Go over to the left hand column of this page and click on World Shakespeare Bibliography Online (you will find find it at the bottom of Selected Bibliographic Resources). Go ahead...we'll wait....
Pretty dang impressive, isn't it?! In just a recent 48-year period (1961-2009), this bibliography records almost 121,000 articles published somewhere in the world about Shakespeare and his works! This simply reinforces the point we tried to make more subtly in yesterday's post--the print distribution network for Shakespeare is phenomenal. His 37 plays, 4 poems (or 5, depending on who you believe) and 154 sonnets can be collected as complete works, as standalone subsets (only the plays, for example, or only the sonnets), or as individual titles. They can be collected as paperbacks, hardbacks or even graphic novels. If you desire the magnificence of his language to be more appropriately clothed, you can even collect his works in fine press editions.
Shakespeare's oeuvre has attracted fine press printers for a very long time. And their numerous attempts to create a "house beautiful" for the Bard's works have produced some of the most beautiful books ever published. Some of these attempts have tackled the complete works...
Clarendon Press, 1771-1772
Others have attempted only a particular poem...
Kelmscott Press, 1893
As seen above, and below, Venus and Adonis has been particularly enticing because of the illustrative opportunities...
Barbarian Press, 2005
Even when the publisher is a trade press, the Bard's works often have been dressed up in elaborate bindings...
Oxford University Press, 1947, in Cosway bindings by Bayntun-Riviere
A recent Shakespearean fine press project of some note is that of The Folio Society, which straddles the line between a trade publisher and a fine press publisher by producing at trade prices books whose production values come very close to meeting the definition of fine press. In the case of their Letterpress Shakespeare, they actually cross the line directly into the fine press category...
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