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The Folger Shakespeare Library has the world's largest collection of materials relating to Shakespeare and his works, from the 16th century to the present day, as well as a world-renowned collection of books, manuscripts, and prints from Renaissance Europe. The Library actively acquires new materials that build on the strengths of the collection. In the Folger’s state-of-the-art conservation lab, conservators prepare collection material for exhibition and for hands-on study by researchers.

To learn more about the Folger’s collection, please visit their website.

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Documents contributed by Folger Shakespeare Library

1594
The first known printed reference to Shakespeare appears in a commendatory poem introducing the poetry collection Willobie his Avisa, printed in 1594. The poem, entitled “In praise of Willobie his Avisa, Hexameton to the Author,” appears before the main text.
1594
This is the only known surviving copy of the first edition of Titus Andronicus, published in 1594. Titus was the first play by Shakespeare to be published.
1595
This is the only known surviving copy of the third edition of Venus and Adonis, Shakespeare’s first printed work. It is a heavily-repaired fragment, with the first section now lost. 
1595
Locrine was published by Thomas Creede in 1595 with a title page claiming that the play is “Newly set foorth, overseene and corrected, By W.S.” This Senecan revenge tragedy, with close thematic and plot links to Shakespeare and George Peele’s Titu
1595
In 1595 William Covell, a church of England clergyman and a fellow of Queen’s College in Cambridge, wrote Polimanteia, which was produced by John Legate, the Cambridge University printer.

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