Genoa. The series of five meetings “400 times (+1) Shakespeare” will open on Thursday 2 May at 5.30 pm at the Actor’s Library Museum, conceived and organized by Stefano Termanini Editore and by the museum itself in collaboration with the University Library of Padua . The cycle refers to the four hundredth anniversary of the printing of the “First Folio” (1623), the first edition of William Shakespeare’s works. It was 1623 when John Heminges and Henry Condell, actors of the company of which Shakespeare was impresario, director and author, edited the first edition of the “Comedies, histories, & tragedies”, printed by Edward Blount and Isaac Jaggard: the “First Folio” .
“The title of the cycle takes inspiration from the 401 years that have passed since Heminges and Condell, delivering the Shakespearean corpus to print and therefore to posterity, saved it from the risk of dispersion – explains Termanini – Of the thirty-six Shakespeare works included in the “First Folio” eighteen they were printed then for the first time. It seemed important to us that this extraordinary anniversary should also be celebrated in Genoa both for its role as Italian Book Capital 2023 and for the ties and connections that bind the city and Shakespeare to the sea”.
The “First Folio” was printed in approximately 750 copies, of which only 233 have survived. In Italy only one is preserved at the University Library of Padua. Used as a prompt book by a theater company, the Padua “First Folio” has its own history that is linked to the trade and cultural exchanges that placed Venice and its mainland at the center of the world. Lavinia Prosdocimi, formerly of the Manuscripts and Rare Books section of the University Library of Padua, will report in the first meeting on the Padua “First Folio”, its history and its peculiar characteristics. Speakers will include Eugenio Pallestrini, president of the museum, Luigi Giannitrapani, author of the very recent volume “Shakespeare and the Call of the Sea”, and Stefano Termanini.
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