Origin. Hollinshed, and probably More.
The Life of King Henry VIII.
Edition. Only in the folio, 1623.
Date. The following memorandum is in the Stationers' Registers:—"12 Feb. 1604[-5]. Nath. Butter. Yf he get good allowance for the Interlude of K. Henry the 8th, before he begin to print it, &c." This has been supposed to be the present play; but the style militates against this supposition. I offer the following proof, which has never, that I am aware of, been observed. In his early plays Shakespeare very rarely puts the preposition or conjunction at the end of one line and the noun or verb at the beginning of the next; in his succeeding ones he does so more frequently, and in his latest he is rather profuse of the practice. Now this construction is as frequent in Henry VIII. as in Coriolanus, Cymbeline, The Winter's Tale, and his other later ones, whence it might seem that it should be referred to the same epoch. We are told, indeed, that in 1613 the Globe Theatre was set on fire and burned down by the discharge of chambers in a new play called "Henry VIII.;" but it is hardly possible that it could be this play, as Shakespeare had retired before that year.
Origin. Hollinshed's Chronicle.
TRAGEDIES.
Romeo and Juliet.
Editions. 4to, 1597; 4to, 1599; 4to, 1609; in the folio, 1623. There is also an undated 4to issued by Smethwick, the publisher of that of 1609, in which many typographical errors are corrected.
Date. In Act I. Sc. 2, the Nurse says, "'Tis since the earthquake now eleven years;" and, as Tyrwhitt justly observed, this could only have been the earthquake which was felt in England on the 6th of April 1580. It was quite in Shakespeare's way to make the allusion; and this would give 1591 as the year in which this play was first performed. This, then, may be the true date, though I greatly doubt of it; I should rather say, entirely reject it; for it surely can hardly be anterior to the first two comedies. The play, as appears from the 4to, 1597, was little more than a sketch of that which appeared, "corrected, augmented, and amended," in 1599.