Act 1 - Comparison between Gutenburg

Comparison Analysis of Act 1 scene 1 - Gutenburg vs. Oxford

The Gutenberg electronic version of Macbeth is located on the official Project Gutenberg website. Considering the fact that it was Project Gutenberg that invented electronic books as well as the fact that Project Gutenberg has been active since 1971, which was fairly close to when the first personal computer was invented, it is not very likely that the Project Gutenberg website will be taken off the net for quite some time. The Project Gutenberg website itself is also updated nightly, which lends credibility to the fact that the website is quite popular and thus is not very likely to go down.
According to a December 2008 newsletter from Project Gutenberg, the website is host to as many titles as the average U.S public library. Because of this, it is quite obvious that Project Gutenberg is a very reliable source.
Variations between the Gutenberg electronic version of Macbeth and the Oxford Edition of Macbeth mainly came in the form of changes in physical layout, for in the Project Gutenberg version, the characters’ lines are on the same line as the characters’ names, while in the Oxford Edition, the characters’ lines follow the characters’ names on the next line. When comparing the two versions, it is quite obvious that there is a difference in font as well as font size: the Project Gutenberg version is slightly bigger than the Oxford version, which allows it to be more easily read.
Besides changes in physical layout, there were also slight changes in stage directions, punctuation, as well as character information. With regards to stage directions, the Project Gutenberg version of Macbeth placed directions with far more significant meaning into the text whereas the Oxford version followed Shakespeare’s example and left the directions extremely vague. Also, the Project Gutenberg version of Macbeth lends a more dramatic feel to the play, as many comas and periods that are present in the oxford version were substituted with exclamation marks. Also, the Project Gutenberg version of Macbeth presents the characters at the start of the play in the order of importance while the Oxford version presents the characters in the order in which they appear in the play.
These variations in text can cause the Project Gutenberg version of Macbeth to seem superior to the Oxford version, however the Project Gutenberg version lacks characteristics essential to a grade 10 understanding of the play which the Oxford version does not. These missing features include footnotes as well as line numbers.
In conclusion, the Project Gutenberg version of Macbeth is certainly a reliable resource, however the Oxford version of Macbeth is slightly better when taking into account the targeted audience.

http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext97/1ws3410.txt