The enterprise on which this book embarks is frankly a bold one, for it aims at two objects, distinct yet inseparable, which are nothing less than revolutionary, and this in so familiar and well-worked a field as the text of Shakespeare's plays. Its purpose is, first to give an intelligible and consistent account of the structure and characteristic features of his dramatic verse, the essential principles of which appear to have been wholly misconceived hitherto, and secondly to show that there are many thousands of lines of it that are given in modern texts not as their author intended them to be delivered, but clipped and trimmed to a featureless uniformity that he would have abhorred.

The plays as we have them present many problems, and among them one which forces itself upon our attention at every turn and therefore cannot be ignored. No solution of it has yet been found or, so far as I am aware, even sought, and it is for these reasons that it is here taken in hand. Its outlines may be briefly stated.

With the exception of certain of the Quartos—exceptions of prime significance, as will be seen—the texts, both early and modern, are strewn in varying proportions with abbreviated forms such as to't, do't, in't, by't, t'intreat, t'have, not o'th'best, th'gods, th'first, th'platform, th'hot duke (th'ot duke!), i'th'throat, in's hand, and's wife, to's (to us), cram's (us), th'art (thou art), y'are (you are), you shall ha't (have it), the town is tane (taken).