There’s drama in the air, with whispers of “ Et tu, Brute ?” and “What’s in a name?” hanging in the air. At the centre of the Curator’s Gallery at the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya (CSMVS), safely ensconced in protective glass, lies a 400-year-old manuscript of William Shakespeare’s first folio. It’s opened to the play, Romeo and Juliet . History and theatre aficionados stand in awe as their eyes move across the 900-page book printed in 1623. Published in London by Isaac Jaggard and Edward Blount, the royal copy from the collection of King George III has now made its way out of England for the first time.
Engraved with a copper image of Shakespeare by Martin Droeshout, the first folio was entitled Mr. William Shakespeare’s Comedies, Histories & Tragedies . It’s difficult to imagine that without this compilation, 18 of Shakespeare’s plays, including Twelfth Night , Measure for Measure , Macbeth , Julius Caesar and The Tempest , may have never survived. From an estimated 750 first folio prints, only 233 are currently known to exist worldwide. Massive in size, with a worn but well-restored appearance and dotted with a serif font that could only belong to the 1600s, the folio is part of the British Library’s collection of artefacts. The show is a collaboration between the CSMVS and the British Library.
The exhibit is replete with lesser-known facts about the playwright and interactive wall art. Marking the end of the bard’s 400th death anniversary, the folio serves as a window to the Indian audience on whom the playwright has had a significant impact through various adaptations. “In the last few years, it would be safe to say that Shakespeare has become an Indian playwright, with works being adapted by [Vishal] Bhardwaj, among other filmmakers. His themes like power, justice, and love, are all things artists want to talk about even today,” says Alan Gemmell, director of the British Council.
Made up of 36 plays, the folio was put together by two of Shakespeare’s friends and acting colleagues, John Heminge and Henry Condell, seven years after the bard’s death (1623). It divides each play into comedy, history, and tragedy for the first time. It is the closest version of Shakespeare’s works as he wrote them since no handwritten manuscripts have ever been found. Shakespeare never authorised the publication or printing of any of his own plays, hence to ensure the folio’s authenticity, Heminge and Condell were said to have sifted through prompt books, authorial fair copy, and working drafts belonging to the bard. This copy was re-bound in burgundy goatskin as part of a conservation treatment by the British Library in the late 20th century.
Getting this 400-year-old piece of history into the country was no easy task. According to Gimmel, the folio even had its own seat on the aircraft here. “It needs to be handled by someone who knows it. Its nervous hands that cause the real damage,” explains Adrian Edwards, head of the printed heritage collections at the British Library. After the folio’s original restoration in the 1980s, Edwards has been safeguarding it since the 1990s.
The room it is exhibited in needs a controlled environment where temperature, light, and humidity levels, can be checked and maintained. “Since December, January, and February are the most pleasant with regard to weather condition, most institutions prefer to lend artefacts to India at this time of the year,” explains Vaidehi Savnal, senior curatorial assistant at CSMVS.
Deemed as one of the most valuable printed books in the world the folio represents a legacy that consists of themes that are still relevant till today.
What’s in a name? – Shakespeare’s first folio in Mumbaiis on till March 8 at the Curator’s Gallery, CSMVS, Fort
