Typography
A typographical symbol appears within The Fairy-Queen, but only sparsely: a brace. It appears bracketing lines of texts twice in The Prologue, as well as three times on the last page of the libretto, page 52. These braces signal rhymed triplets within the writing and dialogue of the play. They are commonly used in this manner in many other seventeenth century playbooks.
It is interesting that these typographical braces only appear on the first and final pages of the opera. It raises questions about the writer and the publisher’s intent for readers. That rhymed triplets only occur at the very beginning and end, bookending the narrative, says something about Settle’s compositional writing style. Then there is the fact that the publisher thought to include the braces for the libretto’s readers, likely to aid them in their reading. Still, the braces pointing out something as minute and rarely occurring as rhymed triplets within this text could hint at the publication’s intended audience: those reading with an eye for nuanced patterns in rhyme, and those who would appreciate such variation from the norm of the text. The braces would have had to be printed independently from the rest of the text, so it is significant that the printers took the time to include them.