Read Online The Mysteries of Udolpho by Ann Radcliffe - Free Book Online
Authors: Ann Radcliffe
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Italian in 1816, it circulated widely on the Continent throughout the nineteenth century. Irish and American editions had dated from 1794 and 1795 respectively. In the twentieth century the work continued to maintain interest, with at least five editions appearing. In 1931 J. M. Dent published
Udolpho
in Everymanâs Library, for which Ernest Rhys modernized to some extent Radcliffeâs spelling and punctuation and Austin Freeman wrote an introduction. Bonamy Dobréeâs 1966 edition for Oxford University Press, which makes very few emendations, has been reprinted many times â most recently in 1998, with a new introduction and notes by Terry Castle.
The text used here is that of the first edition of 1794; unlike her next romance,
The Italian, or the Confessional of the Black Penitents
(1796),
Udolpho
was not revised by either Radcliffe or the publisher for subsequent editions. For the sake of authenticity, original spellings â including eighteenth-century variants, such as âpoinardâ and âponiardâ â have been retained, as have inconsistencies of hyphenation. A few obvious printerâs errors, such as âhebadeâ for âhe badeâ and âfremâfor âfromâ, have been silently corrected, and Radcliffeâs misspellings of âThompsonâ for the poet James Thomson and of âSayerâ (on one occasion) for the poet Frank Sayers have been emended. Her âheavyâ punctuation, with its proliferation of commas and dashes, has been left virtually untouched, preserving the logical ordering of hierarchical relationships of units within her sentences. However, the jarring capitalization of âdeâ in âde Villeroiâ has been returned to lower case wherever it appears in Volume II, as has the capitalization of âdeâ in âde Villefortâ on occasion in Volumes III and IV; âDâEmeryâ has been changed to âdâEmeryâ in Volume I. Again for consistency, âSt Claireâ in Volume III has been silently corrected to the âSt Clairâ which appears elsewhere. Some passages originally in square brackets in Volume IV have instead been enclosed in parentheses, and asterisks and closing quotation marks have been transposed in references to Radcliffeâs footnotes. The chapter numbers in Volume I have been emended after Chapter VII, to make them sequential, and that of Chapter III in Volume II has been corrected. A few loose stitches in the textual fabric, to adapt Sir Walter Scottâs knitting metaphor, have also been attended to. One example occurs in Chapter VIII of Volume III, where âreplied Ugoâ, which is obviously a mistake, has been emended to âreplied the soldierâ. Emendations of such minor incoherencies are tabulated below.
The Penguin Classics house style has been imposed throughout. Full stops after contractions such as âStâ and after headings and source lines have been deleted. Unspaced em dashes have been changed to spaced en dashes, and other dashes have been halved in length. âCHAPâ has been spelt out in chapter headings, and the opening words of chapters have been set in upper and lower case rather than capitals and small capitals. Single quotation marks have been used throughout, with double quotation marks for quotations within dialogue, and closing quotation marks have not been used at the end of a paragraph when dialogue continues at the start of the next paragraph.
Radcliffeâs inconsistent practice in identifying the source of quotations which occur as epigraphs to chapters and in the text has been addressed by citing both the name of the author and the title of the work, the added material being placed in square brackets. The titles of the works quoted have been changed to upper-and-lower-case italics. Omission of whole lines in quoted verse has been indicated by a line of spaced full stops, rather than by the long
Udolpho
in Everymanâs Library, for which Ernest Rhys modernized to some extent Radcliffeâs spelling and punctuation and Austin Freeman wrote an introduction. Bonamy Dobréeâs 1966 edition for Oxford University Press, which makes very few emendations, has been reprinted many times â most recently in 1998, with a new introduction and notes by Terry Castle.
The text used here is that of the first edition of 1794; unlike her next romance,
The Italian, or the Confessional of the Black Penitents
(1796),
Udolpho
was not revised by either Radcliffe or the publisher for subsequent editions. For the sake of authenticity, original spellings â including eighteenth-century variants, such as âpoinardâ and âponiardâ â have been retained, as have inconsistencies of hyphenation. A few obvious printerâs errors, such as âhebadeâ for âhe badeâ and âfremâfor âfromâ, have been silently corrected, and Radcliffeâs misspellings of âThompsonâ for the poet James Thomson and of âSayerâ (on one occasion) for the poet Frank Sayers have been emended. Her âheavyâ punctuation, with its proliferation of commas and dashes, has been left virtually untouched, preserving the logical ordering of hierarchical relationships of units within her sentences. However, the jarring capitalization of âdeâ in âde Villeroiâ has been returned to lower case wherever it appears in Volume II, as has the capitalization of âdeâ in âde Villefortâ on occasion in Volumes III and IV; âDâEmeryâ has been changed to âdâEmeryâ in Volume I. Again for consistency, âSt Claireâ in Volume III has been silently corrected to the âSt Clairâ which appears elsewhere. Some passages originally in square brackets in Volume IV have instead been enclosed in parentheses, and asterisks and closing quotation marks have been transposed in references to Radcliffeâs footnotes. The chapter numbers in Volume I have been emended after Chapter VII, to make them sequential, and that of Chapter III in Volume II has been corrected. A few loose stitches in the textual fabric, to adapt Sir Walter Scottâs knitting metaphor, have also been attended to. One example occurs in Chapter VIII of Volume III, where âreplied Ugoâ, which is obviously a mistake, has been emended to âreplied the soldierâ. Emendations of such minor incoherencies are tabulated below.
The Penguin Classics house style has been imposed throughout. Full stops after contractions such as âStâ and after headings and source lines have been deleted. Unspaced em dashes have been changed to spaced en dashes, and other dashes have been halved in length. âCHAPâ has been spelt out in chapter headings, and the opening words of chapters have been set in upper and lower case rather than capitals and small capitals. Single quotation marks have been used throughout, with double quotation marks for quotations within dialogue, and closing quotation marks have not been used at the end of a paragraph when dialogue continues at the start of the next paragraph.
Radcliffeâs inconsistent practice in identifying the source of quotations which occur as epigraphs to chapters and in the text has been addressed by citing both the name of the author and the title of the work, the added material being placed in square brackets. The titles of the works quoted have been changed to upper-and-lower-case italics. Omission of whole lines in quoted verse has been indicated by a line of spaced full stops, rather than by the long
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