The Two Noble Kinsmen
by John Fletcher, William Shakespeare · first published 1634
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When Theseus, Duke of Athens, learns that the ruler of Thebes has killed three noble kings he swears to take revenge. But after Athens triumphs over the rival city, Theseus is struck by the bravery of two Theban cousins and orders his surgeons to attend to them. Soon, the cousins' lifelong friendship is threatened, as both become overwhelmed with love for the duke's beautiful sister.
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I've been working on adapting Two Noble Kinsmen for performance, and boy, it's not a good piece. I haven't been counting it in my quest to perform every Shakespeare play, since it's not included in the First Folio. I've been treating it as a Fletcher…
on “Rare Edition of Shakespeare’s Last Play Found in Spanish Library” ↗…What is definitely true is that plays during this time period were often collaborations between multiple writers. Different authors might add in lines or scenes. Two authors might co-write a play (The Two Noble Kinsmen) or numerous author might 'punch up' a work. Shakespeare primarily wrote his plays, but other people definitely contributed bits here and there, just like he contributed bits to other plays that don't…
on “Shakespeare’s Son Died at 11. A Novel Asks How It Shaped His Art” ↗> Like many collections, they omit The Two Noble Kinsmen due to unclear authorship, and for this reason I’m omitting it from my list as well. > Also, around 20% of plays credited to Shakespeare were collaborations of some degree, though the collaboration details…
on “My ranking of every Shakespeare play” ↗…the counter-example that comes to mind first. Say "Beaumont" to an English major and he will respond "Fletcher", whether or not he has read their plays. Shakespeare collaborated on at least one play. (Two Noble Kinsmen?) The Goncourt brothers wrote novels together until the one's decline and death--the linked piece mentions duos as more common. Why would writing with someone else necessarily leave the need unsatisfied?
on “Can You Write a Novel as a Group?” ↗…this includes the most well known like "Hamlet", "Romeo and Juliet", "Othello", "King Lear" and so on. But a number of plays were written in collaboration with other playwrights - for example the play "Two Noble Kinsmen" mentioned in the article, which was written in collaboration with John Fletcher. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Shakespeare%27s_collab... for other collaborations. Quantitative textual analysis…
on “Rare Edition of Shakespeare’s Last Play Found in Spanish Library” ↗…perform Shakespeare plays, which I edit according to my goals, and need a source of plain text to start from.) This edition, conveniently, has been lightly edited to regularize the spelling. When I did Two Noble Kinsmen, I had to start from an edition that was directly from the original printed text, and the first step was to make it legible. Despite bearing the title page of the First Folio, this isn't drawn from there.…
on “The Complete Works of William Shakespeare” ↗