Research Of Edmond Malone In Shakespearean Scholarship And Its Significance To Academic History

The eighteenth century is the original stage of Shakespearean Scholarship.As a comprehensive Shakespearean scholar,Edmond Malone provided a lot of basic knowledge of Shakespeare for the entire academic community through rigorous and realistic research methods at this stage.He has made outstanding contributions and far-reaching influence on Shakespeare’ s text collation,stage traditions,chronology,biography and sonnets and other core issues on Shakespeare Study,and he also solved the fraudulent case of Shakespeare’s manuscripts at the end of the eighteenth century..In the history of Shakespearean Scholarship,Malone has occupied a crucial position.His research is the beginning and disciplinary foundation of many subsequent Shakespearean directions,and has strongly promoted the overall rise and prosperity of Shakespearean Scholarship.The preface elaborates the basis,significance and path of this research from the aspects of research value,domestic and foreign research status,research ideas and methods.In terms of our research value,we focus on the magnificence of Shakespeare’s research and of Malone’ s achievements on Shakespeare.The study of Malone not only relates to combing and summarizing Malone’s research results,but also includes an overall evaluation of his research on Shakespeare from the perspective of academic history,and then reflecting on the origin and establishment of Shakespearean Scholarship.However,the current momentum of related research is not strong enough at home and abroad.This research hopes to evaluate and reflect in the sense of academic history of Malone’s research on Shakespeare,and hopes to become a trigger in the field of Shakespeare Study at home and abroad.In the first chapter we introduce Shakespeare Study before Malone.The discovery of Shakespeare ’ s knowledge in the mid-eighteenth century was an important academic background of Malone ’ s research.Previous research before Malone converged on the progress of Shakespeare’ s text edition initiated from Nicholas Rowe to Capell,Rowe’ s brief account on Shakespeare’ s life and Farmer’ s denial of Shakespeare’ s classical knowledge.However,these research have also accumulated many mistakes that needed to be corrected,and there were still many gaps in the core field of Shakespeare Study.However,thanks to the trend of variorum editions initiated by Dr.Johnson and developed by Steevens,the existing knowledge about Shakespeare has been continuously collected in the Shakespeare,which provides enlightenment for Malone’ s research.The second chapter summarizes and evaluates Malone’ s edition of Shakespeare and his study of English stage traditions.Malone’ s Shakespeare employed copies acknowledged as reliable by later scholars,comprehensively and meticulously edited and annotated the texts of Shakespeare’ s works as a whole,carried forward Johnson’s advantage,and achieved a more systematic collation and compilation of the 18 th century Shakespearean Scholarship.His Shakespeare was both the peak of text editing and the paragon of the comprehensive magnum opus of Shakespeare in the18 th century.Malone’ s long essay "An Historical Account of the Rise and Progress of the English Stage",which opened an important research direction for the research of stage history in the Elizabethan era.In the third chapter,we discuss the first chronology of Shakespeare’ s plays contributed to the world by Malone on his own.Malone’ s research on the sequence and year of Shakespeare’ s plays was the beginning of the chronological study in the history of Shakespearean Scholarship.He printed the first complete chronology of Shakespeare’s plays and created multiple methods,leaving valuable experience for future generations.Malone’s chronological research opened up a new direction,then guided it in a right way,laying a crucial academic foundation for subsequent chronological research,biographical research and literary criticism,and effectively promoted the full prosperity of Shakespeare Study.The fourth chapter generally sums up Malone’ s research on the life of the Bard.Malone carried out a complete restoration of Shakespeare’ s real life experience.He conducted the most scientific and systematic research on Shakespeare’ s life at the time,corrected many errors accumulated by the predecessors and added a lot of factual contents.Malone’s conclusions on Shakespeare’ s family pedigree,growth pattern,drama career,emotional life,and anecdotes have long been the most cutting-edge and most critical results in the field of research on Shakespeare’s life and social and historical background.His achievements greatly surpassed Rowe’ s Account.He has provided the most basic and integral materials for the world to understand Shakespeare,which has been one of the most important roots supporting the rise and growth of Shakespeare Study.Chapter fifth explains and evaluates Malone’ s recovery and edition of the Sonnets.Before Malone,the literary value of Shakespeare’s sonnets had been neglected for a long time,and John Benson’s piracy in 1640 also severely damaged the original appearance of Shakespeare’s collection of poems.It was not until Malone exploited historical research that traced back to the original text of the quarto poems in 1609 and modernized the editing based on it,that the sonnets was restored.Malone also included Shakespeare’s poems for the first time in Shakespeare and provided detailed comments and annotations.He was the first commentary editor of Shakespeare’ s poems,and the first to draw people’s attention to the mysterious characters in the poem and the connection between the poem and the author’s life.He enhanced the literary and documentary value of Shakespeare’ s sonnets.The sixth chapter introduces Ireland’ s Forgery and Malone’ s Inquiry of this famous imposition of Shakespeare’ s manuscripts.Shakespeare’s status has risen to national poet at the end of the 18 th century,but the development of Shakespeare’s research is far from satisfying the British people’s passion for the Bard.The19-year-old William Henry Ireland counterfeited a large number of Shakespeare’ s manuscripts,letters,legal documents,portraits and even manuscripts,which attracted the attention of the whole society,aroused pursuit by a large number of celebrities,and even aroused imitation of forgeries.At this critical moment,Malone took on the responsibility of exposing those impositions to the entire British society.He spared no effort to eliminate the cult of those counterfeits immediately with serious arguments,defended the reputation of Shakespeare and British literature,and enhanced the public understanding of Shakespeare and recognizing of professional scholarship.Malone once again strongly promoted the development of Shakespearean textual research.Study of Malone is the most vital part of the work of reviewing and reflecting on the history of Shakespearean Scholarship.Shakespearean Scholarship fully rose through the hands of Malone at the end of the 18 th century,which is closely related to the historical background and the wanting of the era.After the death of Shakespeare,his reputation has been built under the shaping of multiple forces over a century and a half.The most vital one among them was the national consciousness that the British have continuously strengthened in the political,economic and cultural confrontations in Europe.In many aspects,Shakespeare united the British from all classes in modern society from top to bottom,and became a symbol of the glorious identity of Britain as a whole.However,in the 18 th century,while the British intellectuals faced such a noble national poet,they increasingly exposed their weak knowledge and were unable to provide enough facts and explanations to the expectant admirers of the Bard all over the country.Under such circumstances,Malone’s turn to Shakespearean research responded to the voice of the time and supported the continuation and development of Shakespeare’ s reputation with his results of academic research.Malone’ s research penetrated into many core issues of Shakespearean Scholarship,and completed plenty of foundation work in the initial stage of the discipline,which opened up a clear direction for Shakespeare Study in the next one and a half centuries,eliminating many historical issues for Shakespearean critics.His rich and grand research achievements,together with his viewpoints and methods,have provided reference and enlightenment for later Shakespeareans for a long time,and have played a vital role in promoting the overall rise,prosperity and professional development of Shakespeare Study.