A week before we left for D.C., my wife asked what I wanted for my birthday (which is coming up a few days after Mr. Shakespeare’s). I smiled and said, “We’re about to visit the Folger Shakespeare Library. I’m pretty sure I’ll find something.”
Fast forward to actually standing in the middle of the Folger Gift Shop. What should I get, what should I get? Posters? Jewelry? Music? Something about the man, about a specific play, about the sonnets? One of everything, please.
Who are we kidding, I made a beeline straight to what I knew I had to have.
The First Folio of Shakespeare: The Norton Facsimile
Looking at that Amazon price I see that I just paid more than perhaps I should have, but what can ya do. I will forever be able to say that I got this one from the Folger itself. Should have gotten somebody to sign it. 😉
My girls both grabbed for books on the Sonnets, if you can believe that, and I had to talk them out of it. Not because I don’t think that’s good study material, but because neither of them was any sort of “Sonnets for Kids” translation. Both were heavy academic books, and I knew that they wouldn’t understand a bit of it. Instead we settled on some books from one of the Shakespeare for Kids series – one got a book on Shakespeare himself, the other got a translation of Midsummer. They’ve already read them, and switched. Multiple times.
The boy, on the other hand, went with a cool jester hat (see “Foolish Games” post). With bells. Wore it for the rest of our trip, and was a big hit wherever he went. Bonus, everybody kept saying “Where’d you get that hat?” and I kept saying, “The Folger Shakespeare Library!” When he was feeling particularly bold he’d then proclaim, “To be or not to be, that is the question!”
I would open up my prize and flip pages, but my wife promptly stole the book back and announced that I cannot have it until my actual birthday. Bummer! But, that gives me a whole other reason to post in a few days 🙂
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