Thomas Middleton: The Collected Works and Companion: Two-Volume Set

Thomas Middleton (1580-1627) - our 'other Shakespeare' - is the only other Renaissance playwright who created acknowledged masterpieces of both comedy and tragedy; he also wrote the greatest box-office hit of early modern London (the unique history play A Game at Chess). His range extends beyond these traditional genres to tragicomedies, masques, pageants, pamphlets, epigrams, and Biblical and political commentaries, written alone or in collaboration with Shakespeare, Webster, Dekker, Ford, Heywood, Rowley, and others. Compared by critics to Aristophanes and Ibsen, Racine and Joe Orton, he has influenced writers as diverse as Aphra Behn and T. S. Eliot. Though repeatedly censored in his own time, he has since come to be particularly admired for his representations of the intertwined pursuits of sex, money, power, and God. The Oxford Middleton, prepared by more than seventy-five scholars from a dozen countries, follows the precedent of The Oxford Shakespeare in being published in two volumes, an innovative but accessible Collected Works and a comprehensive scholarly Companion. Though closely connected, each volume can be used independently of the other. The Collected Works brings together for the first time in a single volume all the works currently attributed to Middleton. It is the first edition of Middleton's works since 1886. The texts are printed in modern spelling and punctuation, with critical introductions and foot-of-the-page commentaries; they are arranged in chronological order, with a special section of Juvenilia. The volume is introduced by essays on Middleton's life and reputation, on early modern London, and on the varied theatres of the English Renaissance. Extensively illustrated, it incorporates much new information on Middleton's life, canon, texts, and contexts. A self-consciously 'federal edition', The Collected Works applies contemporary theories about the nature of literature and the history of the book to editorial practice. Thomas Middleton and Early Modern Textual Culture is not only a companion to The Collected Works of Thomas Middleton, which every scholar of Renaissance literature will find indispensable. It is also essential reading for anyone interested in the history of the book in early modern Europe. Review an impressive testament to a remarkable writer's career... the Oxford Middleton is a considerable achievement and an invaluable resource ( Mark Hutchings and Michelle O'Callaghan, The Review of English Studies) The Oxford Middleton is a monumental achievement. Gary Taylor and his team of scholars have managed to do for Thomas Middleton what Heminges and Condell did for Shakespeare in the 1623 First Folio: they've collected a great playwright's work in a landmark edition, one that enables us to appreciate afresh an extraordinary literary career. Taken together, The Collected Works of Thomas Middleton and its companion volume Thomas Middleton and Early Modern Textual Culture, provide an essential guide to matters at the heart of the English literary world in the early seventeenth century, from authorship and collaboration to censorship, civic pageantry, and the London book trade. ( James Shapiro, author of 1599: A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare and Professor of English, Columbia University) a monumental work of scholarship ( Jonathan Bate, Times Literary Supplement) It is not, I think, overstating the case to say that the release of this edition feels epochal, and the sense of recognition at what it has added, as well as what it will inspire over the ensuing decades, is already palpable. The Oxford Middleton is a truly momentous work, and it is now in the hands of you, the Great Variety of Readers. ( Will Sharpe, The Shakespeare Bookshop Newsletter) All of us who care deeply about the history of English drama welcome with great enthusiasm and excitement the publication of the Collected Works of Thomas Middleton, a major achievement in textual scholarship