Estate / Collection: The Collection of Erica Jong and Ken Burrows

SHAKESPEARE, WILLIAM
Measure for Measure. [London: Isaac Jaggard etc., 1623]. First printing of the play, extracted from a copy of the First Folio edition of Shakespeare. Three-quarters modern speckled calf by Sangorski & Sutcliffe, marbled sides, housed in a cloth clamshell case. 11 7/8 x 7 1/2 inches (30.5 x 19.5 cm); modern title in manuscript, 24 pp., numbered 61-84, comprising leaves F1-G6. There are small restorations to the extreme lower corners of the first and last text leaves. These restorations (with paper replacement) are clear of the text but affect the surrounding rules, with the page rules in that small area infilled in manuscript. The rule on a few headlines is trimmed. There is a very neatly restored tear on F3 across the first column. Louis Auchincloss's copy, with his book label on the front paste-down; old Quaritch collation marks and codes on the rear endpapers.

There was no quarto edition of the play prior to 1632, so the present pages extracted from the First Folio are the true first edition, one of eighteen of his plays that appeared there for the first time. First performed in 1604, it is generally considered among the comedies of Shakespeare, although it has many of the features of the author's tragic works, and the plot has dark undercurrents, with its emphasis on moral over civil justice.