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The First Folio is the name given to the first published collection of William Shakespeare's plays; its actual title is Mr William Shakespeare's Comedies, Histories and Tragedies. Printed in folio format and containing 36 plays (see the list at William Shakespeare#Bibliography), it was prepared by Shakespeare's colleagues John Heminges and Henry Condell in 1623, about seven years after Shakespeare's death. Its original price was 1 pound (the equivalent of about £95-£110 or *]170 to $190 today). Although several of Shakespeare's plays had been published in quarto prior to 1623, the First Folio is our only reliable text for some twenty of the plays, and a valuable source text even for many of those previously published.
Modern sales
It is believed that around 1,000 copies of the first folio were printed. The most recent census (1995-2000) records 228 still in existence, including five copies held by the British Library. The most recent sales (Oriel College Oxford, 2003, for example) have raised in the order of £3.5 million.
On July 13, 2006, a complete copy of the First Folio owned by Dr Williams's Library was auctioned at Sotheby's auction house. The book, which also happens to still be in its original 17th century binding, sold for £2.8 million, less than Sotheby's top estimate of £3.5 million. The Folio is one of only about 40 remaining complete copies (as most of the existing copies are incomplete). Even more rare is the fact that the Folio was being offered to private collectors, as only one other copy of the book remains in private ownership.
First Folio technique
Some Shakespeare directors believe that modern editions of Shakespeare's plays, which are heavily edited and changed to be more readable, remove what are possibly actor cues in the Folio, such as capitalization, different punctuation and even the changing or removal of whole words.
See also
References
External links
- First Folio - plain vanilla text from Project Gutenberg
- Of Folios and Facsimiles - A discussion of available facsimiles of the First Folio.
- Landmarks in Printing: Shakespeare's First Folio - British Library
- The Internet Shakespeare Editions maintains a collection of full colour facsimilies of the folios and quartos. Full text transcriptions are also available.
"First Folio"