Chronology of William Shakespeare's Plays - Difficulty of Creating A Precise Chronology

Difficulty of Creating A Precise Chronology

Shakespearean scholars, beginning with Edmond Malone in 1790, have attempted to reconstruct the plays' relative chronology by various means, primarily using external evidence (references by contemporary commentators and in private documents, allusions in other plays, entries in the Stationers' Register, and records of performance and publication), and internal evidence (allusions to contemporary events, composition and publication dates of sources used by Shakespeare, the development of his style and diction over time, and the plays' context in the contemporary theatrical and literary milieu). Most modern chronologies are based on the work of E.K. Chambers in 1930, who dated the composition of 2 Henry VI and 3 Henry VI in 1590-1 as Shakespeare's first plays.

However, while most Shakespearean scholars agree within a few years for the composition of most plays, there is no definitive or precise chronology of the plays because of the fragmentary nature of the surviving evidence. This is especially pronounced in relation to the earlier plays; most chronologies tend to agree on the order of plays written after c.1600, but there are many different versions of the pre-1600 chronology.

Dates of performance are often of limited use, as oftentimes it is impossible to determine whether a given performance is the first performance; the first performances of only two plays — Henry VIII and Henry VI, Part 1 — can be identified, and even in this, there is some ambiguity about 1 Henry VI. Similarly, dates of first publication are relatively useless in determining a chronology, as about half of the plays were not published until the First Folio in 1623 (seven years after Shakespeare's death). Performance dates and publication dates are also problematic insofar as many of the plays were performed several years before they were published (for example, Titus Andronicus was performed in 1592, but not published until 1594; Henry VI, Part 3 was performed in 1592 but not published until 1595). Both performance and publication dates can thus be used only to determine terminal dates of composition, and the initial dates are much more speculative.

In addition, some scholars completely break with the conventional dating system. E.A.J. Honigmann for example, dissents from the most common dating of the plays with his "early start theory" by pushing back the beginning of Shakespeare's career four or five years beginning with the composition of Titus Andronicus in 1586 instead of following Chambers. Most scholars, however, reject Honigmann's theory, saying it causes more problems than it solves.