Free Republic

In what has been called a once-in-a-generation event, a complete and original copy of Shakespeare’s First Folio sold for a record-setting price just under $10 million at auction earlier this week. The First Folio, published in 1623, was the first complete printed collection of Shakespeare’s plays. Published seven years after the author’s death, the book marked not only the first complete collection of Shakespeare’s works, but also the first time those works were organized as comedies, tragedies and histories. There are around 235 copies known to exist, and only six complete ones owned privately.

The First Folio To the memory of my beloved, The Author MR. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: and what he hath left us. [by Ben Jonson] ...Soule of the Age! The applause! delight! the wonder of our Stage! My Shakespeare, rise; I will not lodge thee by Chaucer, or Spenser, or bid Beaumont lye A little further, to make thee a roome:Thou art a Moniment, without a tombe, And art alive still, while thy Booke doth live, And we have wits to read, and praise to give. That I not mixe thee so, my braine excuses; I meane with great, but disproportion'd Muses:...