Ben Jonson folios

The folio collections of Ben Jonson's works published in the seventeenth century were crucial developments in the publication of English literature and English Renaissance drama. The first folio collection, issued in 1616, [Brady and Herendeen, pp. 11-22 and ff.] treated stage plays as serious works of literature instead of popular ephemera — at the time, a controversial position. The 1616 folio stood as a precedent for other play collections that followed — most notably the First Folio of Shakespeare's plays in 1623, but also the first Beaumont and Fletcher folio of 1647, and other collections that were important in preserving the dramatic literature of the age for subsequent generations.

The first folio, 1616

The first Jonson folio of 1616, printed and published by William Stansby and sold through bookseller Richard Meighen, [When printers like Stansby acted as publishers, they usually had to arrange with one or more booksellers to sell their books — as, for one example, Thomas Creede sold his books through William Barley.] contained nine plays, all previously published, plus two works of non-dramatic poetry, thirteen masques, and six "entertainments."

*Plays:
** "Every Man in His Humour"
** "Every Man out of His Humour"
** "Cynthia's Revels"
** "The Poetaster"
** ""
** "Volpone"
** "Epicoene, or the Silent Woman"
** "The Alchemist"
** ""

* Poetry:
** "Epigrams"
** "The Forest"

* Masques:
** "The Masque of Blackness"
** "The Masque of Beauty"
** "Hymenaei"
** "The Hue and Cry After Cupid"
** "The Masque of Queens"
** "The Speeches at Prince Henry's Barriers"
** "Oberon, the Faery Prince"
** "Love Freed from Ignorance and Folly"
** "Love Restored"
** "A Challenge at Tilt, at a Marriage"
** "The Irish Masque at Court"
** "Mercury Vindicated from the Alchemists"
** "The Golden Age Restored"

* Entertainments:
** "The King's Entertainment in Passing to His Coronation" ["The Coronation Triumph"]
** "A Panegyre, on the Happy Entrance of James"
** "A Particular Entertainment of the Queen and Prince (at Althorp)" ["The Satyr"]
** "A Private Entertainment of the King and Queen (on May-Day)" ["The Penates"]
** "The Entertainment of the Two Kings (of Great Britain and Denmark)" ["The Hours"]
** "An Entertainment of King James and Queen Anne"

The first five of the masques, from "Blackness" through "Queens", had been printed previously, as had three of the entertainments, the "Panegyre", and the "Epigrams".

The abortive 1631 addition

In 1631 Jonson planned a second volume to be added to the 1616 folio, a collection of later-written works to be published by Robert Allot. [Allot was a member of the syndicate of booksellers who published the Shakespeare Second Folio in 1632.] Jonson, however, became dissatisfied with the quality of the printing (by John Beale), and cancelled the project. Three plays were set into type for the projected collection, and printings of those typecasts were circulated — though whether they were sold commercially or distributed privately by Jonson is unclear. The three plays are:
* "Bartholomew Fair"
* "The Devil is an Ass"
* "The Staple of News"

Allot died in 1635; in the 1637–39 period, the rights to Jonson's works were involved in a complex legal dispute between Philip Chetwinde, the second husband of Allot's widow, and stationers Andrew Crooke and John Legatt, who believed they owned the rights to the works. [Williams, pp. 75-95.]

The second folio, 1640/1

Two folio collections of Jonsonian works were issued in 1640-41. The first, printed by Richard Bishop for Andrew Crooke, was a 1640 in literature|1640 reprint of the 1616 folio with corrections and emendations; it has sometimes been termed "the second edition of the first folio." The second volume was edited by Jonson's literary executor Sir Kenelm Digby, and published by Richard Meighen, [Meighen, like Allot, was a member of the Shakespeare Second Folio syndicate.] in co-operation with Chetwinde. That volume contained later works, most of them unpublished or uncollected previously — six plays (including the three printed in 1631), two of them incomplete, and fifteen masques, plus miscellaneous pieces. In the Digby/Meighen volume — identified on its title page as "the Second Volume" of Jonson's works — the varying dates (1631, 1640, 1641) in some of the texts, and what editor William Savage Johnson once called "irregularity in contents and arrangement in different copies," have caused significant confusion.

* Plays:
** "Bartholomew Fair"
** "The Devil is an Ass"
** "The Magnetic Lady"
** "A Tale of a Tub"
** "The Sad Shepherd" (unfinished)
** "Mortimer: His Fall" (fragment)

* Masques:
** "Christmas, His Masque"
** "A Masque Presented in the House of Lord Hay"
** "The Vision of Delight"
** "Pleasure Reconciled to Virtue"
** "For the Honour of Wales"
** "News from the New World Discovered in the Moon"
** "A Masque of the Metamorphos'd Gypsies"
** "The Masque of Augurs"
** "Time Vindicated to Himself and to His Honours"
** "Neptune's Triumph for the Return of Albion"
** "Pan's Anniversary, or The Shepherd's Holiday"
** "The Masque of Owls"
** "The Fortunate Isles, and Their Union"
** "Love's Triumph Through Callipolis"
** ""
** "The King's Entertainment at Welbeck"
** "Love's Welcome at Bolsover"

* Miscellaneous:
** "Underwoods"
** "Horace, His Art of Poetry"
** "The English Grammar"
** "Timber, or Discoveries"

The third folio, 1692

The 1692 single-volume third folio was printed by Thomas Hodgkin and published by a syndicate of booksellers — the title page lists H. Herringman, E. Brewster, T. Bassett, R. Chiswell, M. Wotton, and G. Converse. [Herringman, Brewster, and Chiswell were members of the four-man syndicate that published the Fourth Folio of Shakespeare's plays in 1685. Herringman was one of three stationers who issued the second Beaumont and Fletcher folio in 1679.] The third folio added two works to the previous total: the play "The New Inn," and "Leges Convivales".

Two other works by Jonson were left out of the 17th-century folios but added to later editions: the plays "The Case is Altered" and "Eastward Ho" (the latter written with Marston and George Chapman).

Notes

External links

* [http://www3.iath.virginia.edu/gants/ Watermarks of the 1616 folio.]

References

* Brady, Jennifer, and W. H. Herendeen, eds. "Ben Jonson's 1616 Folio." Newark, DE, University of Delaware Press, 1991.
* Brock, Dewey Howard. "A Ben Jonson Companion." Bloomington, Indiana University Press, 1983.
* Harp, Richard, and Stanley Stewart, eds. "The Cambridge Companion to Ben Jonson." Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2000.
* Loxley, James. "The Complete Critical Guide to Ben Jonson." London, Routledge, 2002.
* Williams, W. P. "Chetwin, Crooke, and the Jonson Folios." "Studies in Bibliography" 30 (1977).