> Listen | The discovery and identification of First Folios How much did a First Folio cost? A total of 235 First Folios are currently known to survive, including two that were discovered in 2016. Researchers think that there were probably about 750 copies, which was a typical print run at the time. We don't know for sure how many First Folios were printed. How many First Folios were printed and how many survive today? A folio was more expensive and sturdier, so it was more likely to last. Quartos were like the easily disposable paperbacks of today, and relatively few of them survive. The First Folio was the first folio ever published in England devoted exclusively to plays.īefore 1623, about half of Shakespeare's plays were published in quartos-small, one-play books made by folding sheets of paper twice, to create eight pages per sheet. This format was usually reserved for history, religion, and other weighty subjects. > Watch | The First Folio's Droeshout portrait of Shakespeare | How the Droeshout engraving changed over time What is a folio-and why does that format matter?Ī folio is a large book made by folding printed sheets of paper in half, with each sheet forming four pages. The Droeshout engraving is one of very few portraits of Shakespeare that are considered authentic it was approved by those who worked on the First Folio and had known Shakespeare. The title page of the First Folio includes an original portrait of Shakespeare, engraved by the artist Martin Droeshout. Why is the First Folio's portrait of Shakespeare so significant? Shakespeare's original manuscript copies of the plays have been gone for centuries, so the early printed editions, including the First Folio, are the closest thing we have to the plays as he wrote them. The 18 plays that appear for the first time in the First Folio are All’s Well That Ends Well, Antony and Cleopatra, As You Like It, The Comedy of Errors, Coriolanus, Cymbeline, Henry VI, Part 1, Henry VIII, Julius Caesar, King John, Macbeth, Measure for Measure, The Taming of the Shrew, The Tempest, Timon of Athens, Twelfth Night, The Two Gentlemen of Verona, and The Winter’s Tale. Without the First Folio, these plays might have been lost forever. Out of the 36 plays included in the First Folio, 18 had never been published before. The following are frequently asked questions and answers about this iconic volume. William Shakespeare's Comedies, Histories & Tragedies, and it groups his plays into those categories-comedies, histories, and tragedies-for the first time. The First Folio, printed in 1623, is the first published collection of Shakespeare’s plays, produced seven years after his death.

First folio