Expanded List of Shakespeare Links   Dr. Joanne E. Gates

    Shakespeare and his Sources: Links to on-line versions of known sources to the plays.

    Early Plays

  1. Shrew Poem (Merry Jest). This poem, circa 1580, has some bearing on The Taming of the Shrew. Complete Title: "A merry Ieste of a shrewde and curst Wyfe lapped in Morrelles Skin, for her good behauyour." Renascence Editions preserves old spelling. Transcribed by Richard Bear. Morel, or Morrell, is the name of the dead horse. The more direct source to Shakespeare's play is of course, the anonymously published The Taming of a Shrew, not available on line.
  2. The History of King Richard the Third, by Sir Thomas More. A Direct link to the on-line edition, as posted by the Richard III Society and edited by Richard Bear, University of Oregon.
  3. Rosalynde: Euphues Golden Legacie by Thomas Lodge. This is the source to As You Like It, the on-line edition by Richard Bear. Link goes to Part I. There are two additional sections in separate files.   Part 2   Part 3
  4. Amleth, Prince of Denmark, from the Gesta Danorum of Saxo Grammaticus. As edited by D. L. Ashliman, now retired, at his University of Pittsburg Folklore texts site: "This account, written about 1185 but based on older oral tradition, describes the same players and events that were immortalized by William Shakespeare in his The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, written about 1602."
  5. Cinthio's source to Shakespeare's Othello. Note that the "Otello" of the title is from Verdi's opera of that name and is not part of Cinthio's text, where the Moor of Venice is the only name supplied. In its original context, there was no title to this Cinthio tale, part of his Hecatommithi

    Late Plays

  6. The Appolonius segment of Gower's Confessio Amantis, Source for Pericles. (Another version is also on line, from University of Toronto, http://eir.library.utoronto.ca/rpo/display/poem878.html
  7. One source for Cymbeline, Boccacio's tale of the "wager" plot. (If this does not work, Go to Brown and Search Decameron Web. As indicated in the Riverside Introduction, you want the Second Day, the ninth story or novel. Once you find the English text, be careful not to click on the blue bracketed numbers. It will put you into the Italian and it is difficult to get back to English, unless you are in the Frames version.)
  8. True Chronicle History of King Leir. The True Chronicle History of King Leir and His Three Daughters is a presumed dramatic source for Shakespeare's King Lear. Some very interesting alternates to this anonymous version (published circa 1605) are developed by Shakespeare. [But know that this play version does not include the Gloucester plot. See below, under local to JSU resources for the Sidney source.]
  9. Kings of Britain, or The History of the Kings of Britain by Geoffrey of Monmouth, trans. by Aaron Thompson and J. A. Giles (PDF at In Parentheses). Note: This pdf file is 214 pages. The Leir-Cordelia section is Book 2, Chapter 11, pages 28-34.
  10. Greene's Pandosto. Pandosto, The Triumph of Time, is the principal source to The Winter's Tale. It is in three parts with a separate glossary. After scrolling to the bottom punch the button for the next part. Again, I suggest exploring the complete site, by cutting off the address to just elizabethanauthors.com, to see what else is there.
  11. Plutarch's Life on Antony, Part 1. This version, at ClassicAuthors.net, is in five parts. Classic Authors/Plutarch also has Caesar and the complete Plutarch's Lives. Cut off the address to its root if you need to explore their other offerings.
  12. The Tragedy of Antoine Mary Sidney's translation of a French play by Robert Garnier, at Renascence Editions.
  13. Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde at University of Virginia. Shakespeare consulted it for his play. Click from this link to The Entire work in one file, or to the five separate books.
  14. Chaucer's The Knight's Tale in Modern English at Littrix Reading Room. Also be aware of better on-line sources (with numbered lines to the text. CanterburyTales.org provides access to Modern or Medieval English in a Frames format. (Select pagination OFF to get the full tale in one file.)

    Shakespeare Resources at JSU

  15. Source for the Gloucester Plot An extract from Sir Philip Sidney's The Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia, which for Shakespeare's King Lear, corresponds to the Gloucester, Edgar, Edmund parallel plot.

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