Early Modern German Shakespeare: “Hamlet” and “Romeo and Juliet” / “Der Bestrafte Brudermord” and “Romio und Julieta” in Translation. Edited by Lukas Erne and Kareen Seidler

Abstract

With their new series on Early Modern German Shakespeare, the Arden Shakespeare provides an invaluable look at Shakespeare’s influence on the European stage through an in-depth research compilation containing cross-references to years of scholarship on performance practices and textual clues. The series commences with the current scholarship on and a translation of Der Bestrafte Brudermord, a play based on Shakespeare’s Hamlet, and Romio und Julieta, a version of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. Editors Lukas Erne and Kareen Seidler provide detailed commentary on the history of each of the plays. They look at the relationship of the German text to its origins, Shakespeare’s play, and stage history, comparing it to the surviving versions of Q1, Q2, and the Folio. The detailed annotations for Der Bestrafte Brudermord even include references to the Theaterkalender, where an excerpt of Der Bestrafte Brudermord was originally printed, as well as to Shakespeare’s...