Monday, January 4, 2010

Report on the Docents’ Orientation to the Digital First Folio by Mike Neuman

First-time visitors to the Folger are sometimes disappointed to learn that they are not permitted to browse through the Library’s rare resources. Some consolation, though, is available at the kiosk in the Exhibition Hall with its fine example of a First Folio and its digital surrogate that permits browsing and provides many helpful notes. On October 27th, a group of nine docents who offer detailed coverage of the First Folio on their tours gave sample presentations to approximately two dozen of their colleagues who had gathered to learn from and respond to their fellows. Altogether, then, more than half of the docent community was on hand for the event.

The series of five-minute presentations began with an orientation by Jim Kuhn, Folger’s Head of Collection Information Services, on the interface to and features of the digital First Folio. He was followed by the following presentations that, in general, progressed from details on individual pages of the First Folio to broader issues of background:

 Ben Jonson’s tribute to Shakespeare (Larry Plotkin)
 "BI" as Ben Jonson (EJ Truax)
 The Droeshout engraving (Dottie Boerner)
 Lack of a prologue in R&J and problems in editing Shakespeare (Amy Thompson)
 Table of contents: 35 titles for 36 plays (Elaine Miller)
 Featured actors of the King’s Men (Gina Guglielmo)
 The first page of R&J and limited space at the start of a quire (Mike Neuman)
 The law of printing and presenting plays in Shakespeare’s time (Martha Patterson)
 Why do we have so many First Folios? (Sarah Rosenbaum)

Charlton Hinman, Peter Blayney, and Paul Collins—authors of influential works on the First Folio--were often cited, and two question-and-answer sessions were held along the way.
Outside on this late October day, the weather was dreary, but gathered around the light of the First Folio, the docents by all reports had a cozy and stimulating time.

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