A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 09

Produced by Jonathan Ingram, Tapio Riikonen and PG Distributed
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Originally published by Robert Dodsley in the Year 1744.
Fourth Edition,
Now first chronologically arranged, revised and enlarged with the Notes of all the Commentators, and new Notes
1874-76.
How a Man May Choose a Good Wife from a Bad The Return from Parnassus Wily Beguiled Lingua The Miseries of Enforced Marriage
A Pleasant conceited Comedie, Wherein is shewed how a man may chuse a good Wife from a bad. As it hath bene sundry times Acted by the Earle of Worcesters Seruants. London Printed for Mathew Lawe, and are to be solde at his shop in Paules Church-yard, neare unto S. Augustines gate, at the signe of the Foxe_. 1602. 4to.
It is not improbable that the author was Joshua Cooke, to whom, in an old hand on the title of edit. 1602 in the Museum, it is attributed.]
This play agrees perfectly with the description given of it in the title; it is certainly a most pleasant conceited comedy, rich in humour, and written altogether in a right merry vein. The humour is broad and strongly marked, and at the same time of the most diverting kind; the characters are excellent, and admirably discriminated; the comic parts of the play are written with most exquisite drollery, and the serious with great truth and feeling. Of the present piece there were seven editions, within a short period, with all of which the present reprint has been carefully collated, and is now, for the first time, divided into acts and scenes.
Scene, London .
The Exchange .