The Tragedy of Arthur A Novel

396 Pages·2011·2.34 MB·English

by  Phillips Arthur

A W S
LSO BY ILLIAM HAKESPEARE
•
The Taming of the Shrew
Edward III
Henry VI, Parts I–III (with Nashe, et al.)
The Two Gentlemen of Verona
Titus Andronicus (with George Peele)
Richard III
Venus and Adonis
The Rape of Lucrece
The Sonnets
The Comedy of Errors
Love’s Labour’s Lost
Love’s Labour’s Won (lost)
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Romeo and Juliet
Richard II
King John
The Merchant of Venice
Henry IV, Parts I–II
Much Ado About Nothing
Henry V
As You Like It
Julius Caesar
Hamlet
The Merry Wives of Windsor
Sir Thomas More (with Munday, et al.)
Twelfth Night
Troilus and Cressida
Othello
Measure for Measure
All’s Well That Ends Well
Timon of Athens
(with Thomas Middleton)
King Lear
Macbeth (with Thomas Middleton)
Antony and Cleopatra
Coriolanus
Pericles (with George Wilkins)
Cymbeline
The Winter’s Tale
The Tempest
Cardenio (with John Fletcher—lost)
Henry VIII (with John Fletcher)
The Two Noble Kinsmen
(with John Fletcher)
A A P
LSO BY RTHUR HILLIPS
•
Prague
The Egyptologist
Angelica
The Song Is You

Copyright © 2011 by Arthur Phillips
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Random House, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a
division of Random House, Inc., New York.
R H and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
ANDOM OUSE
No reprint, performance, or recital of The Tragedy of Arthur is allowed under international copyright laws
without express written permission of Arthur Phillips.
L C C D
IBRARY OF ONGRESS ATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION ATA
Phillips, Arthur.
The tragedy of Arthur: a novel / by Arthur Phillips.
p. cm.
eISBN: 978-0-679-60506-5
I. Title.
3616.h45t73 2011
PS
813′.6—dc22 2010021192
www.atrandom.com
Jacket design and illustration: Ben Wiseman
v3.1
Contents
Cover
Other Books by This Author
Title Page
Copyright
Preface
Introduction
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
The Tragedy of Arthur
Lines of Succession to the British Throne
List of Parts
Synopsis
Act I
Scene I
Scene II
Scene III
Scene IV
Scene V
Act II
Scene I
Scene II
Scene III
Scene IV
Scene V
Scene VI
Scene VII
Scene VIII
Scene IX
Act III
Scene I
Scene II
Scene III
Act IV
Scene I
Scene II
Scene III
Scene IV
Act V
Scene I
Scene II
Scene III
Scene IV
Scene V
Notes
About the Authors
PREFACE
Random House is proud to present this first modern edition of The Tragedy of
Arthur by William Shakespeare.
Until now, Shakespeare’s dramatic canon consisted of thirty-eight or thirty-
nine plays, depending on whose scholarship one trusted and whose edition of the
Complete Works one owned. Thirty-six plays were included in the so-called First
Folio of 1623, published seven years after the playwright’s death. Two more—
collaborations, likely delayed for copyright reasons—were added to subsequent
seventeenth-century collections. A thirty-ninth play, Edward III, has over the last
two decades garnered increasing academic support as having been written, at
least in part, by Shakespeare, but it was published only anonymously in his
lifetime and is by no means universally acknowledged as a Shakespeare play. A
further two works—Cardenio and Love’s Labour’s Won—are referred to in
historical documents, but no copies of either have survived. Another dozen or so
plays—the so-called Apocrypha—do exist and are debated, but none have
acquired anything approaching scholarly consensus as being the work of
Shakespeare.
The Tragedy of Arthur was published as a quarto in 1597. Its cover’s claim
that the text is “newly corrected and augmented” implies a previous version now
lost, but this 1597 edition was, as far as we now know, the first play to be printed
with Shakespeare’s name on the title page, predating Love’s Labour’s Lost by
one year. Likely banned, or at least judged politically dangerous and therefore
excluded from the 1623 folio, the play apparently fell into disfavor, and only one
copy of that 1597 quarto has so far been discovered. It was not found until the
1950s, and has been held in a private collection until now. The Tragedy of Arthur
is, therefore, the first certain addition to Shakespeare’s canon since the
seventeenth century.
The story it tells is not the legend of Camelot most readers know. There is no
sword in the stone, no Lancelot, no Round Table, no Merlin or magic. Instead,
Shakespeare seems to have worked from his usual source for history plays,
Raphael Holinshed’s 1587 Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland. The
resulting plot is something more like King Lear, a violent argument of
succession in Dark Ages Britain. But, like Lear, it is about so very much more,
and the white heat that courses through the whole structure is Shakespeare’s
unmistakable imagination and language.
Many people have worked with great dedication to make this book possible. It
could not have come to pass without the academic leadership of Professor
Roland Verre, who has overseen the research and tests that have confirmed the
play’s authenticity and William Shakespeare as its sole or primary author.
Professor Verre submitted the text to a battery of computerized stylistic and
linguistic examinations, solicited the critical opinions of his peers on three
continents, and supervised the forensic study of the 1597 document’s paper and
ink. Academic opinion has steadily grown in volume and certainty over the past
year, and there is now no notable voice in Shakespearean studies who questions
the authenticity of The Tragedy of Arthur.
Our gratitude extends equally to the dozens more professors of English
language and literature, theater directors, linguists and critics, historians and
Shakespeare experts who formed our ad hoc advisory board, as well as the
specialists in ink, paper, and printing led by Dr. Peter Bryce, and a legion of
researchers, editorial assistants, and legal experts. The contributions of
Professors David Crystal, Tom Clayton, and Ward Elliott (whose Claremont
Shakespeare Clinic conducted the stylometry tests) demand particular
recognition.
This first edition comes with a unique appreciation by a Random House
author, Arthur Phillips. As his family played a central role in bringing the play to
light and corroborating its authenticity, he was invited to write a brief
introduction to this monumental work, even though he certainly does not claim
to be a Shakespeare expert. He also edited and annotated the text of the play.
Professor Verre has kindly amended some of Mr. Phillips’s notes.
Despite Phillips’s importance to the work’s discovery, we would suggest that
general readers plunge directly into the play, allowing Shakespeare to speak for
himself, at least at first. Then, if some background is helpful, look to this very
personal Introduction or to the many other commentaries sure to be available
soon.
THE EDITORS
Random House/Modern Library
January 2011