John Payne Collier

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John Payne Collier

John Payne Collier (born January 11, 1789 in London , † September 17, 1883 in Maidenhead ) was an English Shakespeare critic . He is also known for a number of manuscript forgeries of the famous playwright.

Reporter and lawyer

His father, John Dyer Collier (1762-1825), was a successful journalist. His ties to the London press enabled his son to take on a position as senior editor, critic and reporter for the Morning Chronicle ; a newspaper that was published in London between 1769 and 1862 and for the u. a. and Charles Dickens wrote (in 1834). He stayed there until 1847; for some time he was also a reporter for The Times . He was summoned to the House of Commons in 1819 for writing a skewed account of a speech by Joseph Hume . He joined the Middle Temple Bar in 1811 , but was not called to the bar until 1829. This delay was partly due to the indiscretions in the publication of his book Critisism on the Bar (1819), which was critical of justice, under the pseudonym " Amicus Curiae ".

Controversial Shakespearean gentleman

In his spare time he was engaged in Shakespeare and early English drama. After a few minor publications, he produced a new edition of Robert Dodsleys ' "Old Plays" in 1825-1827 and an additional volume in 1833 entitled "Five Old Plays". In 1831 his three-volume work "History of English Dramatic Poetry to the Time of Shakespeare and Annals of the Stage to the Restoration" appeared, a poorly put together but acceptable work. It gave him the post of librarian to William Cavendish, 6th Duke of Devonshire and later access to the central collections of early English literature across the kingdom, particularly the treasures of Bridgewater House in Westminster . In 1847 he was appointed secretary of the Royal Commission for the British Museum , which was to move into its current domicile three years later.

Collier used these opportunities to produce a number of literary inventions. In the years that followed he claimed to have discovered some new documents concerning Shakespeare's life and work. After works like "New Facts", "New Particulars" and "Further Particulars respecting Shakespeare" had appeared and had withstood scrutiny as much as possible, Collier produced the famous "Perkins Folio" in 1852. For this he used a copy of the Second Folio from 1632 (see Shakespeare's Folio ) and added handwritten notes and also invented the name Perkins , which he wrote on the title page. In this book, so claimed Collier, there are numerous manuscript editions of Shakespeare from the hand of an "old lecturer ". He published these supposedly newly discovered corrections in 1852 as Notes and Emendations to the Text of Shakespeare, and a year later boldly included them in his next edition of Shakespeare's works.

The authenticity was immediately confirmed by Samuel Weller Singer (1783–1858) in his work “The Text of Shakespeare vindicated from the Interpolations and Corruptions advocated by John Payne Collier esq. in his notes and endations ”and also by Andrew Edmund Brae in“ Literary Cookery with Reference to Matter Attributed to Coleridge and Shakespeare ”(1855), who also cites internal evidence. In 1859 the tome was given to an expert at the British Museum by its owner, the Duke of Devonshire ; the added corrections proved undeniably to be forgeries of modern times. Collier was unmasked by Nicholas Hamilton in his investigation in 1860.

The point of whether Collier had cheated or was himself deceived was left open, but his undisputed forgeries in connection with the founder of Dulwich College , the actor Edward Alleyn (1566-1626), left little doubt as to the former. He had edited Edward Alleyn's memoirs for the Shakespeare Society in 1841. This edition was followed in 1843 by the “Alleyn Papers” and in 1845 by the “Diary of Philip Henslowe ”. When the sale of his library in 1884 gave access to a copy he had made of the diary, with the inserts corresponding to the Dulwich forgeries, it was confirmed that he was interpolating Shakespeare's name into a real letter in Dulwich ; Likewise, the wrong entries in Alleyn's diary could be confirmed as coming from Collier's pen.

Since then, no testimony and no manuscript edited by Collier can be accepted without verification, but he has also done a lot of useful work for Shakepeare research: In 1865 he published a valuable “Bibliographical and Critical Report on the Rarest Books in English” (“Bibliographical and Critical Account of the Rarest Books in the English Language “) together; he reprinted a great number of early English treatises of extreme rarity, and did good service to the numerous antiquarian bookshops with which he was affiliated; especially in the editions he produced for the Camden Society and the Percy Society .

His “Old Man's Diary” (“Diary of an Old Man”), which he wrote in 1871-72, is an instructive document, although here too the blemish of deliberate inaccuracy is not lacking. In the end, what Collier brought into the world as (exposed) forgeries is more likely to be remembered by posterity than his thoroughly respectable and unobjectionable publications. He died on September 17, 1883 in Maidenhead, where he also lived for a long time.

Modern perspectives

In the late 20th century, some scientists tried to reassess Collier, which should also relieve him of the allegation of forgery. Here Dewey Ganzel (1927-2011), professor emeritus of English literature at Oberlin College , was a driving force. In his study Fortune and Men's Eyes , published in 1982 . he describes that Collier's accusers, led by Frederic Madden , were largely guided by envy and class conceit; they were amateurs in a higher class, determined to put down a low-class but determined and hard-working and talented geek. What spoke for Collier was the fact that not all allegations stood up to critical scrutiny. The American psychiatrist Samuel A. Tannenbaum , for example, claimed that Collier had falsified all of the Master of the Revels entries , an accusation that went far beyond the actual offenses committed.

In scientific opinion, however, Collier's guilt is still proven. In the debate on Collier's case, Samuel Schoenbaum mentions an overwhelming hint that Ganzel withheld in his treatise. In 1875, in old age, more than 30 years after the Perkins Folio was published, Collier claimed in a letter that he owned a collection “full of brief notes and notes by John Milton ; 1500 of them ”. ("Full of Milton's brief notes and references; 1500 of them."). At that time, Collier's reputation was already tarnished, so that he could not issue any more forgeries. While the "Milton Collection" actually exists (in the New York Public Library ), the handwritten annotations are not from Milton.

A two-volume study by Arthur Freeman and Janet Ing Freeman, published in 2004, re-examined the evidence and again concluded that Collier was a forger.

To this, Ganzel replied, “He [Arthur Freeman] accepts Collier's guilt and this leads him to encounter Collier's work in anticipation of fraud [...] My study found what was irrefutable evidence that he was a victim of a conspiracy Frederick Madden was involved in [...] Freeman starts with a criminal, I tried to end with a human ["man"]. Freeman says by overturning the verdict on Collier's guilt, you are giving away the opportunity to understand him. This confusion merely leads to some sort of explanation of the events he describes and that is not very satisfactory to me. The point is that the crimes are not 'proven', the perpetrators are. "

Schönbaum referred to an obvious confession in Collier's diary. In the last few years of his long life, Collier expressed moments of remorse in his diary. On February 19, 1881 he wrote:

"I have done many base things in my time — some that I knew to be base at the moment, and many that I deeply regretted afterwards and up to this very day."

"I have done many dishonorable things in my time that I [already] knew at the time I did it, and many that I have deeply regretted thereafter and to this day."

- Samuel Schoenbaum : Shakespeare's Lives New York, Oxford University Press 1970; P. 361.

And on May 14, 1882:

"I am bitterly sad and most sincerely grieved that in every way I am such a despicable offender [.] I am ashamed of almost every act of my life ... My repentance is bitter and sincere [.]"

“I am bitterly saddened, and sincerely grieved, that I am such a despicable criminal in every way. [...] I am ashamed of almost every act in my life. My repentance is bitter and sincere. "

- Samuel Schoenbaum : Shakespeare's Lives New York, Oxford University Press 1970; P. 361.

Frank Kermode added that Collier's "repentance would be far more helpful if he had named his forgeries and falsifications."

However, Collier still has advocates. Ganzel traces Colliers, as he writes "Confession", back in his diary to the fact that he did not accept certain Christian beliefs. An article under the name "To forge or not to forge?" The great-grandson Colliers, Richard J. Westall, published in March 2010 in the genealogical journal Family History Monthly , the evidence and quotes sums in a message Collier shortly before his death to his daughter together sent: "I have written much in verse and prose, but can confidently say that I never produced a line, either in verse or prose that was calculated to be injurious either to morality or religion" ("Ich haben viel in Written verse and prose, but can confidently say that I have never written a line, neither in verse nor in prose, which was considered morally or religiously injurious ”). Westall cites a letter from Arthur Freeman to him stating that the writer couple never assumed Collier's guilt until they sifted through the evidence. Westall notes that this collides with the statement in the work of the Freemans, in which they vilify those who "nobly" overturned Collier's condemnation and that this dealings prevent his ancestors from being understood in their entirety ("... forfeits the opportunity to explain him at all. ").

Literature by and about Collier

Individual evidence

  1. ^ John Payne Collier: The history of English dramatic poetry to the time of Shakespeare; and Annals of the stage to the restoration , J. Murray, London 1831, online
  2. ^ Review of The History of English Dramatic Poetry, to the time of Shakespeare, and Annals of the Stage to the Restoration by J. Payne Collier . In: The Quarterly Review . January 1832, pp. 477-518.
  3. ↑ Louis Alexander Fagan: The Life of Sir Anthony Panizzi , Volume 1, p. 257
  4. ^ Friedrich August Leo, John Payne Collier: Contributions and improvements to Shakespeare's dramas: After handwritten changes in one of J. Payne Collier Esq. Copies of the 1632 folio edition found , A. Asher and comp. Berlin 1853 (English and German) read online at Archive.org
  5. ^ Samuel Weller Singer: The Text of Shakespeare Vindicated , W. Pickering, London 1853 online
  6. ^ Andrew Edmund Brae (ed.): Literary Cookery with Reference to Matter Attributed to Coleridge and Shakespeare . Smith, 1855, p. 12 (English, limited preview in Google Book Search).
  7. ↑ Nicholas Hamilton (ed.): An inquiry into the genuineness of the manuscript corrections in Mr. J. Payne Collier's annotated Shakspere, folio, 1632; and of certain Shaksperian documents likewise published by Mr. Collier. By NESA Hamilton . R. Bentley, London, 1860, pp. 176 (English, read online at Archive.org ).
  8. ^ Dewey Ganzel: Fortune and Men's Eyes: The Career of John Payner Collier , New York, Oxford University Press 1982.
  9. ^ FE Halliday : A Shakespeare Companion 1564-1964 Baltimore, Penguin 1964; P. 109
  10. ^ Samuel Schoenbaum: Shakespeare's Lives New York, Oxford University Press 1970; Pages 332-61.
  11. ↑ Arthur Freeman and Janet Ing Freeman (Eds.): John Payne Collier: Scholarship and Forgery in the Nineteenth Century . New Haven, Yale University Press, 2004, ISBN 978-0-300-09661-3 , pp. 1483 (English, 0300096615 limited preview in Google Book search).
  12. ↑ Dewey Ganzel, personal letter dated August 31, 2005 to Richard J. Westall.
  13. ^ Frank Kermode: London Review of Books , December 16, 2004.
  14. ^ "Fraud and forgery in family history," Family History Monthly , Issue 180, March 2010.
personal data
SURNAME Collier, John Payne
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British literary scholar
DATE OF BIRTH January 11, 1789
PLACE OF BIRTH London
DATE OF DEATH 17th September 1883
Place of death Maidenhead