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By Root 19594 0

title, ‘A Booke called Amours by J. D., with certein other Sonnetes by W. S.’ No book answering this description is extant. In any case it is doubtful if Edgar’s venture concerned Shakespeare’s ‘Sonnets.’ It is more probable that his ‘W. S.’ was William Smith, who had published a collection of sonnets entitled ‘Chloris’ in 1596. On May 20, 1609, a license for the publication of Shakespeare’s ‘Sonnets’ was granted by the Stationers’ Company to a publisher named Thomas Thorpe, and shortly afterwards the complete collection as they have reached us was published by Thorpe for the first time. To the volume Thorpe prefixed a dedication in the following terms:

to the onlie begetter of

these insuing sonnets

mr. w. h., all happinesse

and that eternitie

promised

by

our ever-living poet

wisheth

the well-wishing

adventurer in

setting

forth

T. T.

The words are fantastically arranged. In ordinary grammatical order they would run: ‘The well-wishing adventurer in setting forth [i.e. the publisher] T[homas] T[horpe] wisheth Mr. W. H., the only begetter of these ensuing sonnets, all happiness and that eternity promised by our ever-living poet.’

Publishers’ dedication.

Few books of the sixteenth or seventeenth century were ushered into the world without a dedication. In most cases it was the work of the author, but numerous volumes, besides Shakespeare’s ‘Sonnets,’ are extant in which the publisher (and not the author) fills the role of dedicator. The cause of the substitution is not far to seek. The signing of the dedication was an assertion of full and responsible ownership in the publication, and the publisher in Shakespeare’s lifetime was the full and responsible owner of a publication quite as often as the author. The modern conception of copyright had not yet been evolved. Whoever in the sixteenth or early seventeenth century was in actual possession of a manuscript was for practical purposes its full and responsible owner. Literary work largely circulated in manuscript. Scriveners made a precarious livelihood by multiplying written copies, and an enterprising publisher had many opportunities of becoming the owner of a popular book without the author’s sanction or knowledge. When a volume in the reign of Elizabeth or James I was published independently of the author, the publisher exercised unchallenged all the owner’s rights, not the least valued of which was that of choosing the patron of the enterprise, and of penning the dedicatory compliment above his signature. Occasionally circumstances might speciously justify the publisher’s appearance in the guise of a dedicator. In the case of a posthumous book it sometimes happened that the author’s friends renounced ownership or neglected to assert it. In other instances, the absence of an author from London while his work was passing through the press might throw on the publisher the task of supplying the dedication without exposing him to any charge of sharp practice. But as a rule one of only two inferences is possible when a publisher’s name figured at the foot of a dedicatory epistle: either the author was ignorant of the publisher’s design, or he had refused to countenance it, and was openly defied. In the case of Shakespeare’s ‘Sonnets’ it may safely be assumed that Shakespeare received no notice of Thorpe’s intention of publishing the work, and that it was owing to the author’s ignorance of the design that the dedication was composed and signed by the ‘well-wishing adventurer in setting forth.’

But whether author or publisher chose the patron of his wares, the choice was determined by much the same considerations. Self-interest was the principle underlying transactions between literary patron and protégé. Publisher, like author, commonly chose as patron a man or woman of wealth and social influence who might be expected to acknowledge the compliment either by pecuniary reward or by friendly advertisement of the volume in their own social circle. At times the publisher, slightly extending the field of choice, selected a personal friend or mercantile acquaintance who