- Date:
- 1932 - present
- Related People:
- Henry Clay Folger
- Paul Phillippe Cret
Folger Shakespeare Library
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What is the Folger Shakespeare Library?
The Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C., is a research center for studying William Shakespeare, his contemporaries, and Elizabethan society and culture. Housing over 240,000 books and manuscripts dating from the late 13th century to the present, the library has an unrivaled collection of Shakespeare's works, including 82 copies of the First Folio (1623). The library also holds prints, drawings, photographs, playbills, films, recordings, musical instruments, costumes, and theatrical memorabilia. Founded in 1932, it is administered by the trustees of Amherst College and named after Henry Clay Folger, who bequeathed his Shakespeare collection to the American people.
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Where is the Folger Shakespeare Library located?
The Folger Shakespeare Library, a renowned research center for the study of William Shakespeare and Elizabethan society, is located in Washington, D.C., specifically on Capitol Hill in the southeast quadrant of the city. Several brick townhouses were razed on East Capitol Street in the early 1930s to make way for the library. Founded in 1932, it stands as a marble Art Deco building adorned with relief panels depicting scenes from Shakespeare's plays.
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Who was the Folger Shakespeare Library named after?
The Folger Shakespeare Library is named after Henry Clay Folger, who was the chairman of the Standard Oil Company of New York. He bequeathed his collection of Shakespeare to the American people and provided the funds to house, maintain, and expand it. Folger's interest in Shakespeare began in his senior year at Amherst College after hearing a lecture by Ralph Waldo Emerson. The library, founded in 1932, is administered by the trustees of Amherst College.
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Why is the Folger Shakespeare Library important to the study of Shakespeare?
The Folger Shakespeare Library is a leading research center for studying William Shakespeare, his contemporaries, and Elizabethan society and culture. The library holds an unrivaled collection of Shakespeare's works, boasting over 240,000 books and manuscripts, including 82 copies of the First Folio. Its resources extend to prints, drawings, playbills, films, and theatrical memorabilia, offering a wide array of materials for understanding Shakespeare's world. Additionally, the Folger Institute advances humanistic studies, while educational programs connect students with Shakespeare through performance-based activities.
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What kinds of collections and materials are found at the Folger Shakespeare Library?
The Folger Shakespeare Library is a research center that holds an unrivaled collection of Shakespeare's works, including 82 copies of the First Folio (1623), 119 copies of the later folios, and about 7,000 other Shakespeare editions. The library has over 240,000 books and manuscripts dating from the late 13th century to the present.
Additionally, its collections contain 90,000 prints, drawings, photographs, and paintings, approximately 250,000 playbills, films, recordings, musical instruments, costumes, and theatrical memorabilia. Among the library's earliest books is a 1477 edition of Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales, produced by William Caxton.
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How does the Folger Shakespeare Library support research and education about Shakespeare and his time?
The Folger Shakespeare Library is a research center in Washington, D.C., devoted to studying Shakespeare, his contemporaries, and Elizabethan society and culture. It has an unrivaled collection of Shakespeare's works, with 82 copies of the First Folio (1623), and 7,000 other Shakespeare editions.
The Folger supports research through its reading rooms, open to scholars year-round, and its conservation laboratory, a leading center for treating and conserving rare materials. The Folger Institute, founded in 1970, is a multidisciplinary center for advanced study in the humanities. For grades K–12, the Folger has educational programs that encourage teachers and students to combine reading texts with performance-based activities. The library also publishes the Folger editions of Shakespeare’s works (available online as the Folger Digital Texts) and Shakespeare Quarterly, a scholarly journal.
1 Britannica SourceCreated from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.
Folger Shakespeare Library, research centre in Washington, D.C., for the study of William Shakespeare, his contemporaries, and Elizabethan society and culture. The library, with more than 240,000 books and manuscripts (from the late 13th century to the present), possesses an unrivaled collection of Shakespeare’s work, including 82 copies of the First Folio (1623), 119 copies of the later folios, and about 7,000 other Shakespeare editions. It also possesses 90,000 prints, drawings, photographs, and paintings; some 250,000 playbills; and assorted films, recordings, musical instruments, costumes, and theatrical memorabilia. Among the earliest Folger incunabula is a 1477 edition of Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales produced by William Caxton in England’s first printing shop, located in Westminster.
The library, founded in 1932 and administered by the trustees of Amherst College, is named for Henry Clay Folger, chairman of the Standard Oil Company of New York. His will bequeathed his Shakespeare collection to the American people and provided the necessary funds to house, maintain, and expand it.
The library’s exterior is classic Art Deco style with bas-relief scenes from Shakespeare plays, while its interior reflects the Tudor-Stuart style of vaulted ceilings, richly paneled walls, terra-cotta and tile floors, and windows of leaded and stained glass. The building is on the National Register of Historic Places.
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The Folger’s reading rooms are open year-round to scholars and on one day each year—Shakespeare’s birthday—to the general public. The library celebrates the Bard of Avon’s birthday with Renaissance music, song, and dance and a special Shakespeare lecture. The library’s oak-paneled Great Hall, with its changing exhibitions drawn from the Folger collection and a First Folio of Shakespeare on permanent view, serves as a public museum devoted to Shakespeare’s life and times. Its Elizabethan theatre, modeled after the innyard theatres popular in Shakespeare’s day, hosts performances of Shakespeare’s plays as well as concerts, lectures, films, and assorted family programs. The Folger’s conservation laboratory is a leading centre in North America for the treatment and conservation of rare materials.
The Folger Institute, founded in 1970 by the Folger Shakespeare Library and a consortium of universities, is a multidisciplinary centre for advanced study in the humanities. The Folger also has educational programs for grades K–12, which encourage teachers and students to combine the reading of texts with performance-based activities.
The library’s publications include the Folger editions of Shakespeare’s works (available online as the Folger Digital Texts); Shakespeare Quarterly, a scholarly journal; Folger Magazine, written for the general public; and a number of exhibition catalogs, such as “Noyses, Sounds, and Sweet Aires”: Music in Early Modern England (2006), compiled and edited by Jessie Ann Owens, and Manifold Greatness: The Making of the King James Bible (2011), edited by Helen Moore and Julian Reid.