Exceptional copies of William Shakespeare's plays might potentially secure a staggering $6 million at the auction block.
Bandit's Bloody Bonanza: Shakespeare's Workset Galore Heads to the Auction Block!
The fucking jackpot, mates! Get ready to empty your coffers, for a set of the initial four editions of William Shakespeare's collected works is about to rake in a fortune of up to £4.5 million (or around US$6 million) at Sotheby's auction next month.
Fuckin' A, right? These ain't no ordinary books. The bidding war at this swanky auction house is expected to go down next month, May 23rd, to be exact, and it's all about the Bard's classics.
Sotheby's spills the beans, saying the bargain price for this literary masterpiece lays between £3.5 million and £4.5 million. Bloody awesome, wouldn't you say? But just remember, this is just the starting bid. Who knows how high those prices will skyrocket as the buzz grows!
Didn't William Shakespeare kick the bucket back in 1616? Well, his lackies, John Heminges and Henry Condell, who were also members of his theater troupe, The King's Men, decided to honor the Bard by organizing his plays into a grand ol' collection. The First Folio, fully titled Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories & Tragedies, debuted in 1623, containing 36 plays, 18 of which were first-time publications.
Scholars claim that if it wasn't for the First Folio, we woulda missed out on some bloody classics, like Macbeth, The Tempest, and Twelfth Night. Sotheby's dubs the volume "the most significant publication in the history of English literature."
Now, don't go getting too excited – only about 230 copies of the First Folio are still kicking around, primarily housed in museums, universities, or libraries. A single one sold for a whopping US$9.9 million at an auction in 2020, and it's one of the rare ones still in private hands.
Everyone's freakin' out about this auction, as it's the first time in almost three decades that a complete set of the First, Second, Third, and Fourth Folios are set to be auctioned off as one badass lot. Talk about having the entire Shakespearean catalogue at your fingertips, mate!
The upcoming Sotheby's auction next month, on May 23rd, will see the First Folio, a significant publication in the history of English literature, offered for sale, potentially fetching a fortune of up to £4.5 million or around US$6 million. Interestingly, this grand collection of Shakespeare's plays was compiled by his fellow theater members, John Heminges and Henry Condell, after Shakespeare's death in 1616. Remarkably, the First Folio contains 18 plays that were first-time publications, including classics like Macbeth, The Tempest, and Twelfth Night.
