Editing Timon of Athens (section)

==Authorship==
[[File:Nathaniel Dance Holland (1735-1811) - Timon of Athens - RCIN 406725 - Royal Collection.jpg|thumb|''[[Timon of Athens (painting)|Timon of Athens]]'' by [[Nathaniel Dance-Holland]], c.1767]]
Since the nineteenth century, suggestions have been made that ''Timon'' is the work of two writers, and it has been argued that the play's unusual features are the result of the play being co-authored by playwrights with very different mentalities; the most popular candidate, [[Thomas Middleton]], was first suggested in 1920.<ref name=Jowett />{{rp|pp. 132–136}}

The play contains several narrative inconsistencies uncharacteristic of Shakespeare, an unusually unsatisfying ''dénouement'', drastically different styles in different places and an unusually large number of long lines that do not [[Scansion|scan]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Chambers |first=E. K. |author-link=E. K. Chambers |title=William Shakespeare: A Study of Facts and Problems, Vol. I |location=Oxford |publisher=Clarendon |year=1930 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/williamshakespea017475mbp/page/n522 481]–482 |url=https://archive.org/details/williamshakespea017475mbp |isbn=978-0198117735 |access-date=26 October 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150909142016/https://archive.org/details/williamshakespea017475mbp |archive-date=9 September 2015 |url-status=live }}</ref> One theory is that the play as it appears in the ''First Folio'' is unfinished.<ref>{{cite journal | last=Ellis-Fermor | first=Una | title=''Timon of Athens'': An Unfinished Play | journal=[[The Review of English Studies]] | volume=18 | issue=71 | date=July 1942 | pages=270–283 | url=http://res.oxfordjournals.org/content/os-XVIII/71/270.full.pdf+html| doi=10.1093/res/os-XVIII.71.270| url-access=subscription }} {{subscription required}}</ref> E. K. Chambers believes Shakespeare began the play, but abandoned it due to a mental breakdown, never returning to finish it.<ref>{{cite book|last=Chambers |first=E. K. |author-link=E. K. Chambers |title=William Shakespeare: A Study of Facts and Problems, Vol. I |location=Oxford |publisher=Clarendon |year=1930 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/williamshakespea017475mbp/page/n523 482]–483 |url=https://archive.org/details/williamshakespea017475mbp |isbn=978-0198117735 |access-date=26 October 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150909142016/https://archive.org/details/williamshakespea017475mbp |archive-date=9 September 2015 |url-status=live }}</ref> F. W. Brownlow believes the play to have been Shakespeare's last, and remained uncompleted at his death.<ref>{{cite book | editor-last=Brownlow | editor-first=F. W. | title=Two Shakespearean Sequences: Henry VI to Richard II, and Pericles to Timon of Athens | url=https://archive.org/details/twoshakespearean0000brow_s5b7 | url-access=registration | location=Pittsburgh, PA | publisher=University of Pittsburgh Press | year=1977 | isbn=978-0822911272}}</ref>
The now-predominant theory of collaborative authorship
was proposed by [[Charles Knight (publisher)|Charles Knight]] in 1838.
Today, many scholars believe that other dramatist was Thomas Middleton.<ref>{{cite book | editor-last=Dawson | editor-first=Anthony B. | editor2-last=Minton | editor2-first=Gretchen E. | title=Timon of Athens | location=London | publisher=Cengage Learning | series=The Arden Shakespeare, Third Series | year=2008 | pages=1–10 | isbn=978-1903436974}}</ref> However, the exact nature of the collaboration is disputed. Did Middleton revise a piece begun by Shakespeare, did Shakespeare revise Middleton's work, or did they work together?<ref>{{cite book | editor-last=Klein | editor-first=Karl | title=Timon of Athens | location=Cambridge | publisher=Cambridge University Press | series=The New Cambridge Shakespeare | year=2001 | pages=[https://archive.org/details/timonofathens0000shak_v3p2/page/66 66–67] | isbn=978-0521294041 | url=https://archive.org/details/timonofathens0000shak_v3p2/page/66 }}</ref> John Jowett, editor of the play for both the ''Oxford Shakespeare: Complete Works'' and the individual Oxford Shakespeare edition, believes Middleton worked with Shakespeare in an understudy capacity and wrote scenes 2 (1.2 in editions which divide the play into acts), 5 (3.1), 6 (3.2), 7 (3.3), 8 (3.4), 9 (3.5), 10 (3.6) and the last eighty lines of 14 (4.3).<ref>{{cite book | editor1-last=Wells | editor1-first=Stanley | editor1-link=Stanley Wells | editor2-last=Taylor | editor2-first=Gary | editor2-link=Gary Taylor (scholar) | editor3-last=Jowett | editor3-first=John | editor3-link=John Jowett | editor4-last=Montgomery | editor4-first=William | title=The Oxford Shakespeare: The Complete Works | location=Oxford | publisher=Oxford University Press | year=2005 | edition=2nd | orig-year=1986 | page=[https://archive.org/details/completeworks0000shak_f0m2/page/943 943] | isbn=978-0199267187 | url=https://archive.org/details/completeworks0000shak_f0m2/page/943 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book | editor-last=Jowett | editor-first=John | editor-link=John Jowett | title=The Life of Timon of Athens | location=Oxford | publisher=Oxford University Press | series=The Oxford Shakespeare | year=2004 | page=2 | isbn=978-0199537440}}</ref>

A 1917 study by [[J. M. Robertson]] posited that [[George Chapman]] wrote "[[A Lover's Complaint]]" and was the originator of ''Timon of Athens''.<ref>Robertson, John Mckinnon.  ''Shakespeare And Chapman: A Thesis of Chapman's Authorship of a Lover's Complaint, And His Origination of Timon of Athens'' (1917). Reprint Services Corporation, 1999.</ref> These claims were rejected by other commentators, including [[Bertolt Brecht]],<ref>Kukhoff, Armin Gerd. "''Timon von Athen'':  Konzeption und Aufführungspraxis".  ''Shakespeare Jahrbuch'' 100–101 (Weimar, 1965), pp. 135–159.</ref> [[Frank Harris]],<ref>Harris, Frank.  ''On "Timon of Athens" as Solely the Work of Shakespeare''</ref> and Rolf Soellner (1979), who thought the play was a theatrical experiment. They argued that if one playwright revised another's play it would have been "fixed" to the standards of Jacobean theatre, which is clearly not the case. Soellner believed the play is unusual because it was written to be performed at the [[Inns of Court]], where it would have found a niche audience with young lawyers.<ref name=Soellner />

Linguistic analyses of the text have all discovered apparent confirmation of the theory that Middleton wrote much of the play. It contains numerous words, phrases, and punctuation choices that are characteristic of his work but rare in Shakespeare. These linguistic markers cluster in certain scenes, apparently indicating that the play is a collaboration between Middleton and Shakespeare, not a revision of one's work by the other.<ref name=Jowett />{{rp|pp. 2, 144}}
The evidence suggests that Middleton wrote around one third of the play, mostly the central scenes. The editor of the Oxford edition, John Jowett, states that Middleton,

<blockquote>wrote the banquet scene (Sc. 2), the central scenes with Timon's creditors and Alcibiades' confrontation with the senate, and most of the episodes figuring the Steward. The play's abrasively harsh humour and its depiction of social relationships that involve a denial of personal relationships are Middletonian traits[.]<ref name=Jowett />{{rp|p. 2}}</blockquote>

Jowett stresses that Middleton's presence does not mean the play should be disregarded, stating "''Timon of Athens'' is all the more interesting because the text articulates a dialogue between two dramatists of a very different temper."<ref name=Jowett />{{rp|p. 2}}