Shakspere & Typography

Nature endows no man with knowledge, and although a quick apprehension may go far toward making the true lover of Nature a Botanist, Zoologist, or Entomologist, and although the society of ‘Men of Law’, of Doctors, or of Musicians may, with the help of a good memory, store a man’s mind with professional phraseology, yet the opportunity of learning must be there; and no argument can be required to prove that, however highly endowed with genius or imagination, no one could evolve from his internal consciousness the terms, the customs, or the working implements of a trade with which he was unacquainted. If, then, we find Shakspere’s mind familiar with the technicalities of such an art as Printing – an art which, in his day, had no such connecting links with the common needs and daily pleasures of the people, as now – if we find him using its terms and referring frequently to its customs, our claims to call him a Printer stand upon a firmer base than those of the Lawyer, the Doctor, the Soldier, or the Divine; and we have strong grounds for asking the reader’s thoughtful attention to some quotations and arguments, which, if not conclusive that Shakspere was a Printer, afford indubitable evidence of his having become at some period of his career practically acquainted with the details of a Printing Office. We propose, then, to carefully examine the works of the Poet for any internal evidence of Typographical knowledge which they may afford.

But here, at the outset, we are met by obvious difficulties. Would Shakspere, or any poet have made use of trade terms and technical words, or have referred to customs peculiar to and known by only a very small class of the community in plays addressed to the general public? They might have been familiar enough to the mind of the writer, but would certainly have sounded very strange in the ears of the public. Shakspere was too artistic and too wise to have committed so glaring a blunder. His technical terms are used unintentionally, and with the most charming unconsciousness. Therefore, when we meet with a word or phrase in common use by Printers, it is so amalgamated with the context, that although some other form of expression would have been chosen had not Shakspere been a Printer, yet the general reader or hearer is not struck by any incongruity of language.

What simile could be more natural for a Printer-poet to use or more appropriate for the public to hear than this:

Your mother was most true to wedlock, prince;
For she did print your royal father off,
Conceiving you.

    Winter’s Tale, v, 1.
Here, surely, the Printer’s daily experience of the exact agreement between the face of the type and the impression it yields must have suggested the image.

Printers in Shakspere’s time often had patents granted them by which the monopoly of certain works was secured; and unscrupulous printers frequently braved all the pains and penalties to which they were liable by pirating such editions. It is this carelessness of consequences which is glanced at by Mistress Ford when debating with Mistress Page concerning the insult put upon them by the heavy old Knight, Sir John Falstaff:

He cares not what he puts into the Press when he would put us two.

    Merry Wives, ii, 1.

What printer is there who has put to press a second edition of a book working page for page in a smaller type and shorter measure but will recognise the Typographer’s reminiscences in the following description of Leontes’ babe by Paulina:

Behold, my Lords,
Although the print be little, the whole matter
And copy of the father …
The very mould and frame of hand, nail, finger.

    Winter’s Tale, ii, 3.
Is it conceivable that a sentence of four lines containing five distinct typographical words, three of which are especially technical, could have proceeded from the brain of one not intimately acquainted with Typography? Again, would Costard have so gratuitously used a typographical idea, had not the Poet’s mind been teeming with them?

I will do it, sir, in print.

    Love’s Labour Lost, iii, 1.
The deep indentation made on the receiving paper when the strong arm of a lusty pressman had pulled the bar with too great vigour is glanced at here:

Think when we talk of horses that you see them
Printing their proud hoofs i’ the receiving earth.

    Henry V, Chorus.
The frequency with which the words print or imprint are used is very noticeable:

The story that is printed in her blood.

    Much Ado about Nothing, iv, 1.
I love a ballad in print.

    Winter’s Tale, iv, 4.
She did print your royal father off conceiving you.

    Winter’s Tale, v, 1.
You are but as a form in wax, by him imprinted.

    Midsummer-Night’s Dream, i, 1.
His heart … with your print impressed.

    Love’s Labour Lost, ii, 1.
I will do it, sir, in print.

    Love’s Labour Lost, iii, 1.
This weak impress of love.

    Two Gentlemen of Verona, iii, 2.
To print thy sorrows plain.

    Titus Andronicus, iv, 1.
Sink thy knee i’ the earth;
Of thy deep duty, more impression show.

    Coriolanus, v, 3.
Some more time
Must wear the print of his remembrance out.

    Cymbeline, ii, 3.
The impressure.

    Twelfth Night, ii, 5.
He will print them, out of doubt.

    Merry Wives of Windsor, ii, 1.
We quarrel in print, by the book.

    As You Like It, v, 4.
Let it stamp wrinkles in her brow.

    Lear, i, 4.
His sword death’s stamp.

    Coriolanus, ii, 2.
Hear how deftly Title-pages are treated:

Sim. Knights,
To say you’re welcome were superfluous.
To place upon the volume of your deeds,
As in a title-page, your worth of arms,
Were more than you expect, or more than’s fit.

    Pericles, ii, 3.
Hear, too, Northumberland, who thus addresses the bearer of fearful news:

This man’s brow, like to a title-leaf,
Foretells the nature of a tragic volume.