Shakespeare > First Folio
William Shakespeare. Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies
London: Isaac Jaggard and Ed. Blount, 1623
Columbia RBML PHOENIX P822.33 I
After Shakespeare’s death, Ben Jonson and two members of the King's Men, the acting company of which Shakespeare had been a part, under the patronage of the "Incomparable Paire of Brethren," William, Earl of Pembroke and Philip, Earl of Montgomery, worked with publishers Jaggard and Blount to produce the collection of plays known today as Shakespeare's First Folio. Prior to the First Folio, Shakespeare’s plays had only been published individually and in smaller quarto format, sometimes with abridged or faulty texts.
Shakespeare's First Folio was the first volume published in England devoted exclusively to plays. The folio format was usually reserved for encyclopedias or the collected works of established authors. The First Folio included eighteen plays never before published, including The Winter’s Tale, The Tempest, Macbeth, Anthony and Cleopatra, As You Like It, and Twelfth Night.
Although not as rare as other titles—over 200 copies still exist—the First Folio is considered one of the most collectible of rare books and often fetches over seven figures at auction. This volume came to Columbia in 1881 with the library’s first rare book collection, that of Stephen Whitney Phoenix (Columbia College 1859, MA 1862, LLB 1863).