![]() (It should be noted that the Folio also adds to the errors in the quarto’s stage directions.) On the basis of this evidence, these scholars assert that the Folio Ado thus must be (indirectly) based on the manuscript that was used in the theater, and that the quarto must have been printed from Shakespeare’s own manuscript-his so-called “foul papers.” There is no reason, however, to believe that there existed only these two play manuscripts, since many different kinds of manuscripts of (non-Shakespearean) plays are still extant from the period. To support this opinion, these scholars point to the substitution of what may be an actor’s name ( “Iacke Wilson”) for the name of the character Balthasar in one Folio stage direction, as well as to the Folio correction of one of the several errors in the quarto’s stage directions and the addition of some stage directions for music. Even today, some scholars argue that whoever annotated the copy of the 1600 quarto used by the printers of the First Folio Ado must have referred to a manuscript of the play that had been used in the theater. Scholars used to believe that this very copy of the quarto was employed by Shakespeare’s company in their theaters to regulate performance of the play. The First Folio text is generally thought to be based on a lightly annotated copy of the First Quarto of 1600. In 1623 the play was printed again, this time as part of the collection of Shakespeare’s plays now known as the First Folio. Editors have found very little to require correction in the dialogue but are hard pressed to impose order on the stage directions and speech prefixes. ![]() This quarto is remarkable among early printed texts of Shakespeare’s plays for the contrast it presents between the superb correctness of its dialogue and the many obvious errors and ambiguities in its stage directions and speech prefixes. Much Ado About Nothing was first printed in 1600 as a quarto. ![]()
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