Twelve Days of Shakespeare
On December 5 1623, Sir Edward Dering recorded the first known purchase of the First Folio of Shakespeare’s plays. In the subsequent 400 years the folio has become the most valuable and possibly most important book in the English language. Over the next twelve days I will be posting daily excerpts from my forthcoming book SpearShaker: Ben Jonson, Mary Sidney and Shakespeare. Please subscribe to follow the story of the folio and the remarkable people who brought it to life.