Date:  Mon, 12 Jun 1995 19:12:55 -0400

From:  Allan Metcalf <AAllan[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]AOL.COM>

Subject: Re: meddle



Bowdlerizing editors removed these lines of Mercutio's from 18th century

editions of Shakespeare because they were considered too obscene:



Now will he [Romeo] sit under a medlar tree

And wish his mistress were that kind of fruit

As maids call medlars when they laugh alone.

O Romeo, that she were, O that she were

An open et cetera, thou a pop'rin pear!   [II.i.34-38]



I don't have Partridge's _Shakespeare's Bawdy_, but it probably treats this.



- Allan Metcalf