katherine,
became individuated for Shakespeare in this scene
(although modern editors cannot distinguish them here),
and that the speech prefixes reflect this changed
attitude.[26]
 
      Strangely, however, once the Duke and lords leave
the stage and the ladies begin to engage Boyet in witty
discourse, their designations shift back to their earlier
ambiguity.  At first, the shift is subtle (or perhaps it
has been corrected by partial annotation): "Lady Maria"
and "Lady Ka." speak.  When Katherine continues her
dialogue with Boyet, however, her prefixes revert to the
barely sufficient "Lad.," and suddenly "Lad. 2" and "Lad.
3" return.  Clearly, Shakespeare used the ambiguous
"Lad." when he felt that an ongoing dialogue made further
distinctions unnecessary, but the return to numbered
ladies seems quite extraordinary.  Coming as it does at
the moment that Berowne leaves the stage, it suggests
that Shakespeare composed lines 2.1.213-56 separately
from the central passage, perhaps simultaneously with the
earlier lines in which the ladies are also numbered
rather than named.  Throughout the remainder of the play,
the ladies of France are always identified by name in
their speech prefixes.[27]
 
      Although Jaquenetta, as Costard observes in 1.1, can
be labelled in a great many ways, Q1 uses only two.
Costard speaks of her by name three times in the very
first scene (at 1.1.199 and again, twice, at 1.1.299);
the only other occurrence of her name in the first scene
is in Armado's letter, read by the Duke, and here the
very act of naming her is a self-conscious one: "For
Iaquenetta (so is the weaker vessel called) ..."
(1.1.261; Q1 B1r).  When Jaquenetta actually appears
onstage, however, in 1.2, she is consistently designated
"Maid," as if she had not been introduced in the first
scene (or as if the first scene had not yet been
written).  Furthermore, the only use of her name in the
scene is in the problematic line, "Clo. Come, Iaquenetta,
away" (1.2.138; Q1 B3v) - again, spoken by Costard.[28]
With the single exception of 4.2.140, where her speech
prefix lapses to "Mayd," Jaquenetta is identified by name
everywhere except 1.2.  This would seem to suggest that
Shakespeare first created her character in 1.2, uncertain
of her name until Costard's line, and then either wrote
1.1 later, or later inserted the dialogue involving her
name, and perhaps all the dialogue involving Costard (as
mentioned above, the dialogue involving Costard in 3.1
may well have been written separately).[29]  If
Jaquenetta's on-stage lines in 1.2 were indeed written
earlier than 1.1, it might also provide a tempting
argument that Shakespeare intended Armado to meet
Jaquenetta before his lengthy lovesickness in the earlier
half of 1.2.
 
      Unfortunately, although these explanations may have
some validity, there is another which rather thoroughly
undermines the likelihood that Jaquenetta's speech
prefixes can disclose much about Shakespeare's sequence
of composition: just as the Duke enters as "Nauar" in
2.1, apparently in response to the preceding dialogue,
the lines in 1.2 which identify Jaquenetta as "Maid" seem
to follow as a consequence of Armado's address to her: "I
do betray my selfe with blushing: Maide," to which the
"Maide" naturally enough replies, "Man" (1.2.126-7; Q1
B3r), and remains "Maide" for the rest of the scene.
 
      If the variant speech prefixes in Q1 Love's Labour's
Lost do indeed reflect underlying holograph copy, they
occasionally reveal (through a glass darkly) hints of the
authorial process underlying the text, suggestions of the
chronology of composition, and clues to otherwise
unsuspected duplications (like the two wit matches in
2.1).  More commonly, however, it would seem that the
catalyst for Shakespeare's "polynomials" is his own
dialogue - an observation which should prove considerably
unsettling to those who wish to interpret the vague
prefixes of the "bad" quartos as evidence of a reporter's
ignorance.  It would seem that the author himself, just
as a "reporter," can appear unaware of a character's name
until it arises in dialogue.
 
 
The Fossil Revisions in Love's Labour's Lost
 
      As controversial as evidence of intertextual
revision is, and as tenuous as the implications of the
"polynomials" discussed above may be, modern editors and
textual critics almost unanimously agree that two
passages in Q1/F1 Love's Labour's Lost represent
indisputable intratextual evidence of authorial revision.
It would appear that only one "draft" of each of
Berowne's two duplicated speeches - "O we haue made
a Vow to studie, Lordes" (4.3.293-340; Q1 F2r-F3v; see
Appendix A),  and his penance, imposed by Rosaline, to
"iest a tweluemonth in an Hospitall" (5.2.804-53; Q1
K1r-v; see Appendix B) - was intended to stand in the
play, and therefore most editions either relegate the
"first" drafts to an appendix, the textual apparatus, or
editorial brackets.
 
      Although the redundancy of these passages, and the
repetition of words, phrases, and lines between "drafts,"
seems strong evidence, for the moment it is wise to
maintain a healthy skepticism of the "repetition
bracket" theory.  I believe that the following
examination of the apparent alterations between "drafts"
does indeed support the theory of authorial revision in
these passages, but I will close this paper with an
exploration of the ambiguity of such evidence in Love's
Labour's Lost.
 
 
Passage A: "O we haue made a Vow to studie, Lordes"
 
      "Passage A" is perhaps the most solid example of
twin drafts in the quarto.  Lines 8-30 are apparently the
first attempt at Berowne's speech, which Shakespeare
seems to have immediately rewritten in lines 31-78.[30]
As the parallel text in Appendix A visually illustrates,
eight lines are repeated or substantially echoed between
the two drafts, which also have a great many individual
words and ideas in common.  Molly Mahood suggests that,
by the end of the "first" draft, "the rhythm flags, the
diction begins to creep, the logical distinctions of the
speech grow blurred," and so Shakespeare slept on it
(71).  Clearly the final lines of the first draft
were not composed without effort; J.C. Maxwell points out
that line 29, "With ourselves," is probably the
compositor's attempt to make sense of an authorial
interlineation, in combination with two unnoticed
deletions in line 30.[31]  Maxwell convincingly suggests
reading:
 
      with our selues
  Do we not  ^  (likewise) see (our) learning there?
 
These final lines of the first draft are not merely
flagging or blurred; they also begin toying with the very
features which are expanded in the second draft, and
epitomize several of the elements in the first draft
which Shakespeare seems to have abandoned in the
rewritten version.  This intersection of the two drafts
in lines 26-30, more than any other evidence, asserts the
sequence of the drafts as printed, and corroborates the
argument that we are, in fact, dealing with a revised
passage.
 
      Lines 8-16, the opening nine lines of Shakespeare's
"discarded" draft, evidently remained largely
satisfactory to him, although in the "second" draft they
are divided (and in the case of lines 12-13, they are
scattered among other lines).  Minor repetitions and
echoes of the original draft also appear throughout the
second draft: the "fierie Numbers" of line 35 may have
been suggested by the "true Promethean fire" of line 16,
which evidently persisted in Shakespeare's mind until he
restored it as line 64.  "Teaches such beautie" (line 25)
may have suggested "beautis tutors" (36);  the "motion
and long during action" (19) may have suggested
the "motion of all elamentes" (42); and the "Authour in
the worlde" (24) may be echoed in "all the worlde" (66),
and "the authour of these Women" (72).
 
      Both drafts begin with delight in the paradox that
the vow to study is a vow to avoid women's eyes, the true
"Bookes."  Significantly, the first draft uses
second-person pronouns consistently in lines 3-13 and
21-25: "Consider what you first did sweare vnto," "Can
you fast?," "And where that you haue vowd to studie," "In
that each of you haue forsworne his Booke," "Can you
still dreame and poare and thereon looke," "when would
you my Lord, or you, or you ...." [32].  It cannot be
accidental that, at line 26, the first draft seems to
realize the mistake and begins the first-person plural in
earnest, before the draft itself is abandoned:
 
      Learning is but an adiunct to our selfe,
      And where we are, our Learning likewise is.
      Then when our selues we see in Ladies eyes,
      With our selues.
      Do we not likewise see our learning there?
 
It would seem that, even before Shakespeare began the
second draft, he had firmly decided that Berowne should
not insulate himself from those he criticizes, but
implicate himself as well.  Lines 31-2 assert that "we
haue made a Vow to studie, Lordes, | And in that Vow we
haue forsworne our Bookes."  The rhetorical question
initiates a series of second-person pronouns in lines
33-6, and intriguingly they resurface in lines 68-9
(perhaps supporting Staring Wells' argument about these
lines), but the first person returns in lines 74-5, which
sound an unmistakable note of unity:
 
 
      Lets vs once loose our othes to finde our selues,
      Or els we loose our selues, to keepe our othes.
 
      The rhetorical questions themselves are a technique
which fills the first draft; Berowne asks a total of five
questions in the first version (lines 6, 10, 13, 25, 30),
including the troublesome final lines which evidently
brought the first draft to an end.  In the second
version, however, Berowne asks only three questions (at
lines 33 or 36, 53, and 73), the first of which is
carried over from the first draft, and the second of
which hardly seems to qualify as a question ("For
valoure, is not Loue a Hercules").  The shift of pronouns
which implicates Berowne along with his companions also
seems to do away with the first draft's strategy of
repeated rhetorical questions, ultimately leaving only
one new question in the second draft, in the final lines.
This is the question which prompts the Duke's energetic
response, no longer a rhetorical question but one which
elicits precisely the answer Berowne seeks.
 
      The first draft emphasizes the importance of the
woman's "face" (13, 21), but the second remains firmly
fixed in the "eyes" (35, 40, 63), the windows of the soul
and a fertile poetic image, being both organs and objects
of sight, both transparent and reflective.  The first
draft makes use of these qualities in the final lines
(25-30), but for the second draft Shakespeare abandons
most of the metaphysical image, retaining only a hint in
"shew, containe, and nourish all the worlde" (66).  It is
particularly intriguing that the four references to
"eyes" in the first draft (lines 14, 22, 25, and 28) seem
to spring from the line, "From womens eyes this doctrine
I deriue," an aurally-complex and resonant line which is
in fact precisely retained in the second draft.  The
second draft demonstrates the reverse pattern, in which
the five references to "eyes" (lines 35, 40, 46, 47, and
63) gradually build up to the repeated line.  If, for a
moment, we take the "first" draft as the later draft, and
the "second" as the earlier, the pattern would suggest
the following: Shakespeare began the lengthier passage,
in which the eyes feature as one of the five senses
elaborated in lines 45-52, and finally hit upon their use
in the line which both drafts share.  When he turned to
rewrite the passage, he began with the repeated line, and
then followed it up with several references before the
climactic metaphysical image in the final lines.  If,
however, the printed sequence is also the chronological
one (as other evidence would suggest), Shakespeare
clearly decided to save the key line until the end
of Berowne's speech, making it a logical development from
the sensory imagery that precedes it.
 
      The first draft names women "the Ground, the Bookes,
the Achadems," but the second modifies this to "the
Bookes, the Artes, the Achademes." "Ground" seems
connected to line 12 of the first draft, while "Artes"
seems to have been influenced by line 37 of the second.
The second version of these lines also substitutes the
more concrete "They sparcle still the right promethean
fier" for the earlier abstract "From whence doth spring
the true Promethean fire"; the sparkling eyes are a much
more visual image, and make the connection between fire
and eyes more coherent.  The reversal of lines in the
second draft makes possible the sublime conclusion to the
thought in line 66, "That shew, contain, and nourish all
the worlde."
 
      The first draft of this passage seems to depend
heavily upon triplings and triple patterns, whether in
syntax, alliteration, or prosody.  Syntactic triplings
include  "To fast, to study, and to see no woman," "still
dreame and poare and thereon looke," "you my Lord, or
you, or you," and "the Ground, the Bookes, the Achadems."
In contrast, the second draft depends upon quadruple
patterns and pairings, particularly in structural terms.
Four of the five senses are described in lines 46-52, the
first three getting two lines each, and the last one two
balanced half-lines.  Several rhetorical schemes in the
second draft balance four words or elements.  The four
lines of rhetorical gradatio (70-73) develop from
"Wisedome" to "Loue" to "Men" to "Women," a quadruple
pattern which is emphasized by the compositor's use of
capitalization.  Notably, this four-line scheme is neatly
framed by two fourfold repetitions: the chiasmus of lines
68-9 and of lines 74-5.  The triple pattern is not wholly
excised in the second draft; in fact, it is evident in
precisely those lines which have been reused intact from
the first draft (the syntactic tripling of lines 33 and
65, and the rhythmic triad of "From womens eyes this
doctrine I deriue" at line 63), and in the line which
expands upon them, "That shew, containe, and nourish all
the worlde."  The triple patterns of the first draft are
insistent, obvious, and emphatic; in contrast, the second
draft is subtler, more fluent, and more convincing,
drawing in additional examples and bringing additional
rhetorical guns to bear.
 
      The first draft proceeds to discuss, in biological
terms, the poisonous effects of excessive study.  In the
second draft, "vniuersall plodding" has become "leaden
contemplation," perhaps a deliberate pun on the leaden
type used to produce books (as it is in my title).  The
second draft, however, moves beyond the negative effects
of the "Other slow Artes" to discuss the positive
consequences of "Loue" for the mind, senses, and virtues
of the lover: "Loue ... with the motion of all elamentes,
/ Courses as swift as thought in euery power."  It seems
highly significant that the first draft refers to "study"
four times (at lines 4, 8, 12, and 23) , but never to
"love," whereas the second draft refers only
once to "studie," in its first line (31), but eleven
times to "love" or "louers" (at lines 40, 47, 48, 50, 52,
53, 57, 60, 70, 71, and 78).  In rewriting the passage,
Shakespeare's emphasis seems to have shifted from
learning itself, through female beauty ("For where is any
Authour in the worlde, | Teaches such beautie as a
woma[n]s eye"), to the power and divinity of Love itself
("when Loue speakes, the voyce of all the Goddes, | Make
heauen drowsie with the harmonie").
 
      Shakespeare seems to have found mythological
allusion irresistible in the second draft, adding
somewhat gratuitous allusions to Venus, Bacchus,
Hercules, the Hesperides, the Sphinx, and Apollo, all
within a mere five lines (52-6).  Shakespeare's "fatal
Cleopatra," the pun, also sneaks into the second draft,
with a quibble on "braine" and "barraine" at lines 37-8
(a pun I also believe to be found at Twelfth Night
1.5.85, and Troilus & Cressida 1.3.327).  In the second
shot, Shakespeare seems to have consciously added a
self-reflexiveness to his poetry, describing poetry as
the highest form of virtue to be gained from Love (59-
62), before returning again to the doctrine Berowne
derives from women's eyes.  Such poetic
self-reflexiveness also arises in the revised passage
at 5.1.1-22 in A Midsummer Night's Dream, suggesting not
only that Shakespeare was conscious of his role as a poet
in these early plays, but that the very act of revision
focused his attention still more on that role.
 
      Aural effects, obvious in the first draft, become
still more pervasive in the revision.  The sole end-rhyme
proper in the first draft, "Booke | ... looke" (9-10),
disappears entirely in the second (where there are no
end-rhymes).  Half-rhymes in the first draft, such as
"found ... ground" (12), are surpassed in the second by
such as "eare ... heare" (48), and the three-way
"Hercules | trees ... Hesperides" (53-4).  Alliteration
appears in the first draft, such as "vniuersall plodding
poysons vp" (17), "Learning likewise" (27), and "likewise
... learning" (30), but to nowhere near the extent it can
be found in the second:  "haruest ... heauie" (39), "Loue
... learned ... Ladies" (40), "suspitious .
. . stopt" (49), "soft and sensible" (50), "Subtit ...
Sphinx ... sweete" (55), "heauen ... harmonie" (58),
"Poet ... pen" (59), "all ... ought" (67), "were
... women ... forsweare" (68), and "Wisedomes ... word"
(70).  Consonance appears likewise, such as "Appolos
Lute" (56), or "rauish sauage" (61), as well as many
other aural effects too complex to catalogue here.
      While the first draft ends in an image of
metaphysical complexity (the lovers and their learning
held in stasis within the beloveds' eyes), the second
ends in a crescendo of rhetorical virtuosity.  Chiasmus
("fooles ... forsweare | ... sworne ... fooles" - 68-9)
moves through paradox and antonym ("fooles ... Wisedome"
- 69-70) into gradatio and anadiplosis which climaxes in
repetition ("loue ... | Loues ... men ... | Mens ...
Women ... | Womens ... Men ... Men" - 70-3), and ends
once more in chiasmus and paradox ("othes ... selues ...
| selues ... othes" - 74-5).  Finally the revised passage
ends with scriptural manipulation (Romans 13:8) and
wordplay.
 
 
Passage B: "And what to me my Loue? and what to me?"
 
      "Passage B," the second major passage of fossilized
revision in Q1 Love's Labour's Lost, occurs at 5.2.805-53
(Q1 K1r-v).  Lines 1-6 are a considerably abbreviated
version of lines 22-56, but their redundancy cannot be
ignored; it seems quite clear that both drafts cannot
have been intended to stand in the final text.  James
Cunningham argues that Shakespeare began the passage with
the Princess' "sentencing" of the Duke out of respect for
his social position, and then followed his own interest
as it turned to Berowne and Rosaline.  He then realized
that, "by all the laws of interest these two must come
last," and proceeded to the other lovers first
(Cunningham 107).  It is also possible, in view of the
steady increase in Berowne's importance apparent through
the other passages of revision in the text, that
Shakespeare rewrote this passage at a late stage of
composition, heightening Berowne's centrality to the
play beyond that of even the Duke.  The mere six lines of
the first draft of this passage (fewer than spent on the
sentencing of Dumaine!) could never be considered
sufficient for the character that Berowne has become
once these revisions have occurred.
 
      Shakespeare seems to have repeated Berowne's first
line with minor alteration and assigned it to Dumaine
(line 7), but it seems to me that there is considerable
confusion in the Katherine/Dumaine exchange as it stands
in the text:
 
  Duma.  But what to me my Loue? but what to me?
  Kath.  A wife? a beard, faire health, and honestie,
      With three folde loue I wish you all these three.
  Duma.  O shall I say, I thanke you gentle Wife?
  Kath.  Not so my Lord, a tweluemonth and a day,
      Ile marke no wordes that smothfast wooers say,
      Come when the King doth to my Lady come:
      Then if I haue much loue, Ile giue you some.
  Duma.  Ile serue thee true and faythfully till then.
  Kath.  Yet sweare not, least ye be forsworne agen.
 
Editors tend to assign Katherine's first words at line 8
to Dumaine, but they suggest that Dumaine's second line
(10) actually belongs before her first (line 8):
 
  Duma.  O shall I say, I thanke you gentle Wife?
  Kath.  A wife? a beard, faire health, and honestie,
      With three folde loue I wish you all these three.
 
The variation on Berowne's line may simply result from
compositorial eyeskip, although the confusion in lines
11-16 is hard to resolve.
 
      The first, brief draft of the Berowne/Rosaline
passage is unadorned with her  lengthy monologues, and
does not make explicit the appropriateness of the
punishment to Berowne's crime - tending to the sick seems
a perfectly traditional Christian work of mercy.  It is
intriguing, however, that the original version seems to
contain most of the essentials which are expanded in the
second draft.[33]  Berowne's eager and rather
self-centred questions ("And what to me my Loue? and what
to me?") are replaced in the revised draft by a
lengthier, self-consciously poetic speech, in which
Berowne invokes cliches like "the window of my heart"
(23), and the Petrarchan idiom ("humble suite," "seruice"
- 24-5).
Responding to this effusion of hollow poetry, Rosaline
replies with even harsher criticism in the second draft.
The religious implications of the original version
("purged," "sins" - 2) are postponed until her final word
("reformation" - 54), and "faults" (3)  resurfaces only
in lines 51 and 53.[34]  Two lines of criticism expand
into six lines of caustic commentary on Berowne's
reputation.  Images of "weed[s]" and "Wormewood" (32) are
applied to Berowne's humour, and the personification of
"the worlds large tongue" is introduced at line 27.
 
      The teasing irony of Rosaline's original third line,
"Therefore if you my fauor meane to get," persists in the
revised line, "And therewithall to win me, if you please
..." (33).  Rosaline's final lines in the first version
(5-6) are expanded into 35-9, and in some sense permeate
lines 43-54 also.  An impulse to alliteration seems to
structure much of the revision: "A tweluemonth shall you
spend, and neuer rest" (5) becomes "You shall this
tweluemonth terme from day to day, | Visite the
speechlesse sicke" (35-6).  The first version is
remarkably clear of aural effects (with the exception of
the potential pun, "seeke ... sicke," at line 6), but
alliteration or consonance abounds in virtually every
line of the revised passage: "attends ... answer" (24),
"Impose some seruice" (25), "haue ... heard" (26), "man
... mockes" (28), "Full ... floutes" (29), "estetes ...
execute" (30), "within ... wi[t]" (31), "weed ...
Wormewood" (32), "therewithall ... win" (33), "Without
... which ... won" (34), "tweluemonth ... terme ... day
... day" (35), "speechlesse sicke ... still" (36),  "With
... wit" (38), "pained impotent" (39), "Mirth ... moue"
(42), "Why ... way" (43), "begot ... grace" (44), "him
... heares" (47), "Deaft ... deare" (49), "will ...
withall" (51), "finde ... fault" (53), and "Right ...
reformation" (54).  Perhaps the most intricate sound
effects are created by the line "A tweluemonth? Well:
befall what will befall" (55), which also contributes to
the sole rhyming couplet (55-6).[35]
 
      The preceding analysis of the two major passages of
fossil revision in Q1 Love's Labour's Lost, while
acknowledging occasional ambiguities in the evidence and
attempting to consider a variety of explanations for the
evidence, essentially supports the fossil revision
theory.  The rational, consistent, and deliberate
alterations between "drafts" distinctly suggest
Shakespearean revision, rather than compositorial error
or deliberate repetition.  In both cases, if the printed
sequence is also the chronological order, Shakespeare
expanded his first effort, rather than condensing it.
The second drafts indicate a heightening of rhetorical
and aural special effects, subtle shifts in content and
emphasis, and perhaps most significantly, an expansion of
Berowne's significance in the play.[35a]  In Passage A,
Berowne turns from criticism of his companions to
justification of himself, from an emphasis on learning
through beauty to an emphasis on the divine supremacy of
love.  In Passage B, Rosaline's brief description of a
standard Christian penance, or act of mercy, is expanded
to become distinctly appropriate to Berowne, whose
rhetorical flamboyance and poetic artificiality returns
in the second draft.  In Love's Labour's Lost,
Shakespeare's revisions seem geared to increase poetic
artifice and self-consciousness; the extravagant poetry
of the play, like that of Berowne himself, was quite
deliberate and achieved with some effort.  Fortunately,
the first quarto has preserved invaluable evidence of
these poetic labours almost lost.
 
 
Revision or Repetition?
 
      Q1 Love's Labour's Lost, then, contains some of the
least controversial evidence for Shakespearean revision.
It also, however, presents some of the toughest
challenges to that evidence.  Most critics and editors
agree regarding Passages "A" and "B," but more
controversial is, for example, the Princess's "Holde
Rosaline, this Favour thou shalt weare" (5.2.130-4; Q1
G3r), the supposed first draft of which the Oxford
Complete Works consigns to the appendix, while George
Hibbard's Oxford edition and the Riverside Shakespeare
retain both as a single draft, on the grounds that the
repetition is not redundancy but clarification:
 
      Holde Rosaline, this Fauour thou shalt weare,
      And then the King will court thee for his Deare:
      Holde take thou this my sweete, and giue mee thine,
      So shall Berowne take me for Rosaline.
      And change you Fauours two, so shall your Loues
      Woo contrarie, deceyued by these remoues.
 
                           (5.2.130-3; Q1 G3r)
 
Here, it is primarily the repetition of "Hold" which
suggests two drafts; the content of the lines is
essentially complementary rather than redundant.  If
lines 3 and 4 of this passage were meant to replace lines
1 and 2, though, it would suggest an intriguing shift in
emphasis, from the Princess' delight at the thought of
the Duke's confusion, to an eager anticipation of being
courted by Berowne.  Such an increase in the stature and
centrality of the figure of Berowne would also be
consistent with the two major fossils in the text.
 
      More unsettling than inevitable editorial
disagreement over this ambiguous fossil, however, is the
play's heavy reliance on repetition, redundancy,
interruption, and "false starts" as part of a deliberate
authorial strategy.  In Berowne's first speech of the
first scene, variations on the line "the which I hope is
not enrolled there" occur three times (Q1 A2v, 1.1.38,
41, 46).  Duke Ferdinand is interrupted by Costard when
he attempts to read Armado's letter, and the result is a
clearly deliberate false start, a stuttering of "So it is
... So it is ..." (1.1.220, 227; Q1 A4v-B1r).  A
self-interruption, which also looks distinctly like a
compositorial omission or false start, belongs to
Nathaniel at 4.2.100: "Vnder pardon sir, What are the
contentes? or rather as Horace sayes in his, What my
soule verses" (Q1 E1v).  Of course, Holofernes and Armado
both depend heavily on the use of rhetorical copia and
synonyms.  Armado's letter to Ferdinand epitomizes his
diction, which is repetitive and redundant by nature,
using triplings and quadruplings of epithets and
synonyms:
 
      the ebon coloured Incke, which here thou
      viewest, beholdest, suruayest, or seest ...
      that low spirited Swaine, that base Minow of
      thy myrth, (Clowne. Mee?) that vnlettered
      smal knowing soule, (Clow. Mee?) that
      shallow vassall (Clown. Still mee.) which as
      I remember, hight Costard, (Clow. O mee).
 
                                (1.1.237-49; Q1 B1r) [36]
 
      In the second act, Katherine and Berowne repeat the
same question so precisely that the type seems exactly
duplicated:[37]
 
Berowne.  Did not I dance with you in Brabant once?
Kather.  Did not I dance with you in Brabant once?
 
                                (Q1 C1v; 2.1.113-4)
 
The effect is much like that of compositorial eyeskip, or
perhaps an authorial reassignment of a speech, but the
surrounding dialogue makes it clear that this duplication
is deliberate and necessary to the sense of the passage.
 
      In 5.2, Boyet plays middleman in a deliberate
strategy of repetition which finally tries even his own
patience:
 
      Boyet.  What would you with the Princes?
      Berow.  Nothing but peace, and gentle visitation.
      Rosa.  What would they, say they?
      Boy.  Nothing but peace, and gentle visitation.
      Rosa.  Why that they haue, and bid them so be gon.
      Boy. She saies you haue it, and you may be gon.
      King.  Say to her we haue measurd many miles,
      To treade a Measure with her on this grasse.
      Boy.They say that they haue measurd many a mile,
      To tread a Measure with you on this grasse.
      Rosa.  It is not so. Aske them how manie inches
      Is in one mile? If they haue measured manie,
           The measure then of one is easlie tolde.
      Boy. If to come hither, you haue measurde miles,
      And manie miles: the Princesse bids you tell,
      How manie inches doth fill vp one mile?
      Berow.  Tell her we measure them by weerie steps.
      Boy.  She heares her selfe.
                                      (5.2:179-195; Q1 G4r)
 
It would seem that, throughout Love's Labour's Lost,
Shakespeare is challenging us to define unnecessary or
unintentional repetition, deliberately revelling in
rhetorical tropes of copia and repetition.
 
      Faced with the ambiguity of such passages, we can
turn to additional evidence to reinforce our conclusions
about the underlying copy.  Often fossil revisions can be
identified with more certainty when variant texts are
collated.  Although the independent authority of the F1
text of Love's Labour's Lost is questionable at best, it
does make a number of cuts in passages which do indeed
seem repetitive.  Armado's "Fox, Ape, and Humble-Bee"
jig, for example, appears with a triply-repeated refrain
in Q1:
 
        A.  No Page, it is an epilogue or discourse to
      make plaine, Some obscure presedence that hath
      tofore bin saine. I will example it.
           The Fox, the Ape, and the Humble-Bee,
           Were still at oddes being but three.
      Ther's the morrall : Now the lenuoy.
        Pag.  I will adde the lenuoy, say the morrall
      againe.
        Ar.  The Foxe, the Ape, and the Humble-Bee,
           Were still at oddes, being but three.
      Pag.  Vntill the Goose came out of doore,
           And staied the oddes by adding foure
           Now will I begin your morrall, and do you
           follow with my lenuoy.
          The Foxe, the Ape, and the Humble-Bee,
           Were still at oddes, being but three.
      Arm.  Vntill the Goose came out of doore,
           Staying the oddes by adding foure.
 
                       (Q1 C4v, 3.1.78-94, emphasis mine)
 
As with so many reduplications, there is little in the
text to indicate redundancy with any certainty, but F1
seems to have attempted to "correct" this passage by
deleting nine lines of Armado's dialogue:
 
                                (plaine,
  Ar.  No Page, it is an epilogue or discourse to make
      Some obscure precedence that hath tofore bin saine.
      Now will I begin your morrall, and do you follow
      with my lenuoy.
          The Foxe, the Ape, and the Humble-Bee,
           Were still at oddes, being but three.
  Arm.  Vntill the Goose came out of doore,
      Staying the oddes by adding foure.
 
                      (F1 L4v, TLN 855-68, 3.1.78-94)
 
Although the F1 alternative certainly eliminates the
repetition of the Q1 version of this passage, the
confusion of speech prefixes in F1 certainly suggests
some kind of unusual compositorial eyeskip rather than
deliberate editing.  Ultimately, then, this is unlikely
to represent an unintentional duplication, or fossilized
revision.
 
      Likewise, F1 omits Holofernes' admiration for
Mantuan at 4.2.98, which may be redundant (it does
express much the same thought as the Italian tag
immediately preceding it in Q1):
 
        Nath.  Facile precor gellida, quando pecas omnia
      sub vmbra ruminat, and so foorth.  Ah good olde
      Mantuan, I may speake of thee as the traueiler doth
      of Venice, vemchie, vencha, que non te vnde, que
      non te perreche.  Olde Mantuan, olde Mantuan, Who
      vnderstandeth thee not, loues thee not, vt re sol
      la mi fa: Vnder pardon sir, What are the contentes?
      or rather as Horrace sayes in his, What my soule
      verses.
                                      (4.2.91-100; Q1 E1v)
 
But in Nathaniel's ruminations, rather as in the mad
scenes of King Lear, how can we really distinguish
between deliberate and accidental inconsistency,
repetition, redundancy, or incoherence?
 
 
Summary
 
      Less controversial than intertextual evidence for
Shakespearean revision in the major tragedies is
intratextual evidence in his early plays, particularly
the quartos apparently based on authorial holograph. In
particular, four "foul paper" plays (Titus Andronicus,
Love's Labour's Lost, Romeo & Juliet, and A Midsummer
Night's Dream) contain the majority of "fossilized"
revision: inconsistencies, repetitions, and redundancies.
This intratextual revision is more poetic and less
theatrical than the later, intertextual variety, although
equally hypothetical and ambiguous: consecutive "drafts"
may actually represent deliberate repetition,
compositorial or editorial error, or alternative options
which Shakespeare left to be decided in rehearsal.
 
      Furthermore, much of the evidence in the "good"
quartos looks dangerously like that in the "bad" ones: an
examination of variant speech prefixes, or "polynomials,"
in Q1 Love's Labour's Lost suggests that Shakespeare,
like a supposed "reporter," could often appear unaware of
character names unless they were prominent in dialogue.
Foul-paper "drafts" and confusions also resemble some
confusions in early "bad" quartos like Q1 2 Henry VI.
The "polynomials" in Q1 Love's Labour's Lost also seem to
suggest some discontinuities in the underlying copy, and
may help identify passages which were written out of
their published sequence, or at some chronological remove
from their contexts - particularly when they occur
simultaneously with consistent changes in the content of
the dialogue.
 
      Close readings of the two best-known textual
fossils, "O we haue made a Vow to studie Lordes" (LLL Q1
F2v-3v; 4.3.293-340) and "And what to me my Loue?" (LLL
Q1 K1r-v; 5.2.805-53), reveal deliberate and consistent
revisions in rhetoric, content, and poetic effects.
Shakespeare, it would seem, has deliberately heightened
the poetic artifice and self-consciousness of his lines,
increasing Berowne's centrality to the play and further
developing his character.  Yet this solid evidence for
authorial revision appears in a text in which
inconsistency, repetition and redundancy are part of
Shakespeare's comic strategy, and hence in which
apparent "revisions" are rendered unusually ambiguous.
 
 
                      Notes
 
1.    This paper has evolved from ongoing research for my
thesis, "The Second Heat Upon the Muse's Anvil": Poetic
Revision in Shakespeare's Early Plays.  I am pleased to
acknowledge the support of the Social Sciences and
Humanities Research Council of Canada for my course of
study.
 
2.    The growing critical acceptance of revision theory
has been in large measure due to the impact of two books:
Steven Urkowitz's Shakespeare's Revision of King Lear
(1980), and the collection edited by Gary Taylor and
Michael Warren, The Division of the Kingdoms:
Shakespeare's Two Versions of King Lear (1983).  The
arguments posed in these works were firmly entrenched by
the Oxford Complete Works (1986), which prints edited
texts of both Q1 and F1 King Lear.
 
3.    Random Cloud insists that we must look "away from
the editor's ideal single version - the so-called
'definitive text' - to the author's actual multiple
versions: an infinitive text" (111).  The Oxford
Shakespeare's two texts of King Lear, or perhaps better,
Michael Warren's parallel text facsimile, are steps in
this direction, which may ultimately lead to an
electronic hypertext edition, which could offer continual
choice between facsimile, edition, and editorial
apparatus.
 
4.    The term "fossil revision" seems to have been coined
by Fredson Bowers (cited by Honigmann, 22).
 
5.    Mahood, 84.  Molly Mahood explores process in
Shakespeare's art, including a variety of alternate
versions, such as ghost characters, conflicting plot
details, and other evidence of Shakespeare's "inspired
carelessness" (70).
 
6.    Honigmann, 167.
 
 
7.    The term is that used repeatedly by Philip Henslowe
in his business records.  (See Foakes & Rickert, eds.,
Henslowe's Diary.)
 
8.    I am thinking in particular of Q1 The First Part of
the Contention betwixt the two famous houses of York and
Lancaster (the "bad" quarto of 2 Henry VI), which
contains a number of redundant passages which look
more than a little like those in Q1 Love's Labour's Lost;
and of Q1 Hamlet, in which speech prefixes show some of
the same variations I observe below in a "foul paper"
text.
 
9.    Although it is not possible to explore the specific
passages in all of these texts, a good indication of
their locations is provided in the Oxford Shakespeare
Textual Companion.  In A Midsummer Night's Dream, the
"fossils" themselves are hypothetical, based on
mislineation which suggests marginal revisions.  Of
course intratextual revision also occurs in conjunction
with intertextual revision in the later tragedies, but my
focus here remains on the early plays.
 
10.   The chronology used here is that presented in Gary
Taylor's "The Canon and Chronology of Shakespeare's
Plays," in the Oxford Shakespeare Textual Companion.
 
11.   George Hibbard observes that "no fewer than 43.1 per
cent of the total lines in Love's Labour's Lost and 45.5
per cent of those in A Midsummer Night's Dream are
rhymed.  No other of Shakespeare's comedies comes
anywhere near to approaching them in this respect.
Their closest rival is The Comedy of Errors, with 21.5
per cent... .  Romeo and Juliet, with 16.6 per cent,
[has] more than any other of the tragedies"
(Introduction, 43-4).
 
12.   Quotations from Love's Labour's Lost will be taken
from the Q1 facsimile in the collection edited by Michael
J.B. Allen and Kenneth Muir.  Obsolete typographical
features must regrettably be normalized here.  Lineation
is keyed to George Hibbard's new Oxford edition, and is
supplemented by references to Q1 signatures, where
appropriate.  Quotations from other works of Shakespeare
are referenced to the lineation of the Riverside
Shakespeare.
 
13.   Q1 A1r.  This introduces a new level of ambiguity to
the evidence, of course; if the revised passages are
literally "new" in 1598, they would have to represent
revision after performance, perhaps for revival - what
would be essentially intertextual revision rather than
currente calamo corrections in the original foul papers.
George Price argues that "the omission of a period after
'augmented' should be attributed to a mere oversight by
the publisher or compositor rather than to an implication
that Shakespeare was only the reviser, not the author"
(406), but the presence of such a period would support
Guy Lambrecht's argument that a non-Shakespearean reviser
was involved.  Price's investigation of casting-off
errors in Q1 contradicts E.K. Chamber's suggestion that
Q1 was set from an annotated earlier (and non-extant) Q0.
 
14.   Price, 409.
 
15.   Consider Jaquenetta's blatant error (and
self-contradiction) at 4.2.128: "I sir from one mounsieur
Berowne, one of the strange Queenes Lordes" (Q1 E2r).
 
16.   For example, no speech prefix is supplied for "The
vvordes or Mercurie, are harsh after the | songes of
Apollo" (5.2.911; Q1 K2v), and "The partie is gone" reads
more like a line of dialogue than a stage direction
(5.2.661 ;Q1 I3r).  The prefix "B." is ambiguous before
"Ver begin" (5.2.874 ;Q1 K2r) - Armado's speech is
immediately before, identified as "Brag.," so perhaps
Berowne is intended.  Likewise, "Lady" (in its various
states of abbreviation) variously refers to Rosaline,
Katherine, Maria, and perhaps even the Princess of
France.  And although care is usually taken to identify
Moth as "Page." rather than "Boy." whenever Boyet shares
the stage ("Boy." refers 43 times to Armado's page and 28
times to Boyet), at 5.2.701 (Q1 I3v) it is significantly
unclear who speaks "True, and it was inioyned him in Rome
for want of Linnen: since when, Ile be sworne he wore
none, but a dish-cloute of Jaquenettaes, and that a
weares next his hart for a Fauour": either Boyet
continues to mock Armado, or Moth's speech prefix has
suddenly changed and he is reporting actual past events.
(I am inclined to the former, although most editions
choose the latter, interpretation.)
 
17.   McLeod, 49.
 
18.   In "The Psychopathology of Everyday Art," Random
Cloud has put forth a convincing argument that prompt
copy is often inconsistent (using the examples of George
Bernard Shaw, Shakespeare, and John Barton), and that
editors "wrectify" texts in obliterating these
variations: "however we try to explain it, we must not
explain it away" (142).  In "Stage Directions: A
Misinterpreted Factor in Determining Textual Provenance,"
William Long observes that "regularity and consistency of
theatrical marking is most emphatically what these
manuscripts [Elizabethan promptbooks] do not demonstrate"
(134).
 
19.   Another level of ambiguity, which I have not been
able to incorporate in this paper, stems from Price's
argument that the abbreviation of speech prefixes vary
with compositors in this text (Price, 418).  I have not
yet been able to consider the evidence in relation to the
compositor stints he suggests.
 
20.   It is conceivable that Shakespeare might have
thought of his characters in generic terms before
assigning them names, or that the names were not so
significant as the functions to him.  It is also possible
that a playhouse scribe, annotating or transcribing the
play, might smooth out inconsistencies by assigning
functional labels to these characters.  It is even
possible that a reporter might describe characters by
function out of ignorance.  What is not likely, however,
is that a compositor would impose generic speech prefixes
if proper names stood in the copy text; if the compositor
was indeed setting from "foul papers," these speech
prefixes are very likely authorial.  For the purposes of
this survey, variant abbreviated forms (e.g. "Ferd.,"
"Fer.," and "Ferdinand") will not be distinguished.
 
21.   Although strangely, Q1 here has "Ped." speaking to
"Sir Holofernes," as at 4.2.134 above.  Hibbard's edition
emends the dialogue in each case to "Sir Nathaniel," but
this solution is not completely satisfying.  In any
event, this is the only occurrence in dialogue of one of
their names after scene 4.2.
 
22.   It is particularly surprising, however, that Costard
is consistently "Clo." throughout the lines in 3.1 at
which Moth puns on "a Costard broken in a shin" (3.1.67;
Q1 C4v).  It is only 76 lines later, once Armado and Moth
have left the stage and Costard is speaking to Berowne,
that his speech prefix suddenly becomes "Cost." once more
(3.1.143; Q1 D1v).
 
23.   Although editors unanimously agree that Berowne must
be flirting with Rosaline here, and therefore alter
Katherine's speech prefixes, I see no reason why the
readings of Q1 cannot be allowed to stand.  Indeed, it
seems to me that the humour is heightened if Berowne
unsuccessfully attempts to court both ladies in this
scene - and this would make thematic sense, in connection
with the masquing confusion of 5.2.  Q1 and F1 present a
similar situation in the masquing scene, in which Maria
seems to attract the attention of both Dumaine and
Longaville (5.2.242-55; Q1 H1r-v).  Grace Ioppolo suggests
too that these passages could stand in the text:
 
     ...it does not seem unusual that Berowne, chafing at
     his vow to avoid women, would speak to Katherine,
     particularly since he apparently met her in the company
     of Rosaline at the home of the Duke of Alencon.  (191)
 
 
24.   The editors of F1 may have attempted to correct the
Princess' speech prefix at 2.1.13 with a marginal note,
which the compositor clearly misunderstood: F1 retains
the "Queen" designation, but inserts a "Prin." speech
prefix at 2.1.20, in the middle of the speech.
 
25.   In both Q1 and F1, Berowne asks "Whats her name in
the capp?," to which Boyet replies "Katherin by good
happ" (2.1.208, Q1 C2v).  Modern editions emend this line
to "Rosaline by good hap" - erroneously, I would argue.
 
26.   Of course, if one accepts the argument that
promptbook annotators would seek to correct ambiguous
speech prefixes, it is also possible that such a
non-authorial annotation is responsible for the naming
(or mis-naming) of the ladies in these lines.  (But
William Long refutes that argument.)
 
27.   Only two abnormalities occur: at 5.2.53 and 5.2.57,
Maria is identified as "Marg." (probably a compositorial
misreading of "Mary" or "Maria," or less likely an
authorial slip for the name of the least prominent
lady), and at 5.2.552 an unidentified "Lady." cries out
"Great thankes great Pompey."  It seems highly unlikely
that Shakespeare would revert to this designation so late
in the play, after demonstrating almost perfect
consistency in the use of proper names for Rosaline,
Katherine, and Maria, but it seems still more unlikely
that he would use this term for the Princess of France,
as modern editors generally claim - nowhere else in
the entire text does "Lady" ever refer to the Princess
(or Queen, as she is identified in this scene).
 
28.   Q1 and F1 use the speech prefix "Clo.," which refers
only to Costard throughout the play.  The modern
editorial consensus, which reassigns this speech to Dull,
is based on the misguided assumption that Dull should
speak this line immediately before his exit with
Jaquenetta.  This overlooks considerable humour in
Shakespeare's original staging: it is highly appropriate
that Costard should try to exit at this point, with
Jaquenetta on his arm, because only such an action would
provoke Armado's next line (to stop him short):
"Villaine, thou shalt fast for thy offenses ere thou be
pardoned" (1.2.140; Q1 B3v).
 
29.   It would be intriguing to attempt to demonstrate
that Costard was a late authorial afterthought, added to
the Armado/Jaquenetta subplot as a rustic foil, perhaps
in the tradition of the Petrarchan pastourelle, in which
a courtly man competes with a peasant boy in an attempt
to seduce a peasant girl (detailed by Leonard Forster in
The Icy Fire, 87).
 
30.   To facilitate concentrated references to these
revised passages, which do not appear complete or
sequentially in most editions, I will use the simplified
through-numbers in Appendices A and B.  Staring Wells
suggests that lines 68-78 are the completion of the first
draft of this passage, and that lines 31-67 represent a
marginally-inserted second draft.  This explanation may
help justify the awkwardness of line 67, but rejects the
currente calamo nature of the revision.  Guy Lambrechts
argues that a mediocre non-Shakespearean revisor
attempted to replace the longer passage with the shorter
one, which was printed earlier; I dispute that argument.
 
31.   Price's bibliographical analysis suggests that, in
casting-off, allowance was made for two and a half lines
to follow the "mysterious half line" (line 29), but I
find his speculation less convincing than the simplicity
of Maxwell's argument (Price 414).
 
32.   Although the second-person pronouns of line 11 are
repeated verbatim in the second draft, at line 33, they
take on a very different quality there, in the context of
first-person plural pronouns, and seem no longer so much
accusations as rhetorical questions.  (In quotations from
the Appendices, as here, emphasis will be added without
specific notation.)  Grace Ioppolo observes the first
alteration of pronouns in this passage (184), but I arrived
at this argument independently, in a 1988 graduate paper
on which this paper is in part based.
 
33.   It may be that the first version represents a
marginal memorandum at the point of breaking off
composition.  Honigmann detects such memoranda in a
number of plays, particularly Timon of Athens, which was
set from particularly "foul" papers (148).  He theorizes
that they might serve as reminders for the next few
speeches, jotted down before the author breaks off for
the evening or any break in composition.
 
34.   Rosaline's use of the word "periurie" may carry
overtones of Shakespeare's use in Romeo and Juliet at
2.2.92-3:  "at Louers periuries / They say Ioue laught."
 
35.   It may well be significant that both drafts of the
interchange between Rosaline and Berowne are in unrhymed
verse, but are found in a fully rhymed context.  The
Katherine / Dumaine and Maria / Longaville exchanges,
found between the first and second drafts of this
passage, are fully rhymed, as are the Princess' final
lines and the Duke's speech immediately before the
passages, and the dialogue immediately following (with
the exception of line 5.2.854, also spoken by the
Princess).  If the move to blank verse was not a
deliberate strategy to heighten the gravity of Berowne's
offense, it may reflect a discontinuity in composition.
 
35a.  Ioppolo is apparently the first scholar to note the
confluence of revision on the character of Berowne --
the implications of which have yet to be fully investigated.
(See Ioppolo, 184, 187).
 
36.   All the modern editions consulted (Hibbard's Oxford,
the Oxford Complete Works, David's Arden, and Evan's
Riverside) obscure the nature of these interjections by
removing them from parentheses and treating them as
distinct speeches.  Costard's interruptions in Q1 and F1
are visually more intrusive, and preserve the textual
suggestion that they may have been afterthoughts,  like
Hamlet's marginal interjections "That's wormwood" and "If
she should breake it now" in 3.2 (Hamlet Q2 H2r-v).
 
37.   Again, I argue that the Q1/F1 speech prefixes should
not be emended.
 
 
 
 
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