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The Gatherers : John Heminge and Henry Condell

HEMINGE as he signs his name in the First Folio, or Hemmings as it appears in other places, was an actor, manager, and shareholder in both the Globe and Blackfriars theatres. There is no record extant of the time of his birth, but perhaps he was a native of Shottery, the home of Anne Hathaway, as a man of his name had a child baptized in Stratford Parish Church in 1567.

His original trade was that of a grocer, as we learn from his Will & Testament, where he describes himself as a “citizen and grocer” of London. His name is traced through various documents as actor in a number of plays, and Malone hands down a tradition which he found in a forgotten pamphlet that Heminge was the creator of the character of Falstaff.

He increased in wealth and importance, as is noted from two lists of players in the King’s Company (the players were usually sharers in the profits), when in 1603 his name stands sixth, and in 1619, it is at the head of the list. He was a warm personal friend of Shaksper, who left him by will the sum of twenty-six shillings and sixpence wherewith to purchase a ring. His literary work was confined, so far as we know, to the publication (and editing after a fashion) of the celebrated First Folio edition of the plays of Shakespeare, in association with Henry Condell. This was in 1623, seven years after Shaksper’s death. In a Sonnet upon the pitiful burning of the Globe Playhouse in London (1613) occur the following lines. He died in October, 1630, at Aldermanbury:

There with swol’n eyes like druncken Flemminges
Distressed stood old stuttering Hemminges.

HENRY CONDELL, OR CUNDELL as it was sometimes spelled (Elizabethan spelling was a matter of individual taste and preference) was the associate of John Heminge in the production of the First Folio. He was an actor of moderate reputation and a fellow manager in theatrical ventures with Heminge. From the actors’ lists we learn that he played in the productions of Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, and Beaumont and Fletcher. His relations with the former were confidential and friendly, and in Shaksper’s Will & Testament, he was also remembered by a bequest of money to buy a ring.

He is mentioned in the Sonnet quoted above as follows:

Out run the knights, out run the lords, and there was great ado,
Some lost their hats and some their swords, then out run Burbidge too.
The reprobate’s though drunk on Monday
Pray’d for the Fool and Henry Condye.

In 1599 Richard Burbage and his brother Cuthbert built the Globe Theatre. Condell became a partner in the profits of that theatre, and his prominence in the Lord Chamberlain’s company also secured for him an important share in the profits of the Blackfriars Theatre.
In 1604 Condell acted in Marston’s Malcontent; in Webster’s Induction to that play he is brought on the stage, together with Burbage, Lowin, and other actors, under his own name, and several speeches are assigned him. He acted in Ben Jonson’s Sejanus, 1603, in his Volpone, 1605, in his Alchemist, 1610, and in his Catiline, 1611, and his name appears in the lists of actors who took leading parts in Shakespeare’s and Beaumont and Fletcher’s chief plays.

In 1613 he was acting at the Globe in All is True (probably identical with Henry VIII.) when the playhouse caught fire. The role of the Cardinal in Webster’s Duchess of Main was frequently filled by him before 1623. On 27 March 1618-19 a new patent to his company places his name third on the list, John Heminge and Richard Burbage (then just dead) alone preceding it. When Charles I., renewed the Company’s privileges on his accession to the throne in 1625, Condell is the second actor named. Condell is traditionally associated with leading comic parts, but it is probable that he occasionally appeared in tragedy. All that we have remaining of Condell is the signature to his Will & Testament. There is no record of his birth, but he died in December, 1627.

No portraits are extant of either of the first two editors of Shakespeare’s plays. Whether Heminge and Condell offered the MSS., to the printers, or the printers asked to be permitted to print them, is altogether unknown. It was natural to think that while printers had eagerly seized every opportunity by stealth or otherwise, to print single plays, but were prevented, it would be to their advantage to have the whole, selected by his personal friends, whose property they were. Doubtless the publishers expected to make a legitimate profit by their enterprise. While it is quite clear that Heminge and Condell did not take the risk of publication, it is equally certain that they looked for no profit by it, for they, being personal friends of long standing, distinctly state that their only object in what they did was “to keep the memory of so worthy a friend and fellow alive as was their Shakespeare.”

We are not able to say the number of copies that were printed. It was not quick of sale; a second edition was not called for until nine years afterwards, when Heminge and Condell were both dead. There is the highest degree of probability that the First Folio was produced in the small parish of St. Mary, Aldermanbury; for wherever the manuscript plays were kept, the collectors would most probably arrange them for publication at their homes, as they lived so near each other. But it is remarkable that there is absolutely no record or memorial whatever of these two English worthies themselves, except the following two lines, each embedded and hidden among many others in the register of burials of St. Mary, Aldermanbury:

1627. Dec. 29th. Mr. Condell.
1630. Oct. 1 2th. John Hemmings, player.

 

The Printer : William Jaggard

William and Isaac Jaggard are best known as the printers of the works of Shakespeare. They were associated in the production of the First Folio in 1623, which came from the press of Isaac Jaggard and Edward Blount, at the charges of William Jaggard, Edward Blount, J. Smethwicke, and William Aspley; the editors being the poet’s friends, Heminge and Condell. In addition to being the first collected edition of Shakespeare’s works, this was in many respects a remarkable volume.

William Jaggard was also the printer of “The Essaies Of Sr. Francis Bacon Knight, the Kings Atturney Generall. His Religious Meditations. Places of Perswasion and Diswasion Printed at London for John Jaggard 1613.” A pirated reprint of Beale’s genuine edition of 1612, with the addition of the essay “Of Honour and Reputation”, the Meditationes sacræ and Of the colours of Good and Evill. The two essays “Of the publique” and “Of Warre and Peace”, though announced in the table, are not printed. Another edition, also published by John Jaggard, and apparently printed by William Jaggard, containing exacting the same meter, appeared in the same year.

Of another interesting piece he published is The Passionate Shepherd’s Song. Printed in Love’s Labour Lost, 1598. It is the second of the Sonnets to sundry notes of music, appended to The Passionate Pilgrim by Shakespeare, 1599.

 

The Publishers (Investors) Edward Blount and Isaac Jaggard

Blount and Jaggard, the printers of the First Folio, became also the proprietors, as shown by the entry in the Stationer’s Registries in which they claim “Mr. William Shakspeer’s Comedyes, Histories and Tragedyes soe many of said copies as are not formerly entered to other men.” This remark refers of course to the quarto editions published during the previous 25 years. Burbage, Heminge and Condell were eminent as fellow-actors with Shaksper, and in the same Company. This First Folio is dedicated to the Earl of Pembroke and the Earl of Montgomery.

It is also fact, that Edward Blount, in 1599, licensed Florio John’s (1545–1625) Montaigne’s Essays, being then the translator, but not a work that was published until 1603. Blount also contrived to publish Christopher Marlowe’s translation of the First Book of Lucan where in 1600 Thomas Thorpe (1570?–1635?) became the owner of the unpublished manuscript. Thorpe is remembered to have been the publisher of Shakespeare’s Sonnets.

 

The Printing of the First Folio

The best copies measure 13-1/2 x 8-1/2". The title page bears the portrait of the poet by Droeshout. The dedicatory epistle is in large italic type, and is followed by a second epistle, “To the Readers,” in Roman. The verses in praise of the author, by Ben Jonson and others, are printed in a second fount of italic, and the Contents in a still smaller fount of the same letter.

The text, printed in double columns is in Roman and Italic, each page being enclosed within printer’s rules. Of these various types, the best is the large italic, which somewhat resembles Day’s fount of the same letter. That of the text is exceedingly poor, while the setting of the type and rules leaves much to be desired. The arrangement and pagination are erratic.

The book, like many other folios, was made up in sixes, and the first alphabet of signatures is correct and complete, while the second runs on regularly to the completion of the Comedies on cc.2. The Histories follow with a fresh alphabet, which the printer began as ‘aa,’ and continued as ‘a’ until he got to ‘g,’ when he inserted a ‘gg’ of eight leaves, and then continued from ‘i’ to ‘x’ in sixes to the end of the Histories.
The Tragedies begin with Troilus and Cresside, the insertion of which was evidently an afterthought, as there is no mention of it in the ‘Contents’ of the volume, and the signatures of the sheets are ¶ followed by ¶¶ six leaves each. Then they start afresh with ‘aa’ and proceed regularly to ‘hh,’ the end of the Macbeth, the following signature being ‘kk,’ thus omitting the remainder of signature ‘hh’ and the whole of ‘ii.’ In a series of interesting letters communicated to Notes and Queries, the makeup of this volume is explained very plausibly.

The copyright of Troilus and Cresside belonged to R. Bonian and H. Walley, who apparently refused at first to give their sanction to its publication. But by that time it had been printed, and the sheets signed for it to follow Macbeth, so that it had to be taken out. Arrangements having at last been made for its insertion in the work, it was reprinted and inserted where it is now found. It is also surmised that the original intention was to publish the work in three parts, and to this theory the repetition of the signatures lends colour. (Plomer). It was a large and costly work, and, even though eventually profitable, must have required the advance of a large sum to print it. Where did this money come from? Three men, W. Jaggard, I. Smithweeke and W. Aspley, paid the expense of the publication, while only one man, Ed. Blount, was concerned in printing and expense both.

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