This vast quantity of manuscript material has never before been systematically used in preparing an edition. With a little practice, users can quickly learn how to read the apparatus and be in a position essentially to reconstruct every copy of every poem and to decide for themselves whether the editors have made intelligent choices. The other half of this project is the Variorum commentary. This commentary is arranged topically from the most general to the most specific in the case of Donne, from broad comments on Donne as a poet and comments on groups of poems all the way down to notes and glosses on individual lines, phrases, and words. And in each category the material is presented chronologically so that a user can follow the history of ideas on each point from the first recorded to the most recent.
Authoritative editions form the basis for all serious literary and historical scholarship.
Variorum editions such as USM s Donne project have historically been reserved for our most historically important authors and carried out at most only once in a generation. Such editions are very expensive to produce, requiring heavy investments of both time and money, and they cannot succeed without solid institutional support. We have been fortunate in securing external funding for this project from the National Endowment for the Humanites, but local institutional support has been equally important. Over the past few years, especially, the USM Foundation has also played a very significant role, providing crucial matching funds that have enabled us to accept additional federal money needed to carry on the work. We in the project are very grateful to the Foundation and to Director of Development Bill Pace, and I personally am proud to be part of a university that is willing to commit its resources to such endeavors.