# Arden Shakespeare

The Arden Shakespeare is a long-running series of scholarly editions of the works of William Shakespeare. It presents fully edited modern-spelling editions of the plays and poems, with lengthy introductions and full commentaries. There have been three distinct series of The Arden Shakespeare over the past century, with the third series commencing in 1995 and concluding in January 2020. The fourth series is scheduled to commence publication in 2026.
Arden was the maiden name of Shakespeare's mother, Mary, but the primary reference of the enterprise's title is to the Forest of Arden, in which Shakespeare's As You Like It is set.

## First Series

The first series was published by Methuen. Its first publication was Edward Dowden's edition of Hamlet, published in 1899. Over the next 25 years, the entire canon of Shakespeare was edited and published. The original editor of The Arden Shakespeare was William James Craig (1899–1906), succeeded by R. H. Case (1909–1944). The text of The Arden Shakespeare, First series, was based on the 1864 "Globe" or Cambridge edition of Shakespeare's Complete Works, edited by William George Clark and John Glover, as revised in 1891–93.
The list of the first series is as follows:
| Editor | Title | Year of publication |
| Edward Dowden | Hamlet | 1899 |
| Edward Dowden | Romeo and Juliet | 1900 |
| W. J. Craig | King Lear | 1901 |
| Michael Macmillan | Julius Caesar | 1902 |
| Morton Luce | The Tempest | 1902 |
| Edward Dowden | Cymbeline | 1903 |
| H. C. Hart | Othello | 1903 |
| Herbert Arthur Evans | Henry V | 1904 |
| W. Osbourne Brigstoke | All's Well That Ends Well | 1904 |
| H. C. Hart | Love's Labour's Lost | 1904 |
| H. C. Hart | The Merry Wives of Windsor | 1904 |
| H. Bellyse Balldon | Titus Andronicus | 1904 |
| Henry Cuningham | A Midsummer Night's Dream | 1905 |
| H. C. Hart | Measure for Measure | 1905 |
| K. Deighton | Timon of Athens | 1905 |
| R. Warwick Bond | The Taming of the Shrew | 1905 |
| Charles Knox Pooler | The Merchant of Venice | 1905 |
| R. Warwick Bond | Two Gentlemen of Verona | 1906 |
| Morton Luce | Twelfth Night | 1906 |
| K. Deighton | Troilus and Cressida | 1906 |
| R. H. Case | Antony and Cleopatra | 1906 |
| K. Deighton | Pericles | 1907 |
| Ivor B. John | King John | 1907 |
| Henry Cuningham | The Comedy of Errors | 1907 |
| A. Hamilton Thompson | Richard III | 1907 |
| H. C. Hart | 1 Henry VI | 1909 |
| H. C. Hart | 2 Henry VI | 1909 |
| H. C. Hart | 3 Henry VI | 1910 |
| Charles Knox Pooler | Poems | 1911 |
| Henry Cuningham | Macbeth | 1912 |
| Ivor B. John | Richard II | 1912 |
| F. W. Moorman | The Winter's Tale | 1912 |
| J. W. Holme | As You Like It | 1914 |
| R. P. Cowl, A. E. Morgan | 1 Henry IV | 1914 |
| Charles Knox Pooler | Henry VIII | 1915 |
| Charles Knox Pooler | Sonnets | 1918 |
| W. J. Craig | Coriolanus | 1922 |
| R. P. Cowl | 2 Henry IV | 1923 |
| Grace R. Trenery | Much Ado About Nothing | 1924 |

## Second Series

The second series began in 1946, with a new group of editors freshly re-editing the plays, and was completed in the 1980s, though the Sonnets never appeared. It was published by Methuen in both hardback and paperback. Later issues of the paperbacks featured cover art by the Brotherhood of Ruralists. The second series was edited by Una Ellis-Fermor (1946–58); Harold F. Brooks (1952–82), Harold Jenkins (1958–82) and Brian Morris (1975–82). Unlike the first series, where each volume was based on the same textual source (The Globe Shakespeare), the individual editors of each volume of the second series were responsible for editing the text of the play in that edition.
Editions in the second series :
| Editor | Title | Year | Notes |
| Kenneth Muir | Macbeth | 1951 | |
| Richard David | Love's Labour's Lost | 1951 | |
| Kenneth Muir | King Lear | 1952 | |
| J.C. Maxwell | Titus Andronicus | 1953 | |
| Frank Kermode | The Tempest | 1954 | Reprinted with revisions in 1957. |
| M. R. Ridley | Antony and Cleopatra | 1954 | The introduction by Case from the First Series was reprinted. |
| J.H. Walter | Henry V | 1954 | |
| E. A. J. Honigmann | King John | 1954 | |
| John Russell Brown | The Merchant of Venice | 1955 | |
| T. S. Dorsch | Julius Caesar | 1955 | |
| J. M. Nosworthy | Cymbeline | 1955 | |
| Peter Ure | Richard II | 1956 | |
| Andrew S. Cairncross | 2 Henry VI | 1957 | |
| R. A. Foakes | Henry VIII | 1957 | |
| H. J. Oliver | Timon of Athens | 1959 | |
| M.R. Ridley | Othello | 1959 | |
| G. K. Hunter | All's Well That Ends Well | 1959 | |
| A. R. Humphreys | 1 Henry IV | 1960 | |
| F. T. Prince | The Poems | 1960 | Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece |
| Andrew S. Cairncross | 1 Henry VI | 1962 | |
| R. A. Foakes | Comedy of Errors | 1962 | |
| F. D. Hoeniger | Pericles | 1963 | |
| J. H. P. Pafford | The Winter's Tale | 1963 | |
| Andrew S. Cairncross | 3 Henry VI | 1964 | |
| J. W. Lever | Measure for Measure | 1964 | |
| A. R. Humphreys | 2 Henry IV | 1966 | |
| Clifford Leech | Two Gentlemen of Verona | 1969 | |
| H. J. Oliver | The Merry Wives of Windsor | 1971 | |
| Agnes Latham | As You Like It | 1975 | |
| J. M. Lothian and Thomas W. Craik | Twelfth Night | 1975 | |
| Philip Brockbank | Coriolanus | 1976 | |
| Harold F. Brooks | A Midsummer Night's Dream | 1979 | |
| Brian Gibbons | Romeo and Juliet | 1980 | |
| A. R. Humphreys | Much Ado About Nothing | 1981 | |
| Anthony Hammond | Richard III | 1981 | |
| Brian Morris | The Taming of the Shrew | 1981 | |
| K. J. Palmer | Troilus and Cressida | 1982 | |
| Harold Jenkins | Hamlet | 1982 | |

## Third Series

The third series of The Arden Shakespeare began to be edited during the 1980s, with publication starting in 1995 and concluding in 2020. The general editors for this series were Richard Proudfoot; Ann Thompson of King's College London; David Scott Kastan of Yale University; and H. R. Woudhuysen of the University of Oxford.
The first editions in this series were published by Routledge, before moving to Thomson. They then moved to Cengage Learning. In December 2008, the series returned to Methuen, becoming part of Methuen Drama, its original publisher. From February 2013, the titles appeared under the Bloomsbury imprint.
The editions in the third series were published very much in line with the traditions established by The Arden Shakespeare; however, editions in this series tended to be thicker than those of the first and second series, with more explanatory notes and much longer introductions. One unusual aspect of this series was its edition of Hamlet, which presents the play in two separate volumes. The first, released in 2006, contained an edited text of the Second Quarto (1604–05), with passages found only in the First Folio included in an appendix, while the supplementary second volume, released a year later, contained both the text of the First Quarto (sometimes called the "bad" quarto) of 1603, and of the First Folio of 1623. Other plays with "bad" quartos have them reproduced via photographs of each leaf of a surviving copy rather than deal with each textual anomaly on an individual basis.

### Editions

Due to the long period of time over which the series was published, several editions of the third series were re-issued in revised editions, from 2010 to 2018. Eight editions were reissued in revised form. Some contained minor revisions in later printings, such as Henry V, but are not so noted on the title page. Editions that were revised are marked with the year of revised publication in the 'Year' column.
Editions in the third series :
| Title | Year | Editor | Notes |
| King Henry V | 1995 (r. 1997) | T. W. Craik | Contains a complete photo facsimile of Q. |
| Antony and Cleopatra | 1995 | John Wilders | |
| Titus Andronicus | 1995 (r. 2018) | Jonathan Bate | |
| Othello | 1996 (r. 2016) | E. A. J. Honigmann | Ayanna Thompson contributed a new introduction to the 2016 revised edition. |
| The Two Noble Kinsmen | 1996 (r. 2015) | Lois Potter | The play is attributed to Shakespeare and John Fletcher on the title page. |
| King Lear | 1997 | R. A. Foakes | Contrary to the editors' decision to publish the three versions of Hamlet as three separate texts, Foakes' edition of King Lear is based upon a conflation of the quarto and folio texts of the tragedy, disregarding the practice established by the Oxford Shakespeare of treating them as two separate texts. |
| Shakespeare's Sonnets | 1997 (r. 2010) | Katherine Duncan-Jones | Contains every poetic work included in the original Shakespeare's Sonnets quarto of 1609—that is, 154 sonnets, plus the narrative poem A Lover's Complaint (a work the authorship of which is often disputed). |
| Troilus and Cressida | 1998 (r. 2015) | David Bevington | |
| Love's Labour's Lost | 1998 | H. R. Woudhuysen | |
| Julius Caesar | 1998 | David Daniell | |
| King Henry VI Part 2 | 1999 | Ronald Knowles | |
| The Merry Wives of Windsor | 1999 | Giorgio Melchiori | Contains a complete photo facsimile of Q. |
| The Tempest | 1999 (r. 2011) | Virginia Mason VaughanAlden T. Vaughan | |
| King Henry VI Part 1 | 2000 | Edward Burns | |
| King Henry VIII | 2000 | Gordon McMullan | The play is attributed to Shakespeare and John Fletcher on the title page. |
| King Henry VI Part 3 | 2001 | John D. CoxEric Rasmussen | |
| King Richard II | 2002 | Charles R. Forker | |
| King Henry IV Part 1 | 2002 | David Scott Kastan | |
| The Two Gentlemen of Verona | 2004 | William C. Carroll | |
| Pericles, Prince of Tyre | 2004 | Suzanne Gossett | The play is attributed to Shakespeare and George Wilkins on the title page. |
| Much Ado About Nothing | 2005 (r. 2016) | Claire McEachern | |
| Hamlet | 2006 (r. 2016) | Ann ThompsonNeil Taylor | Contains the Q2 (1604) text. |
| Hamlet: The Texts of 1603 and 1623 | 2007 | Ann ThompsonNeil Taylor | Contains the Q1 (1603) and FF (1623) text. A supplementary volume to the main edition (above) based on Q2 (1604). |
| As You Like It | 2006 | Juliet Dusinberre | |
| Shakespeare's Poems | 2007 | Katherine Duncan-JonesH. R. Woudhuysen | Contains Shakespeare's two major narrative poems—Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece—as well as his metaphysical poem The Phoenix and the Turtle, plus several shorter works attributed to Shakespeare. |
| Twelfth Night | 2008 | Keir Elam | |
| Timon of Athens | 2008 | Anthony B. DawsonGretchen E. Minton | The play is attributed to Shakespeare and Thomas Middleton on the title page. |
| King Richard III | 2009 | James R. Siemon | |
| The Taming of the Shrew | 2010 | Barbara Hodgdon | Contains a complete photo facsimile of The Taming of a Shrew. |
| The Winter's Tale | 2010 | John Pitcher | |
| The Merchant of Venice | 2011 | John Drakakis | |
| Romeo and Juliet | 2012 | René Weis | |
| Coriolanus | 2013 | Peter Holland | |
| Macbeth | 2015 | Sandra ClarkPamela Mason | |
| King Henry IV Part 2 | 2016 | James C. Bulman | |
| The Comedy of Errors | 2016 | Kent Cartwright | |
| Cymbeline | 2017 | Valerie Wayne | |
| A Midsummer Night's Dream | 2017 | Sukanta Chaudhuri | |
| King John | 2018 | Jesse M. LanderJ. J. M. Tobin | |
| All's Well That Ends Well | 2018 | Helen WilcoxSuzanne Gossett | |
| Measure for Measure | 2020 | A. R. BraunmullerRobert N. Watson | |

### Apocrypha

The third series was also notable for publishing single-volume editions of certain plays that traditionally form part of the so-called Shakespeare Apocrypha, but for which there is considered good evidence of Shakespeare having at least been co-author. Three apocryphal plays were published in this manner.
* Double Falsehood, edited by Brean Hammond (2010)
* Sir Thomas More, edited by John Jowett (2011)
* King Edward III, edited by Richard Proudfoot and Nicola Bennett (2017)

## Fourth Series

In March 2015, Bloomsbury Academic named Peter Holland of the University of Notre Dame, Zachary Lesser of the University of Pennsylvania, and Tiffany Stern of the University of Birmingham's Shakespeare Institute as general editors of The Arden Shakespeare fourth series. The fourth series is scheduled to commence publication in 2026 with the following volume editors announced:
Editions in the fourth series :
| Title | Year | Editor | Notes |
| A Midsummer Night's Dream | TBC | Urvashi Chakravarty | |
| All's Well That Ends Well | TBC | Erin Sullivan | |
| Antony and Cleopatra | TBC | Benedict Robinson | |
| As You Like It | TBC | Tom Bishop | |
| Coriolanus | TBC | Laden Niayesh | |
| Hamlet | TBC | M.J. Kidnie | |
| Julius Caesar | TBC | Andrew Hartley | |
| Henry IV Part 1 | TBC | Lucy Munro | |
| Henry IV Part 2 | TBC | Misha Teramura | |
| Henry V | TBC | Gretchen Minton | |
| Henry VI Part 1 | TBC | Claire M.L. Bourne | |
| Henry VI Part 2 | TBC | Sarah Neville | |
| Henry VI Part 3 | TBC | Will Sharpe | |
| Henry VIII | TBC | Iolanda Plescia | |
| King John | TBC | José A. Pérez Díez | |
| King Lear | TBC | Peter Holland | |
| Love's Labour's Lost | TBC | Adam Zucker | |
| Macbeth | TBC | Zachary Lesser | |
| Measure for Measure | TBC | Alice Dailey | |
| Much Ado About Nothing | TBC | Sujata Iyengar | |
| Othello | TBC | Patricia Akhimie | |
| Pericles, Prince of Tyre | TBC | Adam Smith | |
| Poems | TBC | Adam Hooks | Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece |
| Richard II | TBC | Karen Britland | |
| Romeo and Juliet | TBC | Douglas Bruster | |
| Richard III | TBC | Sonia Massai | |
| Shakespeare's Sonnets | TBC | Lukas Erne | |
| Sir Thomas More | TBC | Maria Shmygol | |
| The Merchant of Venice | TBC | Shaul Bassi | |
| The Merry Wives of Windsor | TBC | Evelyn Tribble | |
| The Taming of the Shrew | TBC | James Marino | |
| The Tempest | TBC | Tiffany Stern | |
| The Two Gentlemen of Verona | TBC | Hester Lees-Jeffries | |
| The Two Noble Kinsmen | TBC | Claire McManus | |
| The Winter's Tale | TBC | Peter Kirwan | |
| Timon of Athens | TBC | David McInnis | |
| Titus Andronicus | TBC | Ayanna Thompson & Curtis Perry | |
| Troilus and Cressida | TBC | Elizabeth Taveres | |
| Twelfth Night | TBC | Emma Smith | |

## Arden Early Modern Drama

In 2009, The Arden Shakespeare launched a companion series, entitled "Arden Early Modern Drama". The series follows the formatting and scholarly style of The Arden Shakespeare third series, but shifts the focus onto other English Renaissance playwrights, primarily the Elizabethan, Jacobean, and Caroline periods (although the plays Everyman and Mankind hail from the reign of King Henry VII).
The general editors for this series are Suzanne Gossett of Loyola University Chicago; John Jowett of the Shakespeare Institute, University of Birmingham; and Gordon McMullan of King's College London.
* The Duchess of Malfi by John Webster, edited by Leah Marcus (2009)
* Everyman and Mankind, edited by Douglas Bruster and Eric Rasmussen (2009)
* Philaster by Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher, edited by Suzanne Gossett (2009)
* The Renegado by Philip Massinger, edited by Michael Neill (2010)
* 'Tis Pity She's a Whore by John Ford, edited by Sonia Massai (2011)
* The Tragedy of Mariam by Elizabeth Cary, edited by Ramona Wray (2012)
* The Island Princess by John Fletcher, edited by Clare McManus (2013)
* The Spanish Tragedy by Thomas Kyd, edited by Clara Calvo and Jesús Tronch (2013)
* A Jovial Crew by Richard Brome, edited by Tiffany Stern (2014)
* The Witch of Edmonton by Thomas Dekker, John Ford and William Rowley, edited by Lucy Munro (2016).
* A Woman Killed with Kindness by Thomas Heywood, edited by Margaret Kidnie (2017).
* The Dutch Courtesan by John Marston, edited by Karen Britland (2018).
* The Revenger's Tragedy by Thomas Middleton, edited by Gretchen Minton (2018).
* The White Devil by John Webster, edited by Benedict S. Robinson (2018).
* The Jew of Malta by Christopher Marlowe, edited by William H. Sherman and Chloe Preedy (2021).
* Arden of Faversham, edited by Catherine Richardson (2022).
* The Alchemist by Ben Jonson, edited by Tanya Pollard (2023).

## Complete Works

Arden Shakespeare has also published a Complete Works of Shakespeare, which reprints editions from the second and third series but without the explanatory notes.

## Arden Performance Editions

In 2017, The Arden Shakespeare launched a new series of Performance Editions of Shakespeare's major plays, aimed specifically for use by actors and directors in the rehearsal room, and drama students in the classroom. Each edition features facing-page notes, short definitions of words, guidance on metre and punctuation, large font for easy reading, and plenty of blank space to write notes. The series editors are Professor Michael Dobson and Dr Abigail Rokison-Woodall and leading Shakespearean actor, Simon Russell Beale. The series is published in association with the Shakespeare Institute.

## Critical literature

The Arden Shakespeare has also published a number of series of literary and historical criticism to accompany The Arden Shakespeare Third Series and Arden Early Modern Drama imprints.