• Remembering Antioch Shakespeare Festival

    The Shakespeare Unlimited podcast brings together actor John Lithgow and other children of the Antioch Shakespeare Festival founders to talk about their fathers’ work and its legacy. Explore prompt books in the Folger collection from the 1950s festival, which performed all of Shakespeare’s plays in rep over the course of three summers.

    Listen Explore Prompt Books

  • Folger Shakespeare Library | Julie Ainsworth

    Form and Function: The Genius of the Book

    Dive deep into one of the world's greatest technologies—the book—in the Folger's new exhibition. Open through September 23.

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  • Driving Discovery

    Volunteers transcribing Folger manuscripts on Shakespeare’s World have uncovered a startling antedating for “partner” meaning “spouse,” resulting in a revised Oxford English Dictionary entry.

    Learn More Shakespeare's World

  • Steve Zylius

    Shakespeare's Birthday Lecture

    Listen to a recording of the annual Shakespeare’s Birthday Lecture, presented this year by Julia Reinhard Lupton on Shakespeare’s virtues, with Folger Theatre actor Eric Hissom.

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  • David Reeve

    Inside the Reading Rooms

    Scholars from all over the world come to the Folger reading rooms to use our Shakespeare and early modern collections. Free guided tours for visitors are available on Saturdays and Sundays.

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Inside the Conservation Lab
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FOLGER FINDS

An Argentine Hamlet

Rafael Squirru and Juan Carlos Liberti collaborated to create this Argentine translation of Shakespeare’s Hamlet with surrealist illustrations.

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STAGE CONNECTIONS

George Bernard Shaw on Shakespeare

Shaw was utterly impatient with “Bardolatry,” but Saint Joan may well be the most Shakespearean of Shaw’s major plays in its matter and its style.

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FROM THE BLOGS

Ghostly Dramas

Explore some works in the Folger collection from the early 20th century that were attributed to Shakespeare’s spirit, such as Hamlet in Heaven.

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FROM THE DIRECTOR

Our collections, spanning history from the Renaissance onward, and our educational and public programs support the value of pluralism and an open society in which all people contribute and all are treated with respect.
Michael Witmore
Folger Shakespeare Library Director
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  • Become a 2018/19 Theatre Subscriber

    A season featuring characters that shook their worlds & demonstrate how theater has the power to shake ours. Join us and see the world anew: a smash comedy from the UK, a rarely-seen Shakespeare history play, and a delicious Shakespeare comedy. Subscribers receive discounted tickets to Macbeth, a co-production with Folger Consort.

     

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  • 2018/19 Season of Folger Consort

    A five-course musical banquet brimming with early music of England, Germany, Spain, and Italy, plus a Restoration-era Macbeth opens the season with enchanting music from the 17th-century stage. Subscribe to all five concerts - and save.

    Learn About the Season

  • Macbeth: on stage Sept. 4-23

    Shakespeare's murderous tragedy is seen anew in Davenant's Restoration-era adaptation which delighted audiences for nearly a century after its first performance in 1664. Featuring Ian Merrill Peakes and Kate Eastwood Norris as the bloody couple, with music performed by Folger Consort.

    Tickets & Information

Upcoming at the Folger

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Become a Teacher Member today. This photo by James Brantley is from Teaching Shakespeare, 2014.

Folger Education

Teacher Membership

A Teacher Membership includes special access to the Folger's new online community for teachers, with hundreds of classroom-ready resources for teaching Shakespeare, as well as interviews with scholars, expert teachers, actors, and directors.

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