Comedies BEN JONSON is above all the realist. such as The Alchemist and Bartholomew Fair are transcripts in accurate detail of the daily life of London in the reign of James I. Jonson lived his life in the heart of the city, and knew it to the core; hence the perfection of his local color. And this same local color, which renders Jonson's comedies of exceptional interest to the student of those times, is the greatest obstacle in the way of Jonson's popularity. Not the only one to be sure-his very high intellectual level is another-but still the main hindrance. Most difficult of all his plays in local color is The Alchemist, for alchemy and its professors no longer figure in the popular eye. If literature is the index of civilization-and I think it should be so treated-then it is the work of the editor to make that index accurately legible. To this end care has been taken to present the text exactly as Jonson left it. The atmosphere of the times, especially with regard to alchemy, has been sought after, and an effort has been made to bring that now forgotten belief into such light as shall make this satire upon it intelligible. The editor has had in mind chiefly the requirements of the scholar, but has added some fullness of detail in the hope that the work might be equally intelligible to the non-professional student of literature. Specific details about the Text, Notes, and Glossary will be found at the beginnings of those divisions. I am under obligation to many friends and scholars for help of various kinds for which I can make no adequate acknowledgment. My thanks are especially due to Mr. Robert Hoe of New York for permission to collate his copy of the quarto; to the following professors in Yale University: Albert S. Cook for reading the proofs and for many helpful suggestions, William Lyon Phelps for the use of his copies of the folios of 1616 and 1640 and his collation of the British Museum copy of the quarto and for several notes, H. R. Lang for assistance with the Spanish phrases, and C. C. Torrey for aid with alchemical terms from the Arabic; to Mr. Andrew Keogh of the Yale University Library for help with the bibliographical matter; to Dr. H. Carrington Bolton of Washington for references; and to Mr. H. B. Brougham for the preparation of the index. An excellent popular exposition of alchemy is contained in The Story of Alchemy and the Beginnings of Chemistry by M. M. P. Muir . . . N.Y., 1903, which has come to me too late to be of use. CHARLES M. HATHAWAY, JR. BROOKLYN, N.Y. Feb. 16, 1903. |