Some poems, for example, have been associated with Jonson because they were circulated in manuscript with ascriptions to ‘B. J.’ or ‘J. B.’; some, without an ascription, are contained in manuscripts associated with his scribal circle, or have been claimed later as part of the myth or memory of the poet. Contemporaries, such as the theatre manager, Philip Henslowe, mentioned Jonson in connection with works that certainly existed but subsequently appear to have been lost. Near contemporaries, such as the antiquarian, Anthony à Wood, associated Jonson’s name with similarly non-extant materials (for example, a text entitled Ben Jonson His Motives). Some of these works may not have existed at all or were associated with Jonson simply through confusion or on the basis of hearsay or anecdote. On occasion, as is the case with The Widow, his name was posthumously included on the title-page of a play, perhaps because the publisher hoped Jonson’s fame would encourage purchasers to buy the work.

William Drummond reported that over half of Jonson’s comedies were not in print, a statement that has allowed editors and critics to see Jonson’s hand in a number of seventeenth-century plays that do not bear his name. A distinction needs to be made, then, between plays attributed to Jonson in the seventeenth century and those ascribed to him on the basis of impressionistic stylistic similarities by later theatre historians. Modern methods of computer analysis have greatly enhanced our abilities to investigate the stylistic peculiarities of such early plays. Here, we discuss what happens when the plays The Widow, The London Prodigal, and The Spanish Tragedy are tested using computer-analysis techniques.

The collection is organized by genre, beginning with poetry, moving through prose, and ending with drama. While commentary on the documented lost works (plays mentioned in Henslowe’s diary; some masques and entertainments; The May-lord; and the texts mentioned in the Execration) is found in the Print Edition, Ian Donaldson here assesses the claim that Jonson helped to translate Francis Bacon’s Essays into Latin, and that he was also the author of a work entitled Ben Jonson His Motives, which dealt with his conversion from Catholicism to the Church of England. Even though some texts may be lost (indeed, may not ever have existed), and even though some attributions to Jonson remain debatable or have been refuted, the claims for Jonson’s authorship discussed here remain pertinent and interesting for what they can tell us about changing trends in historical ideas about authorship and about Jonson’s place in the canon of seventeenth-century literature.

Karen Britland

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