As the Swan of Avon celebrates his birthday on Sunday, the actor pays tribute to a ‘miraculous’ book that rescued plays such as The Tempest and Macbeth from oblivion
his Sunday, 23 April, St George’s Day, traditionally Shakespeare’s birthday, 12 copies of the exceedingly rare first edition of his plays will go on public view around the country. The book first appeared in print under the title of Mr William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies in 1623, seven years after the author’s death. Known as the First Folio, it is the apple of auctioneers’ eyes.
Undertaking the daunting task of tracking down decent copies of 18 plays, many of which had fallen out of the repertory, most of which would have existed only as individual parts, was little short of heroic: they were required to become not merely publishers – a demanding job in the low-tech world of Jacobean printing – but also sleuths.– the elusive author who, seven years after his death, was in danger of falling out of fashion.
Hemminge and Condell, in their introduction, speak affectionately of Shakespeare as a colleague, of his punctual and impeccable copy. The appended list of those who acted in the plays is headed by Shakespeare. What he played – what any of the actors played – we don’t know; but he was clearly an active company member.
In due course, the First Folio was supplemented, in second, third and fourth folios, by texts newly come to light, few of them actually by Shakespeare, but it is the 1623 edition that over subsequent decades has occupied an absolutely central role in our connection to the playwright. Some of my colleagues have an almost religious devotion to it, feeling that it brings them close to the source. Personally, I have never felt any great desire to look at a copy.
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