The Devil is an Ass

The Devil is an Ass

The Devil is an Ass was first printed in 1631, and was probably put into circulation at that time, either as a separate pamphlet or bound with Bartholomew Fair and The Staple of News. Copies of this original edition were, in 1640-1, bound into the second volume of the First Folio of Jonsons collected works.[1] In 1641 a variant reprint edition of The Devil is an Ass, apparently small, was issued in pamphlet form. The play reappears in all subsequent collected editions. These are: (1) the Third Folio, 1692; (2) a booksellers edition, 1716 [1717]; (3) Whalleys edition, 1756; (4) John Stockdales reprint of Whalleys edition (together with the works of Beaumont and Fletcher), 1811; (5) Giffords edition, 1816; (6) Barry Cornwalls one-volume edition, 1838; (7) Lieut. Col. Francis Cunninghams three-volume reissue (with some minor variations) of Giffords edition, 1871; (8) another reissue by Cunningham, in nine volumes (with additional notes), 1875. The Catalogue of the British Museum shows that Jonsons works were printed in two volumes at Dublin in 1729. Of these editions only the first two call for detailed description, and of the others only the first, second, third, fifth, and eighth will be discussed. 1631. Owing to irregularity in contents and arrangement in different copies, the second volume of the First Folio has been much discussed. Gifford speaks of it as the edition of 1631-41.[2] Miss Bates, copying from Lowndes, gives it as belonging to 1631, [xii] reprinted in 1640 and in 1641.[3] Ward says substantially the same thing.[4] In 1870, however, Brinsley Nicholson, by a careful collation,[5] arrived at the following results. (1) The so-called editions of the second volume assigned to 1631, 1640, and 1641 form only a single edition. (2) The belief in the existence of the so-called first edition of the second volume in 1631 is due to the dates prefixed to the opening plays. (3) The belief in the existence of the volume of 1641 arose from the dates of Mortimer and the Discoveries, all the copies of which are dated 1641, and of the variant edition of The Devil is an Ass, which will next be described. (4) The 1640 edition supplies for some copies a general title-page, R. Meighen, 1640, but the plays printed in 1631 are reprinted from the same forms. Hazlitt arrives at practically the same conclusions.[6] The volume is a folio by measurement, but the signatures are in fours. ......Buy Now (To Read More)

Product details

Ebook Number: 50150
Author: Jonson, Ben
Release Date: Oct 7, 2015
Format: eBook
Language: English

Contributors

Editor: Cook, Albert S. (Albert Stanburrough), 1853-1927 , Johnson, William Savage, 1877-1942