responsible, on the
other hand, for portions of a few plays that are traditionally claimed
for others. When the account is balanced, Shakespeare must be credited
with the production, during these twenty years, of a yearly average of
two plays, nearly all of which belong to the supreme rank of literature.
Three volumes of poems must be added to the total. Ben Jonson was often
told by the players that 'whatsoever he penned he never blotted out
(_i.e._ erased) a line.' The editors of the First Folio attested that
'what he thought he uttered with that easinesse that we have scarce
received from him a blot in his papers.' Signs of hasty workmanship are
not lacking, but they are few when it is considered how rapidly his
numerous compositions came from his pen, and they are in the aggregate
unimportant.

His borrowed plots.

By borrowing his plots he to some extent economised his energy, but he
transformed most of them, and it was not probably with the object of
conserving his strength that he systematically levied loans on popular
current literature like Holinshed's 'Chronicles,' North's translation of
'Plutarch,' widely read romances, and successful plays. In this regard
he betrayed something of the practical temperament which is traceable in
the conduct of the affairs of his later life. It was doubtless with the
calculated aim of ministering to the public taste that he unceasingly
adapted, as his genius dictated, themes which had already, in the hands
of inferior writers or dramatists, proved capable of arresting public
attention.

The revision of plays.

The professional playwrights sold their plays outright to one or other of
the acting companies, and they retained no legal interest in them after
the manuscript had passed into the hands of the theatrical manager. {47}
It was not unusual for the manager to invite extensive revision of a play
at the hands of others than its author before it was produced on the
stage, and again whenever it was revived. Shakespeare gained his
earliest experience as a dramatist by revising or rewriting behind the
scenes plays that had become the property of his manager. It is possible
that some of his labours in this direction remain unidentified. In a few
cases his alterations were slight, but as a rule his fund of originality
was too abundant to restrict him, when working as an adapter, to mere
recension, and the results of most of his labours in that capacity are