Rare Book Monthly

Articles - November - 2020 Issue

Shakespeare First Folio Sells for Record Breaking Price of Almost $10 Million

The Mills College First Folio (Christie's photo).

The Mills College First Folio (Christie's photo).

A copy of the first edition of William Shakespeare's Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies, better known as the “First Folio,” sold at Christie's on October 14 for a record-smashing price of just a hair under $10 million. The hammer price was $9,978,000. Margaret Ford, Christie's International Head of Group, Books & Manuscripts, London said, “Christie’s is delighted to have established a new world auction record not only for a work by William Shakespeare, but for any work of literature.”

 

Of course, the First Folio is not just any work of literature. It is undoubtedly the most important literary work in the English language, perhaps any. Published in 1623, seven years after Shakespeare died, it contains 36 of Shakespeare's plays, 18 of which might have been lost forever were it not for this edition. Among those that might have been lost are Macbeth, The Twelfth Night, and Julius Caesar. Shakespeare wrote his plays for production, not reading or preservation. The result was that many of his plays were never published during his lifetime. Fellow actors and friends of Shakespeare John Heminge and Henry Condell realized years after his death that his plays might well be lost forever if they didn't publish them while scripts still existed, hence the creation of this monumentally important work.

 

The First Folio is rare and extremely difficult to obtain. The original print run is believed to have been around 750 copies. Of these, 235 are known to still exist. The great majority are in institutions. The Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington incredibly owns 82 of them. According to Christie's, only six complete copies remain in private hands. Over the years, they get bought up by institutions and placed in permanent collections. This copy was a rare exception in that it migrated from an institution back to a private buyer. It belonged to Mills College, a small, private, mostly women's college in Oakland, California. It was given to Mills in 1977 by Mary Louise and James O'Brien in honor of her father, Elias Olan James. Elias James was a professor of English literature at Mills College during the first half of the twentieth century.

 

Unfortunately, like many smaller, private colleges, Mills has had a hard time financially in recent years. Declining applications and admissions, exacerbated by an increasing percentage of students from low income families, put the college into multi-million dollar deficits. In 2017, the the administration declared a “financial emergency.” That led to a restructuring of the curriculum to better appeal to prospective students and the sale of what the college conceded was a “precious asset.” Mills is not the first, nor will they be the last, to incur this sort of a dilemma and the hard choices it generates. They decided to sell their First Folio.

 

As painful as the decision must have been, Mills must have been pleased with the outcome. Christie's estimate, which reflected earlier valuations, was that it would sell for $4-$6 million. It blew that number away. The sale took six minutes as three telephone bidders battled for the winning bid. Once the others bowed out, the hammer came down at $9,978,000 all in. The winning bidder was Stephen Loewentheil of the 19th Century Rare Book & Photograph Shop. Christie's quoted Mr. Loewentheil as saying, “William Shakespeare is incomparably the greatest writer in the English language and one of most important international cultural influencers in all history. The First Folio is the most important collection of plays ever published and revered throughout the world. It is an honor to purchase one of only a handful of complete copies of this epochal volume. It will ultimately serve as a centerpiece of a great collection of intellectual achievements of man.”


Posted On: 2020-11-03 00:18
User Name: artbooks1

I wonder how the donors feel about this sale of the Elias Olan James copy of the book. I know how I'd feel.


Rare Book Monthly

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    Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    17th July 2025
    Forum Auctions
    Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    17th July 2025
    Forum, July 17: Lucianus Samosatensis. Dialogoi, editio princeps, second issue, Florence, Laurentius Francisci de Alopa, 1496. £10,000 to £15,000.
    Forum, July 17: Boccaccio (Giovanni). Il Decamerone, Florence, Philippo di Giunta, 1516. £10,000 to £15,000.
    Forum, July 17: Henry VII (King) & Philip the Fair (Duke of Burgundy). [Intercursus Magnus], [Commercial and Political Treaty between Henry VII and Philip Duke of Burgundy], manuscript copy in Latin, original vellum, 1499. £8,000 to £12,000.
    Forum, July 17: Bible, English. The Holy Bible, Conteyning the Old Testament, and the New, Robert Barker, 1613. £4,000 to £6,000.
    Forum, July 17: Bond (Michael). A Bear Called Paddington, first edition, signed presentation inscription from the author, 1958. £4,000 to £6,000.
    Forum Auctions
    Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    17th July 2025
    Forum, July 17: Yeats (William Butler). The Secret Rose, first edition, with extensive autograph corrections, additions and amendments by the author for a new edition, 1897. £6,000 to £8,000.
    Forum, July 17: Byron (George Gordon Noel, Lord). Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, bound in dark green morocco elaborately tooled in gilt and with 3 watercolours to fore-edge, by Fazakerley of Liverpool, 1841. £4,000 to £6,000.
    Forum, July 17: Miró (Juan), Wassily Kandinsky, John Buckland-Wright, Stanley William Hayter and others.- Spender (Stephen). Fraternity, one of 101 copies, with signed engravings by 9 artists. £6,000 to £8,000.
    Forum, July 17: Sowerby (George Brettingham). Album comprising 22 leaves of original watercolour drawings of fossil remains of Cheltenham and Vicinity, [c.1840]. £6,000 to £8,000.
    Forum, July 17: Mathematics.- Blue paper copy.- Euclid. De gli Elementi, Urbino, Appresso Domenico Frisolino, 1575. £12,000 to £18,000.
  • Sotheby’s
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    Now through July 10, 2025
    Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: Book of Hours by the Masters of Otto van Moerdrecht, Use of Sarum, in Latin, Southern Netherlands (Bruges), c.1450. £20,000 to £30,000.
    Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: Albert Einstein. Autograph letter signed, to Attilio Palatino, on his research into General Relativity, 12 May 1929. £12,000 to £18,000.
    Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: John Gould. The Birds of Europe, [1832-] 1837, 5 volumes, contemporary half morocco, subscriber’s copy. £40,000 to £60,000.
    Sotheby’s
    Books, Manuscripts and Music from Medieval to Modern
    Now through July 10, 2025
    Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: Ian Fleming. A collection of James Bond first editions, 8 volumes in all. £8,000 to £12,000.
    Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: J.K. Rowling. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, 1997, first edition, hardback issue. £50,000 to £70,000.
    Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: J.R.R. Tolkien. Autograph letter signed, to Amy Ronald, on Pauline Baynes's map of Middle Earth, 1970. £7,000 to £10,000.
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  • DOYLE
    Rare Books, Autographs & Maps
    July 23, 2025
    DOYLE, July 23: WALL, BERNHARDT. Greenwich Village. Types, Tenements & Temples. Estimate $300-500
    DOYLE, July 23: STOKES, I. N. PHELPS. The Iconography of Manhattan Island, 1498-1909. New York: Robert H. Dodd, 1915-28. Estimate: $3,000-5,000
    DOYLE, July 23: [AUTOGRAPH - US PRESIDENT]FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT. A signed photograph of Franklin D. Roosevelt. Estimate $500-800
    DOYLE, July 23: [ARION PRESS]. ABBOTT, EDWIN A. Flatland. A Romance of Many Dimensions. San Francisco, 1980. Estimate $2,000-3,000.
    DOYLE, July 23: TOLSTOY, LYOF N. and NATHAN HASKELL DOLE, translator. Anna Karénina ... in eight parts. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell & Co., [1886]. Estimate: $400-600
    DOYLE, July 23: ROWLING, J.K. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. London: Bloomsbury, 2000. Estimate $1,200-1,800
  • Freeman’s | Hindman
    Western Manuscripts and Miniatures
    July 8, 2025
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. FRANCESCO PETRARCH (b. Arezzo, 20 July 1304; d. Arqua Petrarca, 19 July 1374). $20,000-30,000.
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. CIRCLE OF THE MASTER OF THE VITAE IMPERATORUM (active Milan, 1431-1459). $15,000-20,000.
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. CIRCLE OF ATTAVANTE DEGLI ATTAVANTI (GABRIELLO DI VANTE) (active Florence, c. 1452-c. 1520/25). $15,000-20,000.
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. FOLLOWER OF HERMAN SCHEERE (active London, c. 1405-1425). $15,000-20,000.
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. An exceptionally rare, illuminated music leaf from a Mozarabic Antiphonal with sister leaves mostly in museum collections. $11,500-14,000.
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. Exceptional leaf from a prestigious Antiphonary by a leading illuminator of the late Duecento. $11,500-14,000.
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. CIRCLE OF THE MASTER OF MS REID 33 and SELWERD ABBEY SCRIPTORIUM (AGNES MARTINI?) (active The Netherlands, Groningen, c. 1468-1510). $10,000-15,000.
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. Previously unknown illumination from one of the most renowned Gothic Choir Book sets of the Middle Ages. $6,000-8,000.

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