8vo (159 x 89 mm). (Spotting and browning throughout, a few stains to title-page.) Contemporary sheep-backed boards (portions of spine perished, contents starting). Provenance: early ownership signature on front free endpaper.

SECOND AMERICAN EDITION. The first Shakespeare play printed in the United States was published in Boston in 1794. On April 18 of that year, the Boston theatre staged Hamlet, and the text of the play was sold at the door as a libretto, the pages stitched together and without covers. Theatrical performance has long faced suspicion in Boston, where, in 1750, the General Court of Massachusetts passed an act against stage plays, and no theatre operated there until 1792. When one finally opened, it was called a "New Exhibition Room," and plays like Romeo and Juliet and Hamlet were advertised as "moral lectures" to skirt lingering cultural opposition. RARE: We traced no copies of this edition at auction. Jaggard, p.309.