Appendix A

The editors' comments on their editions of the texts:

This new edition with modernised spelling and punctuation has been prepared directly from that of the Reverend Mynors Bright, which was published in 1875&endash;9 from his own transcript and which is by far the most accurate version of the text that has yet appeared.

Samuel Pepys' Diary

 

The texts of the plays in this volume are based upon the first editions. [...] For the sake of clarity, a moderate number of changes in spelling and punctuation have been made

Restoration Plays

 

The plays reprinted in this volume have been edited from photocopies of first editions held by Harvard University Library [...] The punctuation and spelling have been modernised

Restoration Comedies

 

The text of Vanbrugh's plays has remained substantially unaltered throughout the editions. [...] I have usually relied upon the text of the first editions, amending the punctuation where necessary, and correcting occasional misprints.

Plays of Sir John Vanbrugh

 

For each of the plays I have based my text on the first quartos located in the British Library [...] The spelling has been modernised but I have preserved as much of the original punctuation as seemed compatible with modern usage.

Plays of William Congreve

 

I have followed the accepted practice of emending the text as little as possible, and I have retained obsolete spelling and punctuation when they offer the reader no more than momentary difficulty

Plays of William Wycherley

The editor of Josselin's diary writes much about preserving original punctuation and dating not to endanger "the integrity of the original Diary" (p. xvi), and so it can be safely inferred that the wording of the verb phrases have not been changed.

The editors of the Lyme letters and of John Evelyn's diary write nothing about whether they have preserved or changed the original texts, spelling or punctuation. When looking at the texts, however, it is clear that the spelling and punctuation have not been altered, and the assumption has been made that the usage of be versus have has also been kept.

To appendix B: