ABSTRACT
Shakespearean scholarship has been much preoccupied with the fascinating business of editing. Of all of Shakespeare's plays, it is not surprisingly Hamlet that seems to have provoked the most eager and earnest MacGuffinism. The Shakespearean texts are full of such cruxes, some famous, some infamous, and others oddly neglected. Consider for example, as a MacGuffin not taken, the fascinating choice between a 'pelican' and a 'politician' in act 4, scene 5 of Hamlet. The dozen or sixteen lines are a kind of model or template for MacGuffin Shakespeare. Collier's reputation blossomed. He became one of the best known and most highly regarded Shakespeare editors of his time. With some scholarly friends he founded the Shakespeare Society in 1840. In any case, this was fresh evidence that the Shakespeare text needed careful emendation to restore it to its original state.
