Editing Shakespearean problem play (section)

==As conceived by Boas==
[[File:First Folio, Shakespeare - 0017.jpg|thumb|right|''A CATALOGVE of the ſeuerall Comedies, Hiſtories, and Tragedies contained in this Volume.'' From the [[First Folio]] of Shakespeare's plays, this table of contents divides the plays into groups of ''Comedies'', ''Histories'', and ''Tragedies''.]]
Boas himself lists the first three plays and adds that ''[[Hamlet]]'' links Shakespeare's problem-plays to his unambiguous tragedies.<ref name = "boas">F. S. Boas, ''Shakespeare and his Predecessors'', John Murray, Third Impression, 1910, pp. 344–408.</ref> For Boas, this modern form of drama provided a useful model with which to study works by Shakespeare that had previously seemed uneasily situated between the comic and the tragic; nominally two of the three plays identified by Boas are comedies, while the third, ''[[Troilus and Cressida]]'', is found amongst the tragedies in the First Folio, although it is not listed in the ''Catalogue'' (table of contents) of the [[First Folio]]. According to Boas, Shakespeare's problem-plays set out to explore specific moral dilemmas and social problems through their central characters.

Boas contends that the plays allow the reader to analyze complex and neglected topics. Rather than arousing simple joy or pain, the plays induce engrossment and bewilderment. ''[[All's Well that Ends Well]]'' and ''[[Measure for Measure]]'' have resolutions, but ''Troilus and Cressida'' and ''Hamlet'' do not. Instead Shakespeare requires that the reader decipher the plays.<ref name="boas"/> Per Boas, these plays, distinguished by their themes and treatment, require classification beyond comedy; adopting the popular classification of his time, he called them problem plays.<ref name="boas"/>