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Want to support the podcast? Join our Patreon or buy us a coffee. As an independent podcast, Shakespeare Anyone? is supported by listeners like you. Have you ever wondered where those colorful Folger paperback editions of Shakespeare plays got their name? Or how the Folger Shakespeare Library came to have the largest collection of First Folios in the world? Or if there was any relation to the coffee brand? In today's episode, we are going to be exploring the life of Henry Folger, his wife Emily Jordan Folger, their quest for copies of the First Folio, and how their collection forever changed our modern understanding of Shakespeare and the early modern period. Shakespeare Anyone? is created and produced by Kourtney Smith and Elyse Sharp. Music is "Neverending Minute" by Sounds Like Sander. For updates: join our email list, follow us on Instagram at @shakespeareanyonepod or visit our website at shakespeareanyone.com You can support the podcast by becoming a patron at patreon.com/shakespeareanyone, sending us a virtual tip via our tipjar, or by shopping our bookshelves at bookshop.org/shop/shakespeareanyonepod. Find additional links mentioned in the episode in our Linktree. Works referenced: Grant, Stephen H. Collecting Shakespeare: The Story of Henry and Emily Folger. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014 Mays, Andrea E. The Millionaire and the Bard: Henry Folger's Obsessive Hunt for Shakespeare's First Folio. Simon & Schuster, 2016. "Purchasing Power Today of a US Dollar Transaction in the Past," MeasuringWorth, 2025. Staff, Folger Shakesepeare Library. “Andrea Mays on the Millionaire and the Bard.” Folger Shakespeare Library, 18 Nov. 2015, www.folger.edu/podcasts/shakespeare-unlimited/shakespeare-unlimited-episode-36/. Staff, NPR. “A Fortune in Folios: One Man's Hunt for Shakespeare's First Editions.” NPR, NPR, 14 May 2015, www.npr.org/2015/05/14/406470976/a-fortune-in-folios-one-man-s-hunt-for-shakespeare-s-first-editions. Witmore, Michael. "Henry Clay Folger." Encyclopedia Britannica, 14 Jun. 2024, https://www.britannica.com/money/Henry-Clay-Folger. Accessed 5 March 2025.
The Folger started with Henry and Emily Folger, two collectors who loved books and Shakespeare and had the means to pursue what they loved. They were supported by booksellers, who make their livelihoods poring through collections of books and ephemera and bringing those items to the people who want them. "The Booksellers," a new documentary directed by D.W. Young, explores the New York rare book world in all its depth, breadth, history, and quirkiness. In it, you’ll meet Syreeta Gates, who is preserving the artifacts of ‘80s and ‘90s hip-hop; Caroline Schimmel, a pioneering collecting of women’s writing; Jay Walker, the collector behind the Museum of the History of Human Imagination; Michael Zinman, who sought out “damaged” books at a time before other booksellers understood their real value; and many other passionate booklovers. We talked to D.W. Young to learn more about the present state of this community and to find out where it goes from here. Young is interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. D.W. Young’s films have screened at festivals around the world, including the New York Film Festival, South by Southwest, and the Vancouver International Film Festival. "The Booksellers," executive produced by Parker Posey, is streaming on iTunes, Amazon, and other Video-On-Demand platforms in the US. It is available on DVD and through virtual cinema screenings. From the Shakespeare Unlimited podcast series. Published July 7, 2020. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “I Loved My Books,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster. Ben Lauer is the web producer. We had technical help from Andrew Feliciano and Paul Luke at Voice Trax West in Studio City, California.
Henry and Emily Folger were linked together not just by their love for one another, but their shared passion for the works of William Shakespeare. In Collecting Shakespeare: The Story of Henry and Emily Folger (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014), Stephen H. Grant describes how the two of them devoted their lives to acquiring Shakespeare's works and related artifacts and how that collection became the cornerstone of one of the great cultural institutions in the world today. Though his interest in Shakespeare developed during his time at Amherst College, Henry Folger chose a career in business and began working for Standard Oil while in law school. It was through his membership in a literary circle that he met Emily, a Vassar graduate who taught in Brooklyn. As husband and wife they spent their time combing through catalogues, traveling, and engaging in constant correspondence with booksellers and others in search of First Folios and other rare works of early modern English literature. While they were reticent about their collection during their lifetime, the two sought to memorialize their success with what became the Folger Shakespeare Library, a research institution funded by the fortune Henry built up over half a century and guided to realization after his death by Emily. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Henry and Emily Folger were linked together not just by their love for one another, but their shared passion for the works of William Shakespeare. In Collecting Shakespeare: The Story of Henry and Emily Folger (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014), Stephen H. Grant describes how the two of them devoted their lives to acquiring Shakespeare’s works and related artifacts and how that collection became the cornerstone of one of the great cultural institutions in the world today. Though his interest in Shakespeare developed during his time at Amherst College, Henry Folger chose a career in business and began working for Standard Oil while in law school. It was through his membership in a literary circle that he met Emily, a Vassar graduate who taught in Brooklyn. As husband and wife they spent their time combing through catalogues, traveling, and engaging in constant correspondence with booksellers and others in search of First Folios and other rare works of early modern English literature. While they were reticent about their collection during their lifetime, the two sought to memorialize their success with what became the Folger Shakespeare Library, a research institution funded by the fortune Henry built up over half a century and guided to realization after his death by Emily. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Henry and Emily Folger were linked together not just by their love for one another, but their shared passion for the works of William Shakespeare. In Collecting Shakespeare: The Story of Henry and Emily Folger (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014), Stephen H. Grant describes how the two of them devoted their lives to acquiring Shakespeare’s works and related artifacts and how that collection became the cornerstone of one of the great cultural institutions in the world today. Though his interest in Shakespeare developed during his time at Amherst College, Henry Folger chose a career in business and began working for Standard Oil while in law school. It was through his membership in a literary circle that he met Emily, a Vassar graduate who taught in Brooklyn. As husband and wife they spent their time combing through catalogues, traveling, and engaging in constant correspondence with booksellers and others in search of First Folios and other rare works of early modern English literature. While they were reticent about their collection during their lifetime, the two sought to memorialize their success with what became the Folger Shakespeare Library, a research institution funded by the fortune Henry built up over half a century and guided to realization after his death by Emily. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Henry and Emily Folger were linked together not just by their love for one another, but their shared passion for the works of William Shakespeare. In Collecting Shakespeare: The Story of Henry and Emily Folger (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014), Stephen H. Grant describes how the two of them devoted their lives to acquiring Shakespeare’s works and related artifacts and how that collection became the cornerstone of one of the great cultural institutions in the world today. Though his interest in Shakespeare developed during his time at Amherst College, Henry Folger chose a career in business and began working for Standard Oil while in law school. It was through his membership in a literary circle that he met Emily, a Vassar graduate who taught in Brooklyn. As husband and wife they spent their time combing through catalogues, traveling, and engaging in constant correspondence with booksellers and others in search of First Folios and other rare works of early modern English literature. While they were reticent about their collection during their lifetime, the two sought to memorialize their success with what became the Folger Shakespeare Library, a research institution funded by the fortune Henry built up over half a century and guided to realization after his death by Emily. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Henry and Emily Folger were linked together not just by their love for one another, but their shared passion for the works of William Shakespeare. In Collecting Shakespeare: The Story of Henry and Emily Folger (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014), Stephen H. Grant describes how the two of them devoted their lives to acquiring Shakespeare’s works and related artifacts and how that collection became the cornerstone of one of the great cultural institutions in the world today. Though his interest in Shakespeare developed during his time at Amherst College, Henry Folger chose a career in business and began working for Standard Oil while in law school. It was through his membership in a literary circle that he met Emily, a Vassar graduate who taught in Brooklyn. As husband and wife they spent their time combing through catalogues, traveling, and engaging in constant correspondence with booksellers and others in search of First Folios and other rare works of early modern English literature. While they were reticent about their collection during their lifetime, the two sought to memorialize their success with what became the Folger Shakespeare Library, a research institution funded by the fortune Henry built up over half a century and guided to realization after his death by Emily. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Henry and Emily Folger were linked together not just by their love for one another, but their shared passion for the works of William Shakespeare. In Collecting Shakespeare: The Story of Henry and Emily Folger (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014), Stephen H. Grant describes how the two of them devoted their lives to acquiring Shakespeare’s works and related artifacts and how that collection became the cornerstone of one of the great cultural institutions in the world today. Though his interest in Shakespeare developed during his time at Amherst College, Henry Folger chose a career in business and began working for Standard Oil while in law school. It was through his membership in a literary circle that he met Emily, a Vassar graduate who taught in Brooklyn. As husband and wife they spent their time combing through catalogues, traveling, and engaging in constant correspondence with booksellers and others in search of First Folios and other rare works of early modern English literature. While they were reticent about their collection during their lifetime, the two sought to memorialize their success with what became the Folger Shakespeare Library, a research institution funded by the fortune Henry built up over half a century and guided to realization after his death by Emily. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
September 17, 2015 at the Boston Athenæum. Collecting Shakespeare: The Story of Henry and Emily Folger, founders of the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C. is the first book-length account of the American success story about Henry (1857–1930) and Emily (1858–1936) Folger, the reclusive Brooklyn couple who founded the Folger Shakespeare Library near the U. S. Capitol in 1932. The library houses 82 First Folios, 275,000 books, 60,000 manuscripts, artwork, and much more related to Shakespeare and his times. The private research institution welcomes 100,000 visitors a year and provides scholars, researchers, professors, and graduate students from around the world with access to the priceless collections stored in underground vaults. The Folgers met at a literary salon and were the first in their families to receive college educations. Henry rose to become president of the Standard Oil Company of New York, that later became Mobil Corporation. Emily earned a master’s degree in Shakespearean studies in 1896, when only 250 women in the country attained that level of education. It is a love story of a childless couple during the Gilded Age who were devoted to each other, in love with Shakespeare, and bitten by the collecting bug.
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