First Folio: Saving Shakespeare

The First Folio, published in 1623, is one of history's most important books — and you might not realize just how close we came to losing half of Shakespeare's plays forever. Without it, 18 works, including Macbeth, The Tempest, and Twelfth Night, would never have survived. Two of Shakespeare's fellow actors, John Heminges and Henry Condell, compiled it seven years after his death to preserve his legacy. There's far more to this remarkable story than you'd expect.

Key Takeaways

• The First Folio, published in 1623, was compiled by fellow actors John Heminges and Henry Condell to preserve Shakespeare's work after his death.
• Without the First Folio, 18 plays—including Macbeth, The Tempest, and Julius Caesar—would likely have been lost to history forever.
• Approximately 750 copies were printed; only around 233–235 survive today, with 82 housed at the Folger Shakespeare Library.
• No two surviving copies are identical, due to stop-press corrections, differing bindings, repairs, and various owner interventions during the volume's lifetime.
• A First Folio copy sold for nearly $10 million at auction in 2020, reflecting its extraordinary cultural and literary significance.

What Is the First Folio and Why Does It Matter?

Published seven years after Shakespeare's death, the First Folio is the first collected edition of his plays, officially titled *Mr. William Shakespeare's Comedies, Histories & Tragedies*. Colleagues John Heminges and Henry Condell compiled it in 1623, shaping Shakespeare's literary legacy without his direct input.

You can't overstate its role in textual preservation — it's the sole surviving source for nearly 20 plays. Its print history reflects the messy realities of early publishing, including errors and borrowed quarto texts. Over time, it gained cultural authority far beyond what its compilers likely imagined.

The First Folio also fuels the authorship debate, since it entered publication posthumously. Its educational impact remains strong today, appearing in classrooms, exhibits, and scholarly research worldwide. Scholars estimate that only 235 copies of the original print run survive today. In 2023, scholars and institutions marked 400 years since publication, reflecting on how its cultural, literary, and economic value has evolved over four centuries. The publication's extraordinary monetary worth was underscored when a copy sold for nearly $10 million at auction in 2020, cementing its status as one of the most valuable books in literary history.

The 18 Shakespeare Plays Saved by the First Folio

Without the First Folio, nearly half of Shakespeare's plays would likely be gone forever. You'd have no Macbeth, no Tempest, no Twelfth Night — all lost plays that never saw print before 1623. The same goes for Julius Caesar, As You Like It, Antony and Cleopatra, and 12 others.

These weren't minor works. They were central to Shakespeare's performance history, staged repeatedly yet never formally published. Without Heminges and Condell stepping in to collect and preserve them, these scripts would've been discarded as scraps of paper.

In total, 18 plays survived solely because of this single volume. You can thank the First Folio for preserving iconic lines, unforgettable characters, and stories that continue shaping literature and theater more than 400 years later. The manuscript source for The Tempest, for instance, was carefully prepared by Ralph Crane, resulting in one of the highest-quality texts in the entire collection. Originally, 750 copies were printed, and of those, 233 survive today, each containing minor textual differences due to the printing practices of the era.

How the First Folio Was Made and Published

Creating the First Folio was no small feat — it required a team of skilled tradespeople working together across multiple stages of production. Paper sourcing alone was massive: over 190,000 sheets of expensive French linen rag paper went into producing roughly 750 copies. Paper mills were located outside city perimeters due to their noise and smell.

The printing workflow began with compositors hand-selecting movable type, inking it with sheepskin balls, then pressing paper onto it using a screw press. Printed sheets hung on lines to dry before stacking. Compositors worked directly from annotated quarto editions or manuscripts, correcting errors along the way.

Once Jaggard's workshop finished the text, sheets moved to Martin Droeshout, who added the now-iconic portrait. Publishers Edward Blount, Andrew Aspley, and John Smethwick oversaw the project alongside printers Isaac Jaggard and William Jaggard. The shop was licensed to run two printing presses side by side, both of which were likely used for the job.

The First Folio preserved 18 plays never before printed, including works that would have been entirely lost without its publication, as these texts had never appeared in any prior quarto edition. Much like the van Eyck brothers' Ghent Altarpiece, which is considered arguably the most influential painting in history, the First Folio represents a monumental cultural achievement whose loss would have been immeasurable.

Why No Two Copies of the First Folio Are Identical

When you hold a First Folio, you're holding something no other surviving copy duplicates exactly.

Around 500 stop-press corrections happened mid-print, mixing corrected and uncorrected sheets differently across every copy.

Those printing quirks mean even a single stage direction, like Lear's death, exists in three distinct versions depending on which sheets your copy contains.

Binding and repairs created further provenance puzzles.

Missing leaves got replaced with pages from Second Folios, facsimiles, or hand-copied counterfeits.

Folio 36 draws from at least five different copies.

Some owners attempted to regularize erratic pagination, leaving personal marks embedded in the text.

No extant copy is perfect.

The Norton Facsimile had to cherry-pick pages from dozens of copies just to approximate a complete, consistent version. Preliminary pages rank among the most vulnerable sections of any copy, frequently replaced by facsimiles of varying quality and bound in different orders, meaning the introduction a reader encounters depends entirely on which copy they open.

Demand for "perfect" copies peaked between the late eighteenth century and early twentieth century, when sophistication of First Folios became so widespread that collectors, booksellers, and bookbinders routinely supplied missing leaves through whatever means were available.

This kind of meticulous, multi-method examination of historical artifacts mirrors how researchers in 2020 used macro–X‑ray fluorescence scanning to uncover hidden details in Vermeer's Girl with a Pearl Earring that had been invisible for centuries.

How Many First Folios Survive: and What They Sell For Today

Of the roughly 750 First Folios printed in 1623, only about 235 are known to survive today. Most rest in public archives, with the Folger Shakespeare Library holding an impressive 82 copies alone. Meisei University in Tokyo holds 12, while the British Library and New York Public Library hold 5 and 6 respectively.

When copies do reach private hands, their market value skyrockets. A 2020 auction set a literature record at nearly $10 million, while a 2006 Sotheby's sale fetched £2,808,000. Even a copy acquired for $225,000 in the early 1980s reflects dramatic appreciation over time.

Provenance research plays a critical role in these sales, as authenticating a copy's ownership history directly impacts its worth. Undiscovered copies in private collections could still be out there, waiting to surface. Without the First Folio's preservation of previously unpublished works, 18 of Shakespeare's plays — including Macbeth and The Tempest — would be entirely lost to history. The volume was compiled seven years after Shakespeare's death by fellow actors John Heminges and Henry Condell, who sought to preserve his work for future generations.