Literature Currently running at the Library of Birmingham is the exhibition Everything To Everybody: Your Shakespeare, Your Culture and last Tuesday, I made the pilgrimage to have a look at the First Folio which is part of the display. Curated by the Royal Shakespeare Company, the exhibition is based on the collection of the Shakespeare Memorial Library which was suggested and funded by the local fan club (yes, really) in 1864 with an aim to collect "every edition and every translation of Shakespeare; all the commentators, good, bad and indifferent; in short, every book connected with the life and works of out great poet" as well as images and illustrations.
This is not the first First Folio owned by the collection. As Eric Rasmussen et al reveal in their descriptive catalogue of the folios, the first was a "made-up" volume containing 300 original leaves augmented by facsimiles. But the library was almost completely destroyed by fire in 1879, and although around five hundred volumes were saved (of which about two thirds were German publications) many thousands were lost including that book. I shiver to think what else was lost, if there were any unique or irreplaceable items. There is what looks like a handwritten copy of Two Noble Kinsmen with singed pages in the show.
The library and its collection was subsequently rebuilt through donations from private citizens including the current Folio which was purchased from the bookseller Bernard Quaritch for £240 in 1881. Given how grandly most of the Folios I've seen have been displayed, it's surprising to see such a valuable book sitting in a pretty non-descript display case with a few other items. The rather silly accompanying label says that this "is the only one in the world bought with the visionary aim of giving all citizens access to great culture. The city bought the volume in 1881, making it available to all." Tell that to the other libraries.
The label ends with "It is proudly stamped with the inscription "Free libraries of Birmingham"." It certainly is (sort of) and according to Rasmussen that stamp appears eight times throughout the text which shows that in the late nineteenth century the book was considered important not so much as valuable object but for what it contained. I'll admit to an audible gasp on seeing that library mark on the final page of Twelfth Night. Of course now, because it is in a display case, the paradigm has shifted, it's impossible to see any of the other pages so it is now more of an object (with a million pound plus valuation).
As you can see I've decided to go ahead with tickylisting the First Folios and armed with a library copy of Eric Rasmussen's book I'll actually have a list to work from. Mostly I'm going to endeavour to see in real life, but I'll also be covering any which appear in other contexts like television documentaries and writing on here about the context in which they're shown. That adds a certain element of discovery. Has the folio at the University of Pennsylvania ever been put on camera? How about the one in the Paul G. Allen Family Collection? Let's see now.
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