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hand, written by a devoted student of the drama, Montague Summers
—that 'the Mermaid Series remains a magnificent service rendered to
the English drama, a pioneer work, a work that demanded courage,
scholarship, and enthusiasm.' "
In 1917, the firm of T. Fisher Unwin arranged for publication of
the Mermaid Series in the United States by Charles Scribner's Sons.
In 1926 Unwin was absorbed by Ernest Benn Limited who continued
supplying Scribner's with the Mermaid volumes until 1945. After the
Second World War some 12 of the Mermaid volumes were re-issued
in London by Ernest Benn Limited and A. A. Wyn Incorporated in
New York. On this occasion, the Curator of the Bramlcr Matthews
Dramatic Museum at Columbia University (Henry W. Wells) wrote:
"If a class of students in our century was to know the Elizabethan
drama through any more attractive medium than an anthology, this
series provided the almost certain means. Earlier editions . . . were
directed to ... British gentlemen. The new library . . . was addressed
to a very much larger and democratic public. It always sold
well in America. Yet one by one these books went out of print. . . .
The gradual strangulation of the Mermaid Series seemed a mark of
doom upon the popular success of Elizabethan studies themselves. . . .
But lovers of the most humane movement in all English literature
have at present cause for congratulation . . . the Mermaid Series is
being re-issued." But the price of this 1948-49 hard-back edition was
beyond the means of the academic and democratic public Mr. Wells
speaks about. The necessary next step was to issue the books—completely
reset—in paper-back form at little more than one dollar each.
It also seemed high time to continue the work itself where Ellis, so
long ago, had left off. In 1887 were issued the Marlowe, the Dekker,
the Congreve, Middleton Volume I, and Massinger Volume I. In iBBB
followed Heywood, Ford, Shirley, Wycherley, Dtway, Webster and
Tourneur, and an anthology entitled Nero and Other Plays; in 1889-90,
the second volumes of Middleton and Massinger, respectively. In the
nineties came Steele, Chapman, Vanbrugh, and three volumes of Jon.son.
In the nineteen-hundreds, Shadwell, Farquhar, Greene, and two volumes
each of Dry den and Beaumont & Fletcher. The rest was silence.*
In addition to reprinting the original Mermaids, Hill and Wang Inc.
is issuing several new Mermaids a year.
As published by Hill and Wang Inc., the Mermaid Scries is a section
of a still larger series, Dramaboofa, which also includes books old and
new about theatre and drama.
The Publishers
• Ellis's editors—aside from those whose work never appeared—were Alexander
C. Ewald, H. P. Home, Edmund Gusse, Rod en Noel, Ernest Rhys, A. C. Swinburne,
John Ajdingtun Symunds, Arthur Symons, A. W. Verity, and W. C. Ward.
The choice of editors aficr 1890 was presumably made by T. Fisher Unwin. Those
chosen were: G. A. Aitkcn, William Archer, T. H. Dickinson, C. H. Hcrford,
Brinsley Nicholson, William Lvnn Phelps, George Saintsbury, J. St. Loe Strachey,
A. E. H. Swaeo.