The acclaimed Pelican Shakespeare series edited by A. R. Braunmuller and Stephen Orgel   The legendary Pelican Shakespeare series features authoritative and meticulously researched texts paired with scholarship by renowned Shakespeareans. Each book includes an essay on the theatrical world of Shakespeare’s time, an introduction to the individual play, and a detailed note on the text used. Updated by general editors Stephen Orgel and A. R. Braunmuller, these easy-to-read editions incorporate over thirty years of Shakespeare scholarship undertaken since the original series, edited by Alfred Harbage, appeared between 1956 and 1967. With definitive texts and illuminating essays, the Pelican Shakespeare will remain a valued resource for students, teachers, and theater professionals for many years to come.   For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,800 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators. “Gorgeous new Shakespeare paperbacks.”  —Marlon James, author of  A Brief History of Seven Killings “I have been using the Pelican Shakespeare for years in my lecture course--it's invaluable, the best individual-volume series available for students.” — Marjorie Garber, William R. Kenan, Jr. Professor of English and Visual and Environmental Studies, Harvard University   William Shakespeare  was born in Stratford-upon-Avon in April, 1564, and his birth is traditionally celebrated on April 23. The facts of his life, known from surviving documents, are sparse. He died on April 23, 1616, and was buried in Holy Trinity Church, Stratford.  A. R.   Braunmuller  is Distinguished Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of California at Los Angeles. He has written critical volumes on George Peele and George Chapman and has edited plays in both the Oxford ( King John ) and Cambridge ( Macbeth ) series of Shakespeare editions. He is also general editor of The New Cambridge Shakespeare.  Stephen Orgel  is the Jackson Eli Reynolds Professor of the Humanities at Stanford University and general editor of the Cambridge Studies in Renaissance Literature and Culture. His books include  Imagining Shakespeare ,  The Authentic Shakespeare ,  Impersonations: The Performance of Gender in Shakespeare’s England  and  The Illusion of Power . The Life of King Henry the Eighth the prologue I come no more to make you laugh. Things now That bear a weighty and a serious brow, Sad, high, and working, full of state and woe, 3 Such noble scenes as draw the eye to flow We now present. Those that can pity, here May (if they think it well) let fall a tear: The subject will deserve it. Such as give Their money out of hope they may believe, May here find truth too. Those that come to see Only a show or two and so agree 10 The play may pass-if they be still and willing, I'll undertake may see away their shilling 12 Richly in two short hours. Only they 13 That come to hear a merry bawdy play, 14 A noise of targets, or to see a fellow 15 In a long motley coat guarded with yellow, 16 Will be deceived. For, gentle hearers, know 17 To rank our chosen truth with such a show As fool and fight is, beside forfeiting 19 Our own brains and the opinion that we bring 20 To make that only true we now intend, 21 Will leave us never an understanding friend. 22 Therefore, for goodness' sake, and as you are known The first and happiest hearers of the town, 24 Be sad, as we would make ye. Think ye see 25 The very persons of our noble story As they were living. Think you see them great, And followed with the general throng and sweat Of thousand friends. Then, in a moment, see How soon this mightiness meets misery. 30 And if you can be merry then, I'll say A man may weep upon his wedding day. * ¥    I.1 Enter the Duke of Norfolk at one door; at the other, the Duke of Buckingham and the Lord Abergavenny. buckingham Good morrow and well met. How have ye done Since last we saw in France? norfolk      I thank your grace, Healthful, and ever since a fresh admirer 3 Of what I saw there. 4 buckingham      An untimely ague Stayed me a prisoner in my chamber when Those suns of glory, those two lights of men, 6 Met in the vale of Andren. 7 norfolk      'Twixt Guynes and Arde. I was then present, saw them salute on horseback, Beheld them when they lighted, how they clung 9 In their embracement, as they grew together; 10 Which had they, what four throned ones could have weighed 11 Such a compounded one? buckingham      All the