Ralph Crane
Encyclopedia
Ralph Crane was a professional scrivener
or scribe
in early seventeenth-century London. His close connection with some of the First Folio
texts of the plays of William Shakespeare
has led to his being called "Shakespeare's first editor."
he published a small collection of his own poems titled The Works of Mercy, Both Corporeal and Spiritual, which he dedicated to John Egerton, 1st Earl of Bridgewater
. In the prefatory "Proem" to that volume, Crane indicated that he was a native Londoner, and the son of a successful member of the Merchant Taylors Company
. He spent seven years as the law clerk to Sir Anthony Ashley, secretary of the Privy Council
; Crane later became a scribe working mainly for attorneys. Thomas Lodge
dedicated his Scylla's Metamorphosis to a Ralph Crane in 1589
; this may have been the poet/scrivener. Crane turned to writing verse late in life, when he was oppressed by ill health and poverty.
by 1618; he produced multiple transcripts of the company's plays over the next decade and more. The modern scholarly consensus holds that Crane transcripts constituted the copy from which at least five plays were set into type for the First Folio. Those five (in their Folio order) are:
E. A. J. Honigmann, in his edition of Othello
, suggested that Othello should be added as a sixth play to that list; and a few other Folio texts (from Henry IV, Part 2
to Timon of Athens
) have been proposed by individual scholars, though without winning wide acceptance. As a result, Crane's scribal peculiarities concerning stage directions, speech prefixes, punctuation and other specifics have received intense attention from generations of scholars, critics, and editors of Shakespeare.
.) The most notable of his other transcripts for the company may well be his MS. of The Witch
, the Thomas Middleton
play that has a significant relationship with Macbeth
. Crane transcripts provided copy for several plays in the first Beaumont and Fletcher folio
of 1647
, including The False One
, The Knight of Malta
, The Prophetess
, and The Spanish Curate
. The 1623
quarto
of John Webster
's The Duchess of Malfi
was "almost certainly" set into type from a Crane transcript.
None of Crane's Shakespearean MSS. have survived; but Crane scripts of several other works are extant, in addition to the one for The Witch noted above. Two of the six extant MSS. of Middleton's A Game at Chess
are from Crane's hand. (Crane consistently changed all of Middleton's uses of "has" to "hath" in those transcripts, illustrating the complexities involved in using discriminators like "has/hath" and "does/doth" in stylometry
studies.) The play Sir John van Olden Barnavelt
, never printed in its own era, survived to modern times in a single Crane manuscript. (In that instance, Crane did a good job of preserving Fletcher's distinctive pattern of textual and stylistic preferences.)
Crane regularly produced what were called presentation manuscripts, copies of favored works for particular clients. On November 27, 1625 he sent his transcript of John Fletcher's
play The Humorous Lieutenant
to Sir Kenelm Digby
. The extant manuscript of Ben Jonson
's 1618
masque
Pleasure Reconciled to Virtue
, known as the Chatsworth MS., was a Crane presentation manuscript for Sir Dudley Carleton
.
Scrivener
A scrivener was traditionally a person who could read and write. This usually indicated secretarial and administrative duties such as dictation and keeping business, judicial, and history records for kings, nobles, temples, and cities...
or scribe
Scribe
A scribe is a person who writes books or documents by hand as a profession and helps the city keep track of its records. The profession, previously found in all literate cultures in some form, lost most of its importance and status with the advent of printing...
in early seventeenth-century London. His close connection with some of the First Folio
First Folio
Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies. is the 1623 published collection of William Shakespeare's plays. Modern scholars commonly refer to it as the First Folio....
texts of the plays of William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...
has led to his being called "Shakespeare's first editor."
Life
What little is known of Crane's life comes from his own writings. In 16211621 in literature
The year 1621 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*August 26 - Barten Holyday's allegorical play Technogamia, originally produced at Christ Church, Oxford in 1618, is staged before King James at Woodstock Palace...
he published a small collection of his own poems titled The Works of Mercy, Both Corporeal and Spiritual, which he dedicated to John Egerton, 1st Earl of Bridgewater
John Egerton, 1st Earl of Bridgewater
John Egerton, 1st Earl of Bridgewater KB, PC was an English peer and politician.The son of the Thomas Egerton, 1st Viscount Brackley and Elizabeth Ravenscroft, he was a Member of Parliament for Callington from 1597 to 1598, and for Shropshire in 1601. Knighted on 8 April 1599, he was Baron of the...
. In the prefatory "Proem" to that volume, Crane indicated that he was a native Londoner, and the son of a successful member of the Merchant Taylors Company
Worshipful Company of Merchant Taylors
The Worshipful Company of Merchant Taylors is one of the 108 Livery Companies of the City of London.The Company, originally known as the Guild and Fraternity of St...
. He spent seven years as the law clerk to Sir Anthony Ashley, secretary of the Privy Council
Privy Council of the United Kingdom
Her Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council, usually known simply as the Privy Council, is a formal body of advisers to the Sovereign in the United Kingdom...
; Crane later became a scribe working mainly for attorneys. Thomas Lodge
Thomas Lodge
Thomas Lodge was an English dramatist and writer of the Elizabethan and Jacobean periods.-Early life and education:...
dedicated his Scylla's Metamorphosis to a Ralph Crane in 1589
1589 in literature
-Events:*The Children of Paul's perform twice at the English royal court during the first two weeks of January.-New books:*"Jane Anger" - Protection for Women*Giovanni Botero - Della ragione di Stato ...
; this may have been the poet/scrivener. Crane turned to writing verse late in life, when he was oppressed by ill health and poverty.
Shakespeare
Crane was working for the King's MenKing's Men (playing company)
The King's Men was the company of actors to which William Shakespeare belonged through most of his career. Formerly known as The Lord Chamberlain's Men during the reign of Queen Elizabeth, it became The King's Men in 1603 when King James ascended the throne and became the company's patron.The...
by 1618; he produced multiple transcripts of the company's plays over the next decade and more. The modern scholarly consensus holds that Crane transcripts constituted the copy from which at least five plays were set into type for the First Folio. Those five (in their Folio order) are:
- The TempestThe TempestThe Tempest is a play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1610–11, and thought by many critics to be the last play that Shakespeare wrote alone. It is set on a remote island, where Prospero, the exiled Duke of Milan, plots to restore his daughter Miranda to her rightful place,...
– the first play in the volume - The Two Gentlemen of VeronaThe Two Gentlemen of VeronaThe Two Gentlemen of Verona is a comedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1590 or 1591. It is considered by some to be Shakespeare's first play, and is often seen as his first tentative steps in laying out some of the themes and tropes with which he would later deal in more...
– the second play - The Merry Wives of WindsorThe Merry Wives of WindsorThe Merry Wives of Windsor is a comedy by William Shakespeare, first published in 1602, though believed to have been written prior to 1597. It features the fat knight Sir John Falstaff, and is Shakespeare's only play to deal exclusively with contemporary Elizabethan era English middle class life...
– the third play - Measure for MeasureMeasure for MeasureMeasure for Measure is a play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1603 or 1604. It was classified as comedy, but its mood defies those expectations. As a result and for a variety of reasons, some critics have labelled it as one of Shakespeare's problem plays...
– the fourth play - The Winter's TaleThe Winter's TaleThe Winter's Tale is a play by William Shakespeare, originally published in the First Folio of 1623. Although it was grouped among the comedies, some modern editors have relabelled the play as one of Shakespeare's late romances. Some critics, among them W. W...
– the fourteenth play
E. A. J. Honigmann, in his edition of Othello
Othello
The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in approximately 1603, and based on the Italian short story "Un Capitano Moro" by Cinthio, a disciple of Boccaccio, first published in 1565...
, suggested that Othello should be added as a sixth play to that list; and a few other Folio texts (from Henry IV, Part 2
Henry IV, Part 2
Henry IV, Part 2 is a history play by William Shakespeare, believed written between 1596 and 1599. It is the third part of a tetralogy, preceded by Richard II and Henry IV, Part 1 and succeeded by Henry V.-Sources:...
to Timon of Athens
Timon of Athens
The Life of Timon of Athens is a play by William Shakespeare about the fortunes of an Athenian named Timon , generally regarded as one of his most obscure and difficult works...
) have been proposed by individual scholars, though without winning wide acceptance. As a result, Crane's scribal peculiarities concerning stage directions, speech prefixes, punctuation and other specifics have received intense attention from generations of scholars, critics, and editors of Shakespeare.
Others
Crane's work for the King's Men was not restricted to Shakespeare. (Or even to plays: he copied out the last will and testament of Richard BurbageRichard Burbage
Richard Burbage was an English actor and theatre owner. He was the younger brother of Cuthbert Burbage. They were both actors in drama....
.) The most notable of his other transcripts for the company may well be his MS. of The Witch
The Witch
The Witch is a Jacobean play, a tragicomedy written by Thomas Middleton. The play was acted by the King's Men at the Blackfriars Theatre. It is thought to have been written sometime between 1609 and 1616; it was not printed in its own era, and existed only in manuscript until it was published by...
, the Thomas Middleton
Thomas Middleton
Thomas Middleton was an English Jacobean playwright and poet. Middleton stands with John Fletcher and Ben Jonson as among the most successful and prolific of playwrights who wrote their best plays during the Jacobean period. He was one of the few Renaissance dramatists to achieve equal success in...
play that has a significant relationship with Macbeth
Macbeth
The Tragedy of Macbeth is a play by William Shakespeare about a regicide and its aftermath. It is Shakespeare's shortest tragedy and is believed to have been written sometime between 1603 and 1607...
. Crane transcripts provided copy for several plays in the first Beaumont and Fletcher folio
Beaumont and Fletcher folios
The Beaumont and Fletcher folios were two large folio collections of the stage plays of John Fletcher and his collaborators. The first was issued in 1647, and the second in 1679. The two collections were important in preserving many works of English Renaissance drama.-The first folio, 1647:The 1647...
of 1647
1647 in literature
The year 1647 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Thomas Hobbes becomes tutor to the future Charles II of England.* Plagiarist Robert Baron publishes his Deorum Dona, a masque, and Gripus and Hegio, a pastoral, which draw heavily on the poems of Edmund Waller and John Webster's...
, including The False One
The False One
The False One is a late Jacobean era stage play, written by John Fletcher and Philip Massinger. Generally categorized as a "classical history," the play tells part of the story of Julius Caesar and Cleopatra....
, The Knight of Malta
The Knight of Malta
The Knight of Malta is a Jacobean era stage play, a tragicomedy in the canon of John Fletcher and his collaborators. It was initially published in the first Beaumont and Fletcher folio of 1647.-Date and source:...
, The Prophetess
The Prophetess (play)
The Prophetess is a late Jacobean era stage play, a tragicomedy written by John Fletcher and Philip Massinger. It was initially published in the first Beaumont and Fletcher folio of 1647.-Date and performance:...
, and The Spanish Curate
The Spanish Curate
The Spanish Curate is a late Jacobean era stage play, a comedy written by John Fletcher and Philip Massinger. It premiered on the stage in 1622, and was first published in 1647.-Date and source:...
. The 1623
1623 in literature
The year 1623 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*February 2 - The King's Men perform Twelfth Night at Court on Candlemas....
quarto
Book size
The size of a book is generally measured by the height against the width of a leaf, or sometimes the height and width of its cover. A series of terms is commonly used by libraries and publishers for the general sizes of modern books, ranging from "folio" , to "quarto" and "octavo"...
of John Webster
John Webster
John Webster was an English Jacobean dramatist best known for his tragedies The White Devil and The Duchess of Malfi, which are often regarded as masterpieces of the early 17th-century English stage. He was a contemporary of William Shakespeare.- Biography :Webster's life is obscure, and the dates...
's The Duchess of Malfi
The Duchess of Malfi
The Duchess of Malfi is a macabre, tragic play written by the English dramatist John Webster in 1612–13. It was first performed privately at the Blackfriars Theatre, then before a more general audience at The Globe, in 1613-14...
was "almost certainly" set into type from a Crane transcript.
None of Crane's Shakespearean MSS. have survived; but Crane scripts of several other works are extant, in addition to the one for The Witch noted above. Two of the six extant MSS. of Middleton's A Game at Chess
A Game at Chess
A Game at Chess is a comic satirical play by Thomas Middleton, first staged in August 1624 by the King's Men at the Globe Theatre, notable for its political content.-The play:...
are from Crane's hand. (Crane consistently changed all of Middleton's uses of "has" to "hath" in those transcripts, illustrating the complexities involved in using discriminators like "has/hath" and "does/doth" in stylometry
Stylometry
Stylometry is the application of the study of linguistic style, usually to written language, but it has successfully been applied to music and to fine-art paintings as well.Stylometry is often used to attribute authorship to anonymous or disputed documents...
studies.) The play Sir John van Olden Barnavelt
Sir John van Olden Barnavelt
The Tragedy of Sir John van Olden Barnavelt was a Jacobean play written by John Fletcher and Philip Massinger in 1619, and produced in the same year by the King's Men at the Globe Theatre...
, never printed in its own era, survived to modern times in a single Crane manuscript. (In that instance, Crane did a good job of preserving Fletcher's distinctive pattern of textual and stylistic preferences.)
Crane regularly produced what were called presentation manuscripts, copies of favored works for particular clients. On November 27, 1625 he sent his transcript of John Fletcher's
John Fletcher (playwright)
John Fletcher was a Jacobean playwright. Following William Shakespeare as house playwright for the King's Men, he was among the most prolific and influential dramatists of his day; both during his lifetime and in the early Restoration, his fame rivalled Shakespeare's...
play The Humorous Lieutenant
The Humorous Lieutenant
The Humorous Lieutenant, also known as The Noble Enemies or Demetrius and Enanthe, is a Jacobean era stage play, a tragicomedy written by John Fletcher...
to Sir Kenelm Digby
Kenelm Digby
Sir Kenelm Digby was an English courtier and diplomat. He was also a highly reputed natural philosopher, and known as a leading Roman Catholic intellectual and Blackloist. For his versatility, Anthony à Wood called him the "magazine of all arts".-Early life and career:He was born at Gayhurst,...
. The extant manuscript of Ben Jonson
Ben Jonson
Benjamin Jonson was an English Renaissance dramatist, poet and actor. A contemporary of William Shakespeare, he is best known for his satirical plays, particularly Volpone, The Alchemist, and Bartholomew Fair, which are considered his best, and his lyric poems...
's 1618
1618 in literature
The year 1618 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Sir Francis Bacon is appointed Lord Chancellor by King James I of England.*Ben Jonson sets out to walk to Scotland....
masque
Masque
The masque was a form of festive courtly entertainment which flourished in 16th and early 17th century Europe, though it was developed earlier in Italy, in forms including the intermedio...
Pleasure Reconciled to Virtue
Pleasure Reconciled to Virtue
Pleasure Reconciled to Virtue is a Jacobean era masque, written by Ben Jonson and designed by Inigo Jones. It was first performed on Twelfth Night, January 6, 1618, in the Banqueting House at Whitehall Palace...
, known as the Chatsworth MS., was a Crane presentation manuscript for Sir Dudley Carleton
Dudley Carleton, 1st Viscount Dorchester
Dudley Carleton, 1st Viscount Dorchester was an English art collector, diplomat and Secretary of State.-Early life:He was the second son of Antony Carleton of Brightwell Baldwin, Oxfordshire, and of Jocosa, daughter of John Goodwin of Winchendon, Buckinghamshire...
.
Sources
- Haas, Virginia J. "Ralph Crane: a status report." Analytical and Enumerative Bibliography. New series III (1989).
- Howard-Hill, T. H. Ralph Crane and Some Shakspeare First Folio Comedies. Charlottesville, VA, Bibliographic Society of the University of Virginia, 1972.
- Roberts, Jeanne. "Ralph Crane and the Text of The Tempest." Shakespeare Studies 13 (1980).
- Wilson, F. P. "Ralph Crane, Scrivener to the King's Players." The Library, IV, 7 (1926).