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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 29 August 2010
I. The first edition of Romeo and Juliet was published in 1597, with the following title:
An | Excellent | conceited Tragedie | OF | Romeo and Iuliet, | As it hath been often (with great applause) | plaid publiquely, by the right Ho-|nourable the L. of Hunsdon | his Seruants. | London, | Printed by Iohn Danter. | 1597. |
After Sig. D, a smaller type is used for the rest of the play, and the running title is changed from ‘The most excellent Tragedie, of Romeo and Iuliet’ to ‘The excellent Tragedie of Romeo and Iuliet.’
The text of this first Quarto differs so widely from that of later and more perfect editions, that it is impossible to record the results of a collation in foot-notes: we have therefore reprinted it. When we refer to it in the notes, it is designated as (QI), the marks of parenthesis being used as in similar cases previously.
An opinion has been entertained by some critics that in this earliest Quarto we have a fairly accurate version of the play as it was at first written; and that in the interval between the publication of the first and second Quartos, the play was revised and recast by its author into the form in which it appears in the edition of 1599. A careful examination of the earlier text will, we think, prove this notion to be untenable.
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