Third Series. In 1593 Shakespeare awoke and found himself famous. Lines from his comic, erotic, tragic poem Venus and Adonis were on everyone's lips.The appearance in 1594 of the darkly reflective and richly descriptive Rape of Lucrece confirmed his fame as 'Sweet Master Shakespeare', Elizabethan England's most brilliant non-dramatic poet. Shorter poems in this volume testify further to Shakespeare's versatility and to his poetic fame. Some, like the much-debated `Phoenix and Turtle', pose problems of meaning; others raise questions about authorship and authenticity. Detailed annotation and a full Introduction seek to resolve such difficulties while also locating Shakespeare's poems in their literary context, which includes his own career as a playwright. List of illustrations x General editors' preface xii Preface xv Introduction 1 Preliminaries 1 Literary history: Sweet Shakespeare 4 Venus and Adonis and Lucrece 10 1593-4: Idle hours well spent 10 Political context: Southampton, Clapham, Burghley 26 Protagonists: visible and audible women 31 Literary sources: boy and man 57 Social context: plague and pleasure 68 Afterlife of Venus and Adonis and Lucrece 78 1598-9: The Passionate Pilgrim 82 The Phoenix and Turtle' 91 1601: Love's Martyr 91 Shakespeare and the Welsh 95 John Salusbury, literary patron 97 1601: Salusbury's difficulties 107 The best and chiefest of our moderne writers' 111 The Phoenix riddle 118 Conclusion: Tis brief, my lord' 123 THE NARRATIVE AND OTHER POEMS Narrative poems Venus and Adonis 125 The Rape of Lucrece 231 Other poems The Passionate Pilgrim 385 Verses in Love's Martyr [The Phoenix and Turtle'] 419 Poems and inscriptions with contemporary or early attributions to Shakespeare AT 1 [A song, 'Shall I die?'1 431 AT 2 [Upon a pair of gloves] 437 AT 3 [Verses on the Stanley tomb at Tong] 439 [West end] 439 [East end] 441 AT 4 [On Ben Jonson] 447 AT 5 [Inscription for Shakespeare's coat of arms] 449 AT 6 [An epitaph on Elias lames] 451 AT 7 Lin epitaph on John Combe (I)] 453 AT 8 [An epitaph on John Combe (II)] 455 AT 9 [Upon the King] 457 AT 10 'Rutland impresa: lost motto] 461 AT 11 Lin epitaph upon himself] 463 Poems with modern attributions to Shakespeare MAT 1 [The Lucy ballad] 464 MAT 2 [The Skipwith verses] 466 MAT 3 [The Stanford poem] 467 MAT 4 A Funeral Elegy 468 MAT 5 'Tom O'Bedlam's song to K. James' 469 Appendices 1 The texts 471 Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece 471 Venus and Adonis 476 The Rape of Lucrece 482 The Passionate Pilgrim 489 Verses in Love's Martyr 498 Attributed poems 503 This edition 504 Later editions 514 2 Sources for the narrative poems 522 Sources for Venus and Adonis 522 The story of Venus and Adonis 522 The story of Hermaphroditus and Salmacis 525 Sources for The Rape of Lucrece 527 Livy 527 Ovid 531 3 Facsimile of 'Poetical Essays' 535 Abbreviations and references 546 Abbreviations used in notes 546 Works by and partly by Shakespeare 547 Manuscripts and inscriptions collated 548 Early editions of Shakespeare and other authors collated 549 Editions of Shakespeare collated 550 Other works cited 552 Manuscripts 552 Printed books and articles 552 Index 569 Index of first lines 593