[BITList] First Folio: Rare Shakespeare books discovered on Scotland's Isle of Bute - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

[John Feltham]

> http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-04-07/rare-shakespeare-first-folio-discovered-on-scottish-island-bute/7309296?WT.mc_id=newsmail <http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-04-07/rare-shakespeare-first-folio-discovered-on-scottish-island-bute/7309296?WT.mc_id=newsmail>
> 
> First Folio: Rare Shakespeare books discovered on Scotland's Isle of Bute
> 
> Posted about 10 hours ago
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>    </news/2016-04-07/shakespeare-first-edition/7309314> Photo: The First Folio was a three-volume collection of Shakespeare's 36 plays. (AFP: Mount Stuart) </news/2016-04-07/shakespeare-first-edition/7309314>
> A nearly 400-year-old copy of a first edition of William Shakespeare's collected plays has been found in an aristocratic house on the Isle of Bute, off Scotland.
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> Published in 1623, seven years after the bard's death, the First Folio contains Shakespeare's 36 plays.
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> These include plays such as Macbeth, Twelfth Night, Julius Caesar and The Tempest, which would otherwise have been lost.
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> The discovery at Mount Stuart, the neo-Gothic home of the Marquesses of Bute, brings the total of known surviving copies of the First Folio in the world to 234.
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> Most others are in libraries and accessible only to scholars.
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> Emma Smith, Professor of Shakespeare Studies at Oxford University, authenticated the First Folio as genuine.
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> "When the team at Mount Stuart first told me they thought they had a First Folio, I must admit I thought 'yeah, sure, and so do I!'," she said.
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> "But when I went up to investigate, I could tell from the story of the book's origins, the watermarks and the idiosyncrasies of the text that it was genuine.
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> "It was a really exciting moment."
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> It is usually a single volume that would have to be read sitting at a desk, but the Bute copy was split in the past for ease of reading into three leather-bound volumes — one each for comedies, histories and tragedies.
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> "This is something that you could take to the fireside and enjoy," Dr Smith told the BBC.
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> "One of the things that this copy ... shows us is a time when people just really used this book, they enjoyed it, they scribbled on it, they spilt their wine on it, their pet cats jumped on it."
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> The three-volume work formerly belonged to 18th-century literary editor Isaac Reed.
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> Inside the first page is an inscription by him, describing how he acquired the book in 1786.
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> First Folio not for sale
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> News of the discovery came as Britain prepares commemorations marking the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare's death on April 23, 1616.
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> Worth an estimated $3.7 to $4.7 million, according to Dr Smith, the Folio is not up for sale and will be on public display at Mount Stuart until October.
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> The book is part of the Bute Collection, one of Britain's most important private collections of artwork and artefacts that is kept at Mount Stuart.
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> "In terms of literary discoveries, they do not come much bigger than a new First Folio, and we are really excited that this has happened on Bute," said Alice Martin from Mount Stuart.
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> "But it is just the tip of the iceberg for the undiscovered material in the remarkable Bute Collection."
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> AFP/ Reuters
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> Topics: english-literature </news/topic/english-literature>, history </news/topic/history>, scotland </news/topic/scotland>, united-kingdom </news/topic/united-kingdom>
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