About this Item
Complete tragedies, comedies, histories, and poems in one volume. Early printing from the year of publication.
Authoritative single-volume edition of Shakespeare's dramatic and poetic works based on the influential Pelican Shakespeare series. This revised 1969 edition consolidates the thirty-eight individual Pelican Shakespeare volumes originally issued between 1956 and 1967 into a comprehensive scholarly reference edited by Harvard Shakespeare scholar Alfred Harbage. The text incorporates the critically established Pelican editions along with editorial commentary, variant readings, and scholarly apparatus prepared by leading Shakespeare editors of the mid-twentieth century. Intended for students and general readers, the Pelican project became one of the most widely used academic Shakespeare texts in universities during the second half of the twentieth century.
The book features decorative endpapers reproducing the celebrated 1572 Braun & Hogenberg panoramic map of Elizabethan London, originally published in Civitates Orbis Terrarum. This engraving provides one of the earliest visual records of London during Shakespeare's lifetime and depicts the Thames riverfront and Southwark theatre district where the Globe Theatre stood. The volume was designed by renowned typographer Hans Schmoller, whose work with Penguin and Oxford University Press helped define mid-century book design standards.
This copy presents as a well-preserved academic study volume with evidence of university use. The front pastedown bears a handwritten ownership notation reading 'Marshall Hall, Room 124', likely referencing a campus building or residence hall. Scattered pencil annotations and occasional highlighting appear in portions of the introductory material and selected passages (including King Lear), reflecting engaged scholarly study. Despite these markings, the binding remains firm and structurally sound, with tight hinges and a clean text block overall.
Book: Very Good. Solid binding with tight hinges; black cloth boards show shelf wear and rubbing but remain structurally sound. A well-preserved reference copy of a large scholarly volume more than fifty years old.
Copyright page states 'This Revised Edition First Published 1969' with 'Reprinted 1969.' This indicates an early printing of the revised Pelican Text edition, produced the same year as publication. The book carries the transitional SBN numbering system used immediately prior to universal ISBN adoption. Manufactured in the United States by Kingsport Press Inc., a prominent mid-century book printer.
William Shakespeare (1564-1616) remains the most influential playwright in the English language and one of the central figures of world literature. His tragedies, comedies, histories, and sonnets have shaped theater, language, and literary culture for more than four centuries. The Pelican Shakespeare project, overseen by Harvard scholar Alfred Harbage, was a landmark mid-20th-century editorial undertaking that produced accessible yet scholarly texts of Shakespeare's plays for students, teachers, and general readers.
Seller Inventory # NF.SHA.1969.1
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