James Shirley Project: Newsletter 1

 

Introducing the Research Associates

Eva Griffith is Research Associate on the Shirley Project working under General Editor Barbara Ravelhofer at Durham University. Her background is as a theatre-practitioner; her academic field of specialisation is within Shakespeare Studies with particular expertise in theatre history. Apart from The Complete Works of James Shirley she is currently working on her book A Jacobean Company and Its Playhouse: The Queen’s Servants at the Red Bull, Clerkenwell (c.1605-1619), under consideration with Cambridge University Press. She is also editing Changes, or Love in a Maze (London, 1632) for the Shirley edition.

 Alison Searle is Research Associate on the Shirley Project working with Eugene Giddens at Anglia Ruskin University. She is also Visiting Research Fellow at Dr Williams’s Centre for Dissenting Studies. Her research interests include seventeenth-century British literature; trans-Atlantic Puritan literary traditions; theories of the imagination; the relationship between literature and theology and the epistolary genre. She has published a number of articles in these areas; her book entitled The Eyes of Your Heart: Literary and Theological Trajectories of Imagining Biblically is forthcoming from Paternoster Press.

 

Current Research

 

Work on a finding list of all traceable print exemplars of the works of Shirley began in 2006. At least six people have been actively involved in this task and well over 1000 copies have been discovered worldwide. Alison is working on the completion of this list and is also compiling an accompanying finding list of Shirley prompt books. She is also sourcing digital copies of first print editions in order to facilitate collation and the production of the electronic version of Shirley’s works. Eva has presented work to the General Editors on editing sample acts of Changes, or Love in a Maze in pursuance of Editorial Guidelines. These are developing through the generous assistance of editors of other major Jacobean and Caroline works currently or recently completed. The editorial board is drawing upon this wide range of ideas and work on the guidelines for the Shirley edition is in progress.

 

Assistance for Contributors

General Editor Eugene Giddens is currently working at both the Huntington Library and the Clark Library in California. He has offered to do quick checks on Shirley holdings on behalf of contributors to the edition. If you would like his assistance he can be contacted at: eugene.giddens@anglia.ac.uk.

 

Eva is working on an act by act plot summary of plays in the Shirley canon and is noting recurring themes among them. Alison is currently engaged in sourcing digital copies, examining multiple copies of early print editions and creating transparencies for collation purposes. The Research Associates can assist contributors wherever possible within their capabilities; all requests for help should be directed to one of the three General Editors:

Dr Eugene Giddens: eugene.giddens@anglia.ac.uk

Dr Teresa Grant: T.Grant@warwick.ac.uk

Dr Barbara Ravelhofer: barbara.ravelhofer@durham.ac.uk