1438920. 1623 Shakespeare. As You Like It. Single leaf from the First Folio.

 

Original Leaves from The First Four Folios of The Plays of William Shakespeare 1623, 1632, 1663, 1685.

 

The four leaves comprise: 1. First Folio (1623): As You Like It, pp. 205-6, comprising the end of Act 5  Scene 2 through most of Scene 4. As the play draws to its close, the forest-dwelling characters and the courtiers come together, and multiple couples find love and get married. The First Folio marked the first publication of As You Like It. 2. Second Folio (1632): Henry the Fourth Part II, pp. 83-4, comprising most of Act 2 Scene 4. At Mistress Quickly's inn in Eastcheap, the disguised Prince Hal and Poins hear Falstaff's demeaning comments about them. 3. Third Folio (1663-4): Hamlet, pp. 751-2, comprising the end of Act 4, scene 3 through to the end of scene 5. Hamlet reveals he has killed Polonious, and is sent to leave for England, but he turns around with a renewed dedication to revenge. Ophelia further descends into madness and sings love songs. 4. Fourth Folio (1685): The Tragedy of King Lear, pp. 109-110, comprising most of Act 5 scene 3. The scene, the final in the play, includes one of Shakespeare's best-known passages, Lear's speech over the body of Cordelia, and his death from grief. Folio. Four folio leaves, tipped-in to volume of red quarter morocco, spine lettered in gilt, patterned paper sides. Each folio text leaf preceded by a facsimile title page from each folio. Folio leaves a little browned, neat repair to short closed tear at foot of that of First Folio leaf; in very good condition

 

A relic of the greatest playwright in world literature: a leaf from each of the four folios, that is, the first four collected editions of Shakespeare's plays. The leaves were gathered for issue by the Grabhorn Press and specially bound with an introductory essay by Edwin Eliott Willoughby of the Folger library. This is number 54 of 73 copies produced. The four folios were the only collected editions of Shakespeare's plays published in the 17th century. The First Folio of 1623 is of inestimable importance for English literature, being the sole source for 18 of Shakespeare's plays which would have otherwise been lost. The Second Folio of 1632 included an additional encomium by the young John Milton, his first published poem in English, and modernized some of the spelling and punctuation. "The Second Folio was issued when England under Charles I was drifting into civil war. It helped to keep alive the poetry of Shakespeare during the days of the Commonwealth when play-acting was proscribed as a work of the devil" (Willoughby's introduction). The Third Folio of 1664 added the play Pericles, and six spurious Shakespeare plays. It is the rarest of the folios, due no doubt to a large part of the edition being destroyed in the Great Fire of London in 1666. The Fourth Folio completed the great quartet in 1685. It maintained the text of the Third Folio, and was in turn used as the basis for the edited texts of the 18th century.

 

 

Wonderful penultimate leaf of the play in which Rosalind assures Orlando, Phoebe and Silvius that although it seems improbable at the moment, they will all have their loves requited and reconciled by tomorrow in time for the wedding celebration.  Rosalind (as Ganymede) and Orlando (who may or may not know of Rosalind’s disguise) then discuss the odd fact that Oliver has undergone a sudden strong fascination with Aliena (Celia in disguise).  We then further learn that Touchstone and Audrey will also be married tomorrow.

The next day, Rosalind and Celia arrive (dressed as themselves) together with Hymen and in one of the great comic scenes of the canon, Hymen declares that he will “bar all confusion” and perform four marriages.