Dering Manuscript

The Dering Manuscript is the earliest extant manuscript text of any play by William Shakespeare. The manuscript combines Part 1 and Part 2 of Henry IV into a single-play redaction. Scholarly consensus indicates that the manuscript was revised in the early 17th century by Sir Edward Dering, a man known for his interest in literature and theater. Dering prepared his redaction for an amateur performance starring friends and family at Surrenden Manor, Kent, where the manuscript was discovered in 1844. This is the earliest known instance of an amateur production of Shakespeare in England. Sourced from the 1613 fifth quarto of Part 1 and the 1600 first quarto of Part 2, the Dering MS contains many textual differences from published quarto and folio editions of the plays. Dering cut nearly 3000 lines of Shakespearian text (including significant abridgment of the character of Falstaff) and added some 50 lines of his own invention along with numerous minor interventions. The Dering MS is currently a part of the collection at the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, DC (Folger MS V.b.34).

The Dering MS is a small folio (11.75 in x 7.75 in) of 55 extant leaves, composed of two large quires with six cancel leaves interposed in between. These six cancels come from different stock paper than the main quires. They are wider, cut more irregularly and slightly shorter at the spine than the main quires. These differences suggest that these six leaves were inserted after the completion of the two main quires. The first and second quires correspond to Part 1 and Part 2 of Henry IV respectively, and the six cancel leaves in between contain transitional scenes that Dering reworked after the manuscript’s initial preparation.

Two hands contributed to the composition of the Dering MS, known as Hand I and Hand II. Hand I wrote page one of the manuscript and attached an eight line addition to the first scene on a piece of scrap paper. Hand II completed the remainder of the text. The manuscript also displays numerous modifications and corrections of Hand II's work by Hand I. Stylistic differences between the two show that Hand I was an unprofessional hand, whereas Hand II belonged to a professional scribe. Hand I has been identified as that of Edward Dering, who began to compile a redacted version based on the quarto editions he owned, before contracting the work out to a professional scribe. Hand II therefore belongs to this scribe, a man named Samuel Carington, who appears in Dering’s “Booke of Expenses” in early 1623 for “writing oute the play of Henry the fourth”. After outsourcing the transcription to Carington, Dering went through the text again and re-revised.

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