This is the first of two volumes to appear in The Cambridge Edition of the Works of John Webster, beginning with the plays The White Devil and The Duchess of Malfi. While both of these plays are available in modernized versions, the Cambridge edition incorporates the most recent editorial scholarship, including valuable information on Webster's biography, new critical methods, and textual theory. The edition also presents previously unpublished material, such as a fragment of an otherwise lost play and a hitherto unknown poem, in addition to a brief biography of Webster, a history of the Webster canon, and each play's reception history. The following volume will include the other plays as well as the poems and prose.