The Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia

by Philip Sidney, Albert Feuillerat, Albert 1874-1953 Feuillerat

Book Overview

Basilus, a foolish old duke, consults an oracle as he imperiously wishes to know the future, but he is less than pleased with what he learns. To escape the oracle's horrific prophecies about his family and kingdom he withdraws into pastoral retreat with his wife and two daughters. When a pair of wandering princes fall in love with the princesses and adopt disguises to gain access to them, all manner of complications, both comic and serious, ensue...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 014043111X
• ISBN13: 9780140431117
• Release Date: December 1977
• Publisher: Penguin Books
• Length: 880 Pages
• Weight: 1.40 lbs.
• Dimensions: 2.2" x 5.2" x 7.8"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

This is the one you want

RESOLVED: The "New" Arcadia is better than the old--much better. And this is the edition of it you ought to read.

A monument of dullness?

T.S. Eliot labelled Sidney's Arcadia as a "monument of dullness," and about 100 pages into the book, I felt inclined to agree with his assessment. Sidney was a poet first and foremost, and even he admitted to his sister, the Countess of Pembroke, that this particular work was but "a trifle."Yet, surprisingly, I found myself getting captivated by the plot of two princes disguised as shepherds to win the girls of their dreams (in the process, of course, they also win girls -- and guys -- of their nightmares). The somewhat stilted (even by Renaissance standards) language makes it difficult to plod through at times, but the plot is interesting and keeps your attention -- and that's ultimately what counts.Re: this edition, it is one of the few good editions of the original "Old" Arcadia around. Sidney revised the work during his lifetime and his friend and biographer, Fulke Greville, later published a bizarre composite of the old and revised versions that for centuries stood as the definitive "Arcadia". K. Duncan-Jones provides a clean text with useful scholarly apparatus. One caveat: in my edition, pp. 297-306 were *missing*, mistakenly replaced by a double-printed pp. 307-316. This is an annoyance for someone who is reading the book as a scholar, which I believe represents the majority readership of the book, as I can't imagine casual readers picking it up for bedstand reading! All in all, a fun work and better than the first act leads one to believe!