Dr Emma Smith, professor of Shakespeare Studies at Oxford University, is erudite and extraordinary in her talk on the First Folio. She managed to delight her audience with little-known facts about William Shakespeare, the world he lived in and also gave some indication of where we might find and view an original copy of the First Folio. 

Her talk was very educational, and I learned a lot of new things about life in the early modern period and the unwritten rules of literary publishing at the time. 

Dr Smith was fascinating in her ability to build up audience enthusiasm for the struggles the publishers went through to finally put Shakespeare’s play into the focus of a greater audience. She detailed the 22-month-long process of the publication process, and the downside to the effort: at first only the upper classes of society could afford such a large publication. However, later it was made available to the less financially affluent.  

When the First Folio was published, Shakespeare was falling out of the limelight as younger writers took to creating and promoting their own theatrical forms. The Folio was published as a way to increase interest in Shakespeare’s work, but the publishers had no great expectations of profits. Smith argues they were on a sacred mission to help Shakespeare’s works become more famous, and they could do that through publishing his work in a book, or folio, format that could not easily be lost, destroyed, or worn with time.  

Smith makes an interesting point. We all think Shakespeare has always been the popular playwright we have now, but Smith argues that his perceived immortality owes a lot to the true friendship and labor of those loyal and close to him and his work. We can only hope we each will be remembered in a similar fashion after our lifetimes.