Born, in Dublin, 4 Oct. 1741. Early education at private school in Dublin. To Trin. Col., Dublin, 1756; scholar, 1760; B.A., 1762. [Visit] To England, 1759. Student of Inner Temple, 1763. Friendship with Dr. Johnson begun, 1765. Travelled in France, 1766–67. Called to Irish Bar at King’s Inns, 1767. Contrib. to Irish periodicals. Settled in London, May 1777. Resided there till his death. Mem. of Literary Club, 1782. Friendship with Boswell begun, 1785; assisted him in preparing “Life of Johnson” for press. Engaged in Shakespearean criticism. Hon. D.C.L., Oxford, 5 July 1793. Hon. LL.D., Dublin, 1801. Unmarried. Died, in London, 25 May 1812. Buried in Kilbixy Churchyard. Works: “Attempt to ascertain the order in which the Plays of Shakespeare were written,” 1778; “Supplement to Johnson’s edn. of Shakespeare” (anon.), 1780; “Cursory Observations on the Poems attributed to Thomas Rowley” (anon.), 1782. “A Second Appendix to Mr. Malone’s Supplement,” 1783; “A Dissertation on the three parts of ‘King Henry VI.,’” 1787. “Letter to the Rev. R. Farmer,” 1792; “An Enquiry into the Authenticity of certain papers” [the Ireland Forgeries], 1796; “An Account of the incidents from which the title and part of the story of Shakespeare’s Tempest was derived” (priv. ptd.), 1808. “Biographical Memoir of W. Windham” (anon.), 1810. Posthumous: “Correspondence … with the Rev. J. Davenport,” ed. by J. O. Halliwell, 1864; “Original Letters … to J. Jordan,” ed. by J. O. Halliwell, 1864. He edited: “The Tragicall Hystory of Romeus and Juliet,” 1780; Goldsmith’s Works, 1780; Shakespeare’s Works (11 vols.), 1790; Sir Joshua Reynolds’ “Writings,” 1797; Dryden’s Works (4 vols.), 1800; the 1807 edn. of Boswell’s “Life of Johnson;” Hamilton’s “Parliamentary Logick,” 1808. Life: by Sir James Prior, 1860.
Personal
I have just dipped far enough into Mr. Malone’s edition of Shakspeare to find he has not been sparing of his epithets whenever he has occasion to introduce me to the notice of his readers. In fact, I believe I originally gave him some little provocation. But I thought your countrymen had been remarkable rather for the suddenness of their anger than the duration of their malignity. Have the morals of this worthy editor been corrupted by his long residence amongst us?
I had the melancholy task of announcing to him the death of our excellent friend, Mr. Malone. I am unable to name in the large circle of Mr. Kemble’s acquaintance, any gentleman for whom he had a more perfect esteem. He frequently alluded, in conversation to the elegance of his manners; and delighted to quote him, as one of the best illustrations of the old school. As a commentator upon Shakespeare, Mr. Kemble greatly preferred Mr. Malone; because he saw in him unwearied diligence and most scrupulous accuracy; with an utter rejection of that impertinent self-display which had discredited, on too many occasions, the wit, the learning, and the labour of some of his rivals.
Editions of Shakespeare
The heaviest of all books, Mr. Malone’s “Shakspeare,” in ten thick octavos, with notes, that are an extract of all the opium that is spread through the works of all the bad play-wrights of that age: mercy on the poor gentleman’s patience!
His pages abound with profound ignorance, idle conjectures, crude notions, feeble attempts at jocularity.
Hylactor means a dog with a clear and strong voice: One would think that “this dog” was one of Canidia’s breed, which called from the sepulchre the actual remains of the dead to enchant and stupefy the living. This dog has been scratching up the earth about “Doctors Commons,” and has torn up all “the Wills” of the actors who lived in Shakspeare’s time, and carried them in his mouth to the printer of a late edition of that author.
Rival editors have recourse to necromancy to know from Shakspere himself who of them is the fittest to edit and illustrate him. Describe the meeting, the ceremonies of conjuration, the appearance of the spirit, the effect on the rival invokers. When they have resumed courage, the arbiter appointed by them asks the question. They listen,—Malone leaps up while the rest lay their heads at the same instant that the arbiter reëchoes the words of the spirit, “Let Malone!” The spirit shudders, then exclaims in the dread and angry utterance of the dead, “No! no! Let me alone, I said, inexorable boobies!” O that eternal bricker-up of Shakspere! Registers, memorandum-books—and that Bill, Jack, and Harry; Tom, Walter, and Gregory; Charles, Dick, and Jim, lived at that house, but that nothing more is known of them. But, oh! the importance when half a dozen players’-bills can be made to stretch through half a hundred or more of pages, though there is not one word in them that by any force can be made either to illustrate the times or life or writings of Shakspere, or, indeed, of any time. And yet, no edition but this gentleman’s name burs upon it—burglossa with a vengeance. Like the genitive plural of a Greek adjective, it is Malone, Malone, Malone, Μαλῶν, Μαλῶν, Μαλῶν.
Allied to this library in the general complexion of its literary treasures is that of Marcellus; while in the possession of numberless rare and precious volumes relating to the drama, and especially his beloved Shakespeare, it must be acknowledged that Marcellus hath somewhat the superiority. Meritorious as have been his labours in the illustration of our immortal bard, he is yet as zealous, vigilant, and anxious as ever to accumulate everything which may tend to the further illustration of him.
Malone and Steevens were two laborious commentators on the meaning of words and phrases; one dull, the other clever; but the dulness was accompanied by candor and a love of truth; the cleverness, by a total absence of both. Neither seems to have had a full discernment of Shakspeare’s genius.
Malone professes the same anxiety to adhere to the genuine text of Shakspere as Steevens had professed before him; but he opened a wide field for editorial licence, in his principle of making up a text out of the folio edition and the previous quartos; and, to add to the apparent value of his own labours, he exaggerated, as others have since done, the real value of these quartos.
Though not highly accomplished, he was a scholar, a man of good judgment, and, for his day, of good poetical taste. He was patient, indefatigably laborious, and modest—that is, as modest as it was possible for a Shakesperian critic and editor of the last century to be. Above all, he was honestly devoted to his task; he sought the glory of his author, not his own—except in so far as the latter was involved in the former. We of to-day can see that he committed many and great blunders; but he saved the text of Shakespeare from wide and ruthless outrage, and by painful and well-directed investigation into the literature and manners contemporary with his author, cast new light upon his pages. To Edmund Malone the readers of Shakespeare during the last decade of the last century, and the first quarter of this, were indebted for the preservation of his works in a condition nearly approaching their original integrity.
In the eighteenth century the persistent raillery of Voltaire ended in producing in England a certain waking up. Garrick, whilst correcting Shakespeare, played him, and acknowledged that it was Shakespeare that he played. They reprinted him at Glasgow. An imbecile, Malone, made commentaries on his plays, and, as a logical sequence, whitewashed his tomb. There was on this tomb a little bust, of a doubtful resemblance, and moderate as a work of art; but, what made it a subject of reverence, contemporaneous with Shakespeare. It is after this bust that all the portraits of Shakespeare have been made that we now see. The bust was whitewashed. Malone, critic and whitewasher of Shakespeare, spread a coat of plaster on his face, of idiotic nonsense on his work.
He depended with greater fidelity than any of his predecessors on the early editions; and in Shakespearean biography and theatrical history he brought together more that was new and important than any predecessor or successor. But when he attempted original textual emendation, his defective ear became lamentably apparent. His intellect lacked the alertness characteristic of Steevens or Gifford.
General
From the perusal of Mr. Malone’s Inquiry, it must appear evident to the meanest capacity that the commentator never dreamed of an opponent, although he ventured to peep into the court of Apollo during his drowsy fit: for after his conclusions are drawn upon each topic of discussion, his pages are so conceitedly interlarded with “Let us no longer hear of this”—“I trust we shall hear no more of that,” and an hundred et-ceteræ of the same nature, that it should appear as if Mr. Malone’s fiat was irrevocable; whereas, from the perusal of Mr. Chalmer’s Apology and Supplement, the facts in them exhibited and the just conclusions drawn, it is obvious that Malone was not only dreaming of Parnassus, but absolutely in a doze from the beginning to the termination of his boasted inquiry.
In Malone was exhibited the character of all our dull and tasteless Life writers, editors, and critics for half a century past.
Malone forms a striking example of a life devoted almost to one literary pursuit. The object indeed was not personal but national, having employed more pens and given birth to more readers and admirers in our island than any other literary topic whatever. For this he forsook law, wealth, and probably station for unprofitable literature; and proved beyond most other men fitted for the occupation…. A few, not acquainted with the peculiarities of his line of studies, deemed them little more than dalliance with letters—a kind of agreeable disporting over the green fields of literature. They knew not the labours it involved; the occasional difficulties of access to the places where deposited; the interminable research, the exhausted patience, eyes, and frames of which I have in him endeavoured to depict an outline. None of his predecessors had attempted what he accomplished. Few of his successors have, on most points, added materially to our knowledge. When assailed for excess of accuracy by the idle or superficial, he disdained reply. He was studious, and selected an object of popular study; inquiring, and left nothing unexplored likely to afford information; reflective, and therefore usually accurate in drawing conclusions where positive testimony was at fault. His talents were steady and practical; his learning extensive; his critical judgments, as we have seen in the preceding pages, sound. He who could throw light upon the career of Shakspeare and Dryden—give us the first and best history of the Stage—and leave, for our study and guidance volumes at Oxford which no other spot supplies, must be considered no small benefactor to letters.
