The First Folio preserves 18 of his plays, including some of the most major, which otherwise would have been lost for all time.
Quotes about folio (5 Quotes)
Devise, wit write, pen for I am for whole volumes in folio.
The First Folio preserves 18 of his plays, which otherwise would have been lost for all time. Relatively complete copies of the Folio in contemporary or near contemporary bindings very rarely come to the market.
Without this edition, eighteen of Shakespeare's plays including some of his most famous like Macbeth, The Tempest and other plays would have been lost for all time. It's the only surviving source for eighteen of Shakespeare's plays. With regard to this particular copy of the first folio, it's remarkable because it's preserved in it's original seventeenth century binding. There's no other copy in the world in private hands preserved in a seventeenth century binding complete with all it's text leaves.
The real 'Hamlet' is of course later, first performed in 1600, then performed with revisions in 1601, and eventually included in the First Folio after Shakespeare's death, ... It really has more in common with the two major works it comes between, the two great comedies 'As You Like It' and 'Twelfth Night'.