The Variorum Shakeiipeare has always been famous for the extraordinary
detail of its comment and apparatus ; and there is "much to be said for so concentrated an attention to Shakespeare's words as Coriolanus, edited by Howard Furness, Junr. (Lippincott, 25s.), demands. All the views that have been advanced by critics of importance upon any line of the plays are here printed in a giant collection. There is a certain sardonic pleasure to be gained from hearing so many positive opinions so dogmatically rendered ; one critic outswearing all others in favour of the absolute undoubted and solitary value of his own comment or emendation. But perhaps the most valuable part of the Variorum volumes consists in the appendices, in which are collected what the different critics have said of the characters themselves. On Coriolanus Coleridge has less to say than usual. Goethe has not enriched the play with any observations. In modern times Mr. Middleton Murry has called Coriolanus "one of the most masterly of Shakespeare's plays." The present volume is the twentieth in the new edition : it completes the series of Roman plays.
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