Folger Collections
Corsets, Curls, and Fontanges! Oh, my!
Hi, Blog-ites! The other Emily T, aka Alpiew, here. So The Gaming Table is officially up and running, and I’ve heard that we’ve received some terrific press, which is lovely and much appreciated. Looks like we have a hit on…
Women marking the text
“I beegan, to ourloke this Booke . . . .” These words are written by Lady Anne Clifford on the title page of her copy of John Selden’s Titles of Honor (1631), which is featured in the first case of…
A newly uncovered presentation copy by Margaret Cavendish
Heather: The other day I received an email from the Conservation Lab with the subject line: “Annotation found on the verso of a lined frontispiece,” and a link to a couple of images, one taken under ultraviolet light. The conservators…
Two ways of looking at the same book
As I’ve written about before, in my Undergraduate Seminars students devote the bulk of their research time to crafting a biography of the book they’ve chosen as their primary focus. They find out who wrote the book and who printed…
Investigating the origins of a Folger manuscript
With this post we inaugurate a series by people working at the Folger as Interns. Classroom work and professional training never quite capture the true nature of the j – o – b. Therefore, for those pursuing advanced degrees in…
Play a Game, Win a Prize!
Hello, Gaming Table friends! Emily Trask here again. We’re deep into the heart of rehearsals here at the Folger and will be starting technical rehearsals very soon. The set is incredible, the costumes unbelievable, and everyone is rightfully excited to…
Wagner and Shakespeare meet in Bayreuth
Back in August, I posted about a unique artists’ book from 1995. Today, I’d like to showcase an example from the other end of the twentieth century, an artists’ book created in 1908 by American painter Pinckney Marcius-Simons (1867–1909). In…
Basset, anyone?
Recently, a handful of brave cast members, as well as the director, stage manager, and dialect coach of The Gaming Table all bellied up to that titular table to learn how to play Basset. Why Basset, you ask? And why did…
Game On!
We are halfway through our first week of rehearsals for The Gaming Table, and it’s already too much fun not to share. So without further ado… Welcome to the Folger Theatre Production Diary for Susanna Centlivre’s The Gaming Table (originally titled The Basset Table), brought…
Reduce, reuse, recycle
Did you think that “reduce, reuse, recycle” was just a modern slogan? Check out this early modern book: That’s an image of the front inside cover and front endleaf of a 1636 edition of Charles Fitz-Geffrey’s The blessed birth-day, which…
“What’s that letter?”: Searching for water amongst the leaves
A guest post by Folger Institute participant and short-term fellow Lehua Yim Sixteenth-century England was particularly formative in the long history of what “Britain” means for the peoples of that archipelago, as reformulations of political, legal, economic, and religious institutions…
Manuscript reunions
Sometimes we come across a manuscript on the market that looks vaguely familiar, and sends us scrambling to Hamnet to figure out why. I was reminded of this last week when a bookseller offered us a “naval return for Queen…