The New Twelfth Night ..

I don't as yet possess any Shakespeare FS editions and letterpress series are not an option financially. I was wondering about this new one, seems like it will be first ifof a set. Has anyone seen it first hand, I was wondering what people's views on it are...maybe bit early perhaps for reviews

I keep waiting for CUP to stop teasing me over the full works in paperback and either quote a price or tell us they have to be bought as single volumes. As it is they keep changing the release date every month!

Anyway - back at the question.

I haven't seen this Twelfth Night in person but £50 or near offer seems a bit steep to me for a slim volume sans notes, sans performance history, sans textual discussion, sans everything save some pretty illustrations and (obviously) a version of the text.

PS Yes I know, wrong play. But it seemed appropriate.

>1 frostymaxim:

I haven't seen this new edition either, but from the description on the FS website, I would not touch it. As mentioned by TheHumbleOne, it has no scholarly addenda, and it has only one "pretty illustration". And that seems a steep price for such a book. If you want nice individual volumes, you should look into acquiring volumes from the original FS set, published between 1950 and 1975, on the second-hand market. They all have more illustrations, including one by Salvador Dali, and introductions by famous actors and directors,such as Laurence Olivier. And they won' set you back by £50, except maybe for the Dali "As You Like It".

I have purchased the new Twelfth Night. I was on the fence about it due to its high cost (and it is such a slim volume with only one illustration). But I really want to start reading Shakespeare and this new set should get me headed in that direction, and will be affordable provided FS slowly churns out future volumes.

I personally like that it doesn't have commentary, textual notes, etc. (I'm a purist I guess!)

I probably won't be receiving it for a week, but when I do I will post some thoughts on it.

>4 Diglot:
Appreciated .

Thanks all for your feedback

I wonder if the text block is using the same layout as the Letterpress edition? Obviously it is not printed letterpress and is on different (slightly smaller) paper, but this would be a way for the Folio Society to extract further value from the Letterpress project.

>6 nonehead:

Yes, I wondered if that was the case.

>6 nonehead:

From the images on the website it appears that the layout is identical to that in the Letterpress Shakespeare.

I have been tempted by the original FS - many a time my finger has hovered over a "buy" button. And yet there are so many volumes of Lit Crit, reviews and what pass for biography being churned out year after year - not just by newbie academics with careers to make, hacks with money to make and old timers with hands to keep in but some folk with interesting ideas. The old folding stuff won't pay for all of this, nor the shelves provide a home. Then there's the time.....

Priorities.....

For the genuine purist there are the various facsimile First Folios.

Indeed I have a FS copy myself.

But to be honest it doesn't get taken out that much.

>10 TheHumbleOne:

Neither in truth does mine, an early version of the Norton facsimile that was later offered in Folio Society dress. I've a decided preference, though, for reading Shakespeare unmodernised, so my complement of Folio Letterpress volumes has stopped at three. The four-volume New Nonesuch set offers compact and affordable access to original texts, and I've since acquired the Limited Editions Club's 37 volumes. They don't often become available in the UK and would cost a small fortune to ship, and while 37 different artists provide the illustrations Arthur Rackham's contributions to A Midsummer Night's Dream result in it tending to change hands for about the same sum as all the rest put together.

>8 gatxito: Could the new edition be a photographic reproduction of the letterpress edition?

>11 terebinth:

I have a guilty secret - I don't really like Early Modern spelling (or the lack thereof). I only deal with it when I have to.

>13 TheHumbleOne:

I don't know if that's any guiltier than my own reluctance to lose the guidance as to the sound and flavour of a line that I often find is lost to me by modern spelling and punctuation. Not to worry: the New Nonesuch and LEC editions are clearly not for you; I'd thought it might only be the facsimile's unwieldiness and/or its dark-grey-on-pale-grey print (at least, such is my version) that made it a volume of infrequent resort.

>12 pythagoras:

It looks very like that to me, looking only at the website for the new edition. It has the text roughly centred on the page, where the letterpress volumes have very wide fore-edge margins - a good inch more than the sewn-edge margins, and that would largely account for the difference in the finished sizes of the books. Otherwise the typography certainly seems to suggest photographic reproduction, but I can't magnify the website image of the new edition with enough clarity to confirm that it is Baskerville.

>15 affle:

The page for Twelfth Night says it is set in Baskerville

Does anyone have insight as to whether Folio have abandoned the series? I'm enticed by the 50% off in the current sale and the website still says it's part of a new set, but we haven't seen anything else since this was first released.

Which series do you mean: the Balbusso Sisters' Shakespeare?
I suspect that was a one-off rather than a series.

>18 Cat_of_Ulthar:
'In the first of a new Folio series, Shakespeare’s most popular comedy is presented in a lavish edition illustrated by the Balbusso twins.' This is what it states on the website but I agree with you.

At last, in the 2019 Summer Sale catalogue, confirmation of a sort comes from the FS as to the true origin of this edition: "Exquisitely bound and printed letterpress" (my bold italics).

Given that even the Balbusso sisters' contribution evidently wasn't enough to sell out an edition presumably limited to about 3000 copies at the full price which was already quite a bargain, I can't but think the surplus sheets of the other early Letterpress Shakespeare volumes are doomed if not already pulped.

>20 terebinth: It's a shame, because I'm sure that if Folio had shown a genuine commitment to proceeding with and completing what would have been an impressive series (at surely relatively little extra cost for the selling price, the letterpress printing having already been undertaken) it would have sold well as an affordable fine series. I wasn't tempted to buy precisely because I worried that it would stand in unloved isolation.

>21 cronshaw:

It would have been a very odd beast of a series, though, at best, with Coriolanus and Titus Andronicus up for inclusion but no prospect of Romeo and Juliet or Henry V.

>22 terebinth: Indeed, you're quite right. Which makes me wonder what they envisaged when they stated that it was the first of a 'new Folio series'. Unless they intended to print the others again, hence prohibitive cost.

Sorry could you explain this? Is it suggesting that it had been printed by letterpress or that the same paper was used as the letterpress volumes and then printed normally.

>24 Jobasha:
The FS published the entire Shakespeare oeuvre between 2007 and 2014 in 39 superb letterpress printed, goatskin leather and marbled paper bound, solander boxed editions.
Unfortunately for the FS, they over estimated the demand for these expensive editions as they initially printed 3750 copies of each volume, but this was soon reduced to 1000 copies for later volumes.
The result was that they had a lot of unbound letterpress printed sheets for some titles. They tried an experiment to get rid of these beautifully printed sheets by binding them in a simpler (but still quality) style and selling them as a special edition.
The only volume (so far, and probably ever) published in this format was Twelfth Night. It appears that the experiment failed, as it has not sold well, and is therefore in the sale.
If you love Twelfth Night, this would be a great purchase, but don't expect it to be the first of a significant series.

Who does not love the Twelfth Night? I had already bought it, and was awaiting is arrival, but I had not expected it to be letterpress. This is great! Thanks for the information.

>25 wcarter:

It’s really sad to see the Letterpress Shakespeare reduced to this. They are lovely but yes humongous and overly impractical with their solander boxes. I do not collect them anymore and have gone over to the Oxford commentaries. Actually I did pick them up on a previous sale from folio and ordered the whole lot. They are in the sale now and can be purchased quite cheaply. Well bound and beautiful and great size and easy on the shelf. I highly recommend them

Edited to correct Autocorrect

>27 ironjaw:

Stop it Faisel!

>23 cronshaw: I guess that, had Twelfth Night sold well, they could always have reprinted Henry V, Richard III, Romeo, etc. again in a similar format and on similar paper but without letter pressing it. Then I guess the cost wouldn't be too prohibitive.

It would have made quite a nice series at a very fair price in my opinion. But.I can't complain too loudly: I didn't buy Twelfth Night because I already have the letterpress version.

My Twelfth Night arrived and for the price I think it is great value. The only illustration is not to my taste but besides that the size and generous layout, together with the beautiful font and paper, make this in sum an excellent addition.

Any Folio Society Devotee want to join me in Stratford-upon-Avon this December to watch the Royal Shakespeare production of this play? I'll be there (traveling from Seattle) for the Friday the 13th performance and if it is convenient for any Devotees, it would be fun to chat about the books or the play anytime Friday or Saturday morning before I head to London for my daughter's graduation. Message me if you're up for it! Re-reading this gorgeous edition soon.