LEMDO: Speeches without Speech Prefixes

Speeches without Speech Prefixes

Rationale

Some early modern playbooks contain speeches that do not have a speech prefix. In most cases, a stage direction or a heading or some other information indicates who is speaking. In semi-diplomatic transcriptions of such playbooks, we will of necessity have a speech element without a child speaker element.

Practice

Do not supply a speech prefix in semi-diplomatic transcriptions. This work will happen at the level of the modernized text. Instead, encode the stage direction or other information truthfully.

Examples

In this example, we have a stage direction indicating that Banquo speaks a one-line speech from within the tiring house. The editor of the modern text might decide to encode Banquo as a speech prefix and within as a stage direction, but the mise-en-page of the playbook clearly sets Banquo within as a single typographical unit. The placement of the opening tag of the


                                          <sp>

is tricky. The encoding is valid with the opening


                                          <sp>

tag before or after the


                                          <stage>

element. However, because the stage direction contains information that could be turned into a speech prefix in the modern text, LEMDO prefers to put the stage direction inside the


                                          <sp>

element to show that it contains information intrinsically connected to the speech. Note that we put the stage direction before the


                                          <ab>

element. (For a rationale of the


                                       @type

values on


                                          <stage>

, see Practice: Encode


                                             @type

Values.)

<lb type="wln" n="1220"/> <sp xml:id="emdMac_F1_sp290">
<stage type="delivery location" place="plc-left-inline">Banquo within.</stage>
<ab>Giue vs a Light there, hoa. </ab>
</sp>

This example is similar to the Macbeth example, where the stage direction is the first item in the speech.¹

<sp xml:id="emdCym_F1_sp393">
  <stage type="business" place="plc-centre">Imogen reades.</stage>
  <ab rendition="rnd:italic">
    <lb type="wln" n="1693"/> THy Mistris (Pisanio) hath plaide the Strumpet in my <lb type="wln" n="1694"/>Bed: the Testimonies whereof, lyes bleeding in me.</ab>
</sp>

Special Case: Pageantry

Books describing pageants and entertainments are normally a hybrid of prose, poetry, and dramatic interludes. Printers of such books usually set the names of speakers in the same type as the headings for prose and poetry sections. We encode such headings with the


                                          <label>

element (and a


                                       @type

value of "heading"). For headings that function as speech prefixes, we follow the practice for encoding headings but do not add a


                                       @type

value. Doing so is a truthful encoding of compositorial practice. The editor of the modern text may well choose to shift this information inside the


                                          <sp>

element and treat it as a speech prefix, but we avoid making such claims in the semi-diplomatic text.

In this simplified example, “London” is the heading above the speech given by the character named “London”.

<lb type="wln" n="74"/> <label>London.</label> <lb type="wln" n="75"/> <sp xml:id="emdCivi_Q1_sp3">
<ab rendition="rnd:italic">ANd you our honour’d Sonnes, whose Loyalty, <lb type="wln" n="76"/>Seruice, and zeale, shall bee exprest of mee, <lb type="wln" n="77"/>Let not your louing ouer-greedy Noyse, <lb type="wln" n="78"/>Beguile you of the Sweetnesse of your Ioyes. <lb type="wln" n="79"/>My wish ha’s tooke effect, for ne’r was knowne <lb type="wln" n="80"/>A greater Ioy, and a more silent one. </ab>
</sp>

Notes

1.Note that this situation occurs only if the stage direction is positioned so that it stands in for a speech prefix. If a character begins reading aloud in the middle of a speech, there will be a


                                    <speaker>

element at the top of the speech.↑

Prosopography

Janelle Jenstad

Janelle Jenstad is a Professor of English at the University of Victoria, Director of The Map of Early Modern London, and Director of Linked Early Modern Drama Online. With Jennifer Roberts-Smith and Mark Beatrice Kaethler, she co-edited Shakespeare’s Language in Digital Media: Old Words, New Tools (Routledge). She has edited John Stow’s A Survey of London (1598 text) for MoEML and is currently editing The Merchant of Venice (with Stephen Wittek) and Heywood’s 2 If You Know Not Me You Know Nobody for DRE. Her articles have appeared in Digital Humanities Quarterly, Elizabethan Theatre, Early Modern Literary Studies, Shakespeare Bulletin, Renaissance and Reformation, and The Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies. She contributed chapters to Approaches to Teaching Othello (MLA); Teaching Early Modern Literature from the Archives (MLA); Institutional Culture in Early Modern England (Brill); Shakespeare, Language, and the Stage (Arden); Performing Maternity in Early Modern England (Ashgate); New Directions in the Geohumanities (Routledge); Early Modern Studies and the Digital Turn (Iter); Placing Names: Enriching and Integrating Gazetteers (Indiana); Making Things and Drawing Boundaries (Minnesota); Rethinking Shakespeare Source Study: Audiences, Authors, and Digital Technologies (Routledge); and Civic Performance: Pageantry and Entertainments in Early Modern London (Routledge). For more details, see janellejenstad.com.

Joey Takeda

Joey Takeda is LEMDO’s Consulting Programmer and Designer, a role he assumed in 2020 after three years as the Lead Developer on LEMDO.

Mahayla Galliford

Project manager, 2025-present; research assistant, 2021-present. Mahayla Galliford (she/her) graduated with a BA (Hons with distinction) from the University of Victoria in 2024. Mahayla’s undergraduate research explored early modern stage directions and civic water pageantry. Mahayla continues her studies through UVic’s English MA program and her SSHRC-funded thesis project focuses on editing and encoding girls’ manuscripts, specifically Lady Rachel Fane’s dramatic entertainments, in collaboration with LEMDO.

Martin Holmes

Martin Holmes has worked as a developer in the UVic’s Humanities Computing and Media Centre for over two decades, and has been involved with dozens of Digital Humanities projects. He has served on the TEI Technical Council and as Managing Editor of the Journal of the TEI. He took over from Joey Takeda as lead developer on LEMDO in 2020. He is a collaborator on the SSHRC Partnership Grant led by Janelle Jenstad.

Navarra Houldin

Training and Documentation Lead 2025–present. LEMDO project manager 2022–2025. Textual remediator 2021–present. Navarra Houldin (they/them) completed their BA with a major in history and minor in Spanish at the University of Victoria in 2022. Their primary research was on gender and sexuality in early modern Europe and Latin America. They are continuing their education through an MA program in Gender and Social Justice Studies at the University of Alberta where they will specialize in Digital Humanities.

Tracey El Hajj

Junior Programmer 2019–2020. Research Associate 2020–2021. Tracey received her PhD from the Department of English at the University of Victoria in the field of Science and Technology Studies. Her research focuses on the algorhythmics of networked communications. She was a 2019–2020 President’s Fellow in Research-Enriched Teaching at UVic, where she taught an advanced course on Artificial Intelligence and Everyday Life. Tracey was also a member of the Map of Early Modern London team, between 2018 and 2021. Between 2020 and 2021, she was a fellow in residence at the Praxis Studio for Comparative Media Studies, where she investigated the relationships between artificial intelligence, creativity, health, and justice. As of July 2021, Tracey has moved into the alt-ac world for a term position, while also teaching in the English Department at the University of Victoria.

Orgography

LEMDO Team (LEMD1)

The LEMDO Team is based at the University of Victoria and normally comprises the project director, the lead developer, project manager, junior developers(s), remediators, encoders, and remediating editors.

Metadata

Authority title	Speeches without Speech Prefixes
Type of text	Documentation
Publisher	University of Victoria on the Linked Early Modern Drama Online Platform
Series	Linked Early Modern Drama Online
Source	TEI Customization created by Martin Holmes, Joey Takeda, and Janelle Jenstad; documentation written by members of the LEMDO Team
Editorial declaration	n/a
Edition	Released with Linked Early Modern Drama Online 1.0
Encoding description	Encoded in TEI P5 according to the LEMDO Customization and Encoding Guidelines
Document status	prgGenerated
Funder(s)	Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada
License/availability	This file is licensed under a CC BY-NC_ND 4.0 license, which means that it is freely downloadable without permission under the following conditions: (1) credit must be given to the author and LEMDO in any subsequent use of the files and/or data; (2) the content cannot be adapted or repurposed (except in quotations for the purposes of academic review and citation); and (3) commercial uses are not permitted without the knowledge and consent of the editor and LEMDO. This license allows for pedagogical use of the documentation in the classroom.