Edmund Spenser.—The Faerie Queene, Book I., Canto I., should be read. Maynard's English Classic Series, No. 27 (12 cents) contains the first two cantos and the Prothalamion. Kitchin's edition of Book I. (Clarendon Press. 60 cents) is an excellent volume. The Globe edition furnishes a good complete text of Spenser's work. Ample selections are given in Bronson, II., Ward, I., and briefer ones in Manly, I., and Century.
THE DRAMA
The Best Volumes of Selections.—The least expensive volume to cover nearly the entire field with brief selections is Vol. II. of The Oxford Treasury of English Literature, entitled Growth of the Drama (Clarendon Press, 412 pp., 90 cents). Pollard's English Miracle Plays, Moralities, and Interludes (Clarendon Press, 250 pp., $1.90) is the best single volume of selections from this branch of the drama. Everyman and Other Miracle Plays (Everyman's Library, 35 cents) is a good inexpensive volume. Manly's' Specimens of the Pre-Shakespearean Drama (three volumes, $1.25 each) covers this field more fully. Morley's English Plays (published as Vol. III. of Cassell's Library of English Literature, at eleven and one half shillings) contains good selections from nearly all the plays mentioned below, except those by Shakespeare and Jonson. Williams's Specimens of the Elizabethan Drama, from Lyly to Shirley, 1580-1642 (Clarendon Press, 576 pp., $1.90) is excellent for a comprehensive survey of the field covered. Lamb's Specimens of English Poets Who Lived about the Time of Shakespeare (Bohn's Library, 552 pp.) contains a large number of good selections.
Miracle Plays.—Read the Chester Play of Noah's Flood, Pollard,[32] 8-20, and the Towneley Play of the Shepherds, Pollard, 31-43; Manly's Specimens, I, 94-119; Morley's English Plays, 12-18. These two plays best show the germs of English comedy.
Moralities.—The best Morality is that known as Everyman, Pollard, 76-96; also in Everyman's Library. If Everyman is not accessible, Hycke-Scorner may be substituted, Morley; 12-18; Manly's Specimens, I., 386-420.
Court Plays, Early Comedies, and Gorboduc.—The best Interlude is The Four P's. Adequate selections are given in Morley, 18-20, and in Symonds's Shakespeare's Predecessors in the English Drama, 188-201. Pollard and Manly give several good selections from other Interludes.
Ralph Royster Doyster may be found in Arber's Reprints; in Morley's English Plays, pp. 22-46; in Manly's Specimens, II., 5-92; in Oxford Treasury, II., 161-174, and in Temple Dramatists (35 cents).
Gorboduc is given in Oxford Treasury, II. pp., 40-54 (selections); Morley's English Plays, pp. 51-64; and, under the title of Ferrex and Porrex, in Dodsley's Old Plays.
What were some of the purposes for which Interludes were written?
How did they aid in the development of the drama?
In what different forms are The Four-P's, Ralph Royster Doyster, and Gorboduc written? Why would Shakespeare's plays have been impossible if the evolution of the drama had stopped with Gorboduc?