INTRO Francis Douce, the Shakespeare annotator, made two DUCTION references to the work, neither of them of any great importance, about the year 1839, and then seems to have laid the book aside.1 THE FRENCH TRANSLATIONS As already mentioned, there were two translations into French which were published in 1579, the first by Gabriel Chappuys (Lyon, Beraud), the second by François de Belleforest (Paris, P. Cavellat). Each version was independent of the other. Both authors were well known. at the time as writers of history, Belleforest having held the post of Historiographer Royal of France and a continuator of the Grandes Chroniques, up to the time of his death in 1583, when he was succeeded by Chappuys in that office. Belleforest was also the chief translator of Bandello's Novelle (1568-1570). Chappuys also translated Castiglione's Courtier into French in 1580. Each of these first French versions of the Civile Conversation was reprinted three times before 1609: they are both of considerable rarity. There is no copy of either translation, in any edition, in the British Museum. There is little to choose between the two versions. That of Belleforest is perhaps the more literal of the two, and it contains a good many passages omitted in that of Chappuys. This, however, may have been because the two authors happened to use different editions of the Italian text; for I find that Guazzo did make additions 1 See post, Shakespeare section, As You Like It. to his original work, and these appeared in the Venice INTROeditions of 1580. Apart altogether from merely biblio- DUCTION graphical considerations, the matter becomes an interest ing one when we try to discover which of the two translations was used by George Pettie when turning the work into English. 1 It has already been mentioned 1 that, when seeking the licence of the Stationers' Company, he handed in, through Watkins his printer, a copy of Chappuys' work as the book to be translated.' This, however, is not absolute proof that he confined himself to Chappuys' version, for he may afterwards have consulted that of Belleforest. But, though he makes no direct statement on the subject, Pettie gives us a clue, the employment of which, coupled with the other evidence, is, I think, sufficient to settle the question. At the end of the Preface to the Readers (page 12) he writes: "I have supplyed divers thinges out ' of the Italian original, which were left out by the French 'translator. . . . I have included the places within two starres, as you may see throughout the Booke.' 2 Using the hint given here, I have examined a number of the starred passages in Pettie's version, and, having found that they are nearly all omitted in Chappuys, while they are included in Belleforest, and in the later editions of Guazzo's Italian text, I conclude that Chappuys' was the French translation which Pettie must have used. Another interesting fact became clear in the examination. 1 See p. xvii, ante. These stars are preserved in the reprint of Pettie's translation-i.e. Books I., II., and III. INTRO. Some of the starred passages were not found in the first DUCTION (1574) or second (1575) editions of Guazzo's Italian, and they were also left out by both French translators. But they do appear in the Venice edition of Guazzo of 1580, the title-page of which describes the work as 'recently 'corrected by the author himself and augmented in divers 'places with many useful and pleasing additions.' This, then, must have been the Italian edition used by Pettie when supplying the omissions of Chappuys.1 GEORGE PETTIE AND SHAKESPEARE The Civile Conversation was published when Shakespeare was seventeen years old, and shortly before his coming to London. It is extremely likely that his attention was drawn to the work about the time when he first put a 'prentice hand to the refurbishing of old plays, and certainly before he began to write his first original comedy. If only for its insight into Italian life and manners, the Civile Conversation was a volume that would have been studied with no little care by any playwright of the time who, never having visited Italy, contemplated the production of a drama the scenes and characters of which were to be cast in an Italian mould. But this was by no means its sole attraction. The description already given of the general nature of the contents of the volume, its admirable style, its quiet humour, the attractiveness 1 It is perhaps worth mentioning that both of these French translators show a curious pride in their place of birth, the one giving his name as Gabriel Chappuys Tourangeau (of Tours), and the other as F. Belleforest Commingeois (of Comminges). and ease of its power of expression, the genuine tone of its morality, and, above all, the dramatic force of its dialogue form, provided a combination so exactly suited to the needs of a playwright, whether his scene were at home or abroad, that none can wonder at its being a book to draw even Shakespeare to a study of its pages. He may have read it only once-though I fancy the evidence is rather the other way, and, anyhow, we know his memory was prodigious. His own description of young Posthumus Leonatus was possibly but a picture of himself: "The King he takes the babe To his protection ... Puts him to all the learnings that his time Could make him the receiver of; which he took, (Cymbeline, 1. i. 40 sq.) We know that Shakespeare never hesitated to make use of the labour of other writers, their jests, their expressions, their allusions, their turns of thought, their recorded experiences, and their knowledge, when in a mind to do so. The practice was common and recognised amongst the brotherhood of actors and playwrights of the time.1 One of the few protests against the custom that has reached us from Tudor times is that peevish outburst of jealousy which Robert Greene launched against the only Shake-scene in a country' for trying to oust a once popular writer from a position which his own misguided conduct had already reduced to insignificance. The very nature of Shakespeare's borrowing was such as 1 See Hart in Introduction, 2 Hen. vi. p. 51, Arden edition. INTRO DUCTION INTRO- to close the mouth of protest: what he borrowed for conceive that the writers from whom he borrowed were 'BRUTUS: Were he to stand for consul, never would he (Coriolanus, 11. i. 247.) and (b) a passage from Holinshed's Chronicles-on which Macbeth was founded: For the pricke of conscience . . . 'caused him ever to feare lest he should be served of 'the same cup, as he had ministered to his predecessor,' which Mr. J. Churton Collins thought was reproduced by Shakespeare as: 'this even-handed justice Commends the ingredients of our poison'd chalice In other respects, too, Shakespeare followed the habit of the period. Early in his dramatic career, led by other eminent playwrights, he became infected with a leaning to Italy and Italian stories. He must have resorted many times to books for the information he needed, though, naturally enough, some of that information may have |