Author: DRAMA.
Title: The Old English Drama. A Collection of Plays from the Old English Dramatists.
Description: London: Printed for Hurst, Robinson, and Co...., 1825, 1824. 2 volumes. 8vo, 182 x 111 mms., pp. [iv], iv, 90, [8], 99 [100 colophon], [6], 79 [80 blank], [10], 106; [ii], xxii, [4], 82, [iv], [iv], 72, xii, [iv], 63 [64 blank], [xii], 78, [2], with woodcut title-page before first play in volume 1 and after first play in volume 2, publisher's advert in volume 1 before The Rape of Lucrece announcing a series of 12 plates of Der Freischütz, with a note in a contemporary hand "With a Travesty of the Drama," separate title-pages and imprints for each play, contemporary half calf, gilt spines, marbled boards; spines dried, joints cracked, boards a bit rubbed, with the contemporary autograph "H. Alleyne Nicholson" on the recto of the free end-paper in each volume. The owner was almost certainly Henry Alleyne Nicholson (1844 - 1899), the biologist and palaeontologist. The plays in volume 1 are The Second Maiden's Tragedy, A Pleasant Conceited Comedy, The Ball, and The Rape of Lucrece; in volume 2, Love's Mistress, or the Queen's Masque, Albertus Wallenstein, Dido, Queen of Carthage, and The Lady's Privilege. The publisher's advert mentioned above indicates that the plays were issued separately as part of a series, with the 1824 title-pages "Printed for Charles Baldwyn." The inclusion of two plays, Albertus Wallerstein and The Lady's Privilege by the virtually unknown Henry Glapthorne Glapthorne did not lead to a revival of performances of his plays, but his surviving works were edited and published in 1874. The first play in volume 1, The Second Maiden's Tragedy is printed from a manuscript in the Lansdown Collection and appears to be the first printing of the play.

Keywords: Drama printing history


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