The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 12.2496  Tuesday, 30 October 2001

[1]     From:   Marcus Dahl <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
        Date:   Monday, 29 Oct 2001 11:12:03 EST
        Subj:   Re: SHK 12.2490 Re: Actors' Additions

[2]     From:   W. L. Godshalk <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
        Date:   Monday, 29 Oct 2001 20:58:49 -0500
        Subj:   Re: SHK 12.2490 Re: Actors' Additions


[1]-----------------------------------------------------------------
From:           Marcus Dahl <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date:           Monday, 29 Oct 2001 11:12:03 EST
Subject: 12.2490 Re: Actors' Additions
Comment:        Re: SHK 12.2490 Re: Actors' Additions

<< > From:           W. L. Godshalk <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>

 > I found what might be interpreted as an actor's addition in Troilus
and
 > Cressida. I give the Q version:
 >
 > Pan: Here, here, here he comes, a sweete ducks.
 > Cres. Oh Troilus, Troilus. >>

The formulation 'here he/she comes' / 'see where he comes' etc
(particularly with the repeated 'here' which is also a formulaic
element) is a standard oral device as witnessed in Laurie Maguire's
'Shakespearean Suspect Texts' (where she draws on Thomas Pettit's series
of articles on Zielform / formulaic structures in Renaissance play texts
/ ballads / pamphlets).

The 'sweet ducks' element whilst containing a clear colloquial aspect is
however also in keeping with the colloquial / bawdy 'character' of
Pandarus.  (i.e. see Chaucer's version etc).

Wider repetitions of 'o/oh' as Gary Taylor has pointed out tend to sound
non-Shakespearean but are also heavily aligned with theatrical
repetition / orally derived texts.

The repetition of 'Troilus' could of course be intended rhetorically
however simple repetition for effect is commonly assumed to be an
indicator of stage influence / oral milling.

This passage alone does not necessitate the presence of theatrical
intervention but perhaps in the context of a wider analysis the noted
formulaic elements would certainly fit with a folkloric analysis and
point to a theatrical / oral source.

Best,
Marcus

[2]-------------------------------------------------------------
From:           W. L. Godshalk <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date:           Monday, 29 Oct 2001 20:58:49 -0500
Subject: 12.2490 Re: Actors' Additions
Comment:        Re: SHK 12.2490 Re: Actors' Additions

Geralyn Horton suggests,

>May I suggest, hesitantly, that this might be intended to be an
>overlap?  . . . Cressida begins "O Troilus"
>as soon as she spots him, probably after the 2nd "here," and lengthens
>the "oi" sounds, while Pandarus takes an unnotated catch breath rest
>before "sweet ducks," so that the lines finish together.

This reading does not conflict with mine.  I was suggesting that those
scholars who believe in "actors' additions" might well identify "sweet
ducks" as such an addition.  But there is no reason to believe that it
is; "sweet duck" or "ducks" appears in both Q1 and the Folio.  Perhaps
Shakespeare was indeed thinking of an overlap as he wrote.  In any case,
it's an interesting possibility.

Yours, Bill Godshalk

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