Arden 1

For some reason, probably because they were all the thing when I was an adolescent, I like to read my Shakespeare - which I like to do before going to see one played - in the blue hardback edition called 'Arden' from Methuen. Hardbacks which have been properly bound and more or less stay open on the page without your having to hold the pages down. Easy to read while reclining, with one hand. Plenty of support in the way of critical apparatus, without that support being visually, or in any other way, intrusive. Probably rather dear in their day, which meant that schoolboys usually had to make do with Signets.

The hardback Ardens went out of print some time ago, but over the years I have built up a more or less complete collection, some in duplicate and some going back near a hundred years. A brand which had quite a long life, taking in several changes of cover colour.

So on the occasions of the two outings to Herny IV Part I before Christmas (see, for example, reference 1), I got the Arden down and it was sculling around the house for a few weeks. Then I forgot about it, and then I remembered about it, to find that it was not in it's spot on the shelf. Hunted high and low, including all the silly places you look when something is really bugging you. Eventually I was instructed to stop; the thing would turn up of its own accord if I left it alone. But while I could stop looking, I could not stop worrying. One symptom of which was taking a look in the theatre bookshop mentioned at reference 2, quite near Carr-Saunders hall, where the best they could do was a rather poor quality paperback reproduction from, I think, Bloomsbury. No good at all.

Next stop Abebooks, on this occasion no help at all. In desperation, I try Ebay, where they look to have lots of them, a good proportion in the US, which is fine but the delivery can be weeks. So I selected one from Germany, from Antiquariat Bookfarm, Engertstrasse 6, 04177 Leipzig, streetviewed above. The lesson clearly being that if you want a decent edition of a classic book of England, go to Germany where they still read them. See reference 3.

A fortnight or so later, the book turns up, once the property of the English Department of Munich University (Institut für Englische Philologie), bookmarked 'Sh H4 300' and complete with brown card holder for the library ticket. No dust jacket but otherwise in good condition; used but not worn. But perhaps even there, in the heart of Bavaria, Bard studies are fading. Maybe they no longer even memorise great swathes of Goethe and Heine. Two more metal clips used to close the packet, rather smaller than those mentioned at reference 3 and not brass. I wonder that the German Postal Workers Union has not had the things banned on the grounds that they would be apt to catch and tear cold fingers.

PS: really don't like the orange banner to the new blog. Must try to do something about it.

Reference 1: http://psmv2.blogspot.co.uk/2015/12/henry-iv-part-i-part-ii.html.

Reference 2: http://psmv2.blogspot.co.uk/2016/01/a-swing-through-fitzrovia.html.

Reference 3: http://psmv2.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/romeo-beta.html.

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