Transcriber's Note:
The cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.
IN VERONA,
Nella Stamparia di Girolamo Discepolo.
M D X CIIII.
A PROBABLE ITALIAN SOURCE
OF
SHAKESPEARE’S “JULIUS CÆSAR”
PREFACE
This monograph was submitted to the Faculty of NewYork University in partial fulfillment of the requirementsfor the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, and was acceptedby them in May, 1912. Its composition was prompted chieflyby a desire to call attention to the long forgotten work ofOrlando Pescetti, because it is at least an open questionwhether Shakespeare derived from the “Cesare” of theItalian dramatist many hints which he later used in his own“Julius Caesar.” Pescetti’s drama seems to have beenentirely overlooked as a possible source, although the manystriking similarities to Shakespeare’s tragedy render it wellworth investigating. I believe that the present work isthe first attempt to demonstrate the possible relation betweenthe two dramas.
“Cesare” seems to be the only play on the subject whichhas not been exhaustively examined. The only notices inEnglish with which I am acquainted appeared in letterspublished in the Nation, June 2 and 9, 1910, while this workwas in process of preparation. The first, by Miss Lisi Cipriano,called attention to some marked similarities in expressionand treatment between the two dramas. In reply, twoletters appeared the following week: one from ProfessorHarry Morgan Ayres of Columbia University, the otherfrom Professor Henry N. McCracken of Yale. Neitherseemed to regard the parallels cited by Miss Cipriano asindicative of direct borrowing on the part of Shakespeare.Professor Ayres had previously in the June, 1910, number ofthe “American Modern Language Association Publications”been the first to make any mention of Pescetti in relationto Shakespeare. In his article, “Shakespeare’s Julius Caesarin the Light of Some other Versions,” he called