From the Editor

I am delighted and honored to introduce myself as the incoming Editor of Shakespeare Quarterly. It is a privilege to have the opportunity to build upon the extraordinary work Gail Kern Paster has done over the past two decades in keeping the journal at the forefront of Shakespeare studies. My transition into this role has been supported, and the considerable labor and responsibility it entails have been and will continue to be shared by an indefatigable editorial staff; by the expertise of readers on and beyond the Editorial Board; by Michael Witmore, Director of the Folger Shakespeare Library; by the Department of English at the University of Toronto; and by Gail herself, in her capacity both as outgoing Editor and as incoming Consulting Editor. One small indication of my debt to Gail is how closely this note resembles the one that opens her own first issue as Editor in the Spring of 1998 (Volume 49, Issue 1); as with all that she has done with the journal, that statement of a new Editor's mission, goals, and supports is hard to improve upon.

Any editorial transition must bring with it a question about the journal's future direction: is this a moment for continuity or for change? Shakespeare studies itself is currently preoccupied with just such a question as scholars strive, on the one hand, to find vocabularies and methodologies that move beyond a historicist paradigm and, on the other, to imbue the connections they perceive between our uncertain present and the receding past with a rich sense of history. My work as Editor will not be to set the agenda for the critical conversation that arises from this struggle but rather to give it a shape that best represents its diverse and changing emphases, its key disagreements, and its moments of consensus. My primary goal will, therefore, be very similar to that of previous editors, and it is simply stated: to publish the very best work in Shakespeare studies, and to provide a forum—in essays, notes, and book reviews as well as on the journal's website (sq.folger.edu)—for rigorous, collegial discussion of the most urgent and exciting issues in the field.

Shakespeare Quarterly belongs to the global community of Shakespeare scholars; almost everyone who reads it has some particular idea about what the journal is, has been, and should be. And while the journal cannot be all things to all people, it can accommodate a truly expansive range of ideas, arguments, and discursive forms. Which is to say: we want and need your submissions, even if you are uncertain whether they are "the kind of thing SQ usually publishes." In your submissions are the lines of the journal's continuity and the seeds of its change. I look forward to reading them in the coming years.