This Oxford Shakespeare edition of Hamlet represents a radically new text of the best known and most widely discussed of all Shakespearean tragedies. Arguing that the text currently accepted is not, in fact, the most authoritative version of the play, this new edition turns to the First Folio of 1623—Shakespeare's "fair copy"—that has been preserved for us in the Second Quarto. Introducing fresh theatrical momentum, this revision provides, as Shakespeare intended, a better, more practical acting script.
Professor Hibbard's illuminating and original introduction explains the process by which variant texts were fused in the eighteenth century to create the most commonly used text of today. Drawing on both critical and theatrical history, he shows how this fusion makes Hamlet seem a much more 'problematic' play than it was when it originally appeared in the First Folio of 1623.
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