This listing provides a summary of the main areas of interest in the printed book collections.

Reference books and bibliographies

The standard Shakespeare bibliographies from the first attempt at a comprehensive listing by William Jaggard in 1916 to the annual World Shakespeare Bibliography now available online; concordances from Samuel Ayscough's Index of 1790 to the nine-volume work by Marvin Spevack (1968-80); the printed catalogues of the world's major Shakespeare collections, including the Folger and Birmingham Shakespeare Library; a range of reading guides for students at every level.

Periodicals

Periodicals and scholarly journals dedicated to the study of Shakespeare from the nineteenth century onwards, including single issues with one or more relevant articles. The Library subscribes to or receives by gift the primary Shakespeare journals, Shakespeare Quarterly, Shakespeare Survey, Shakespeare Studies, as well as international publications such as Shakespeare Jahrbuch. Many articles are separately indexed by author and subject in the Library's catalogues.

Editions

The first four Folio editions of Shakespare's plays; a number of seventeenth-century quartos; most early editions of the works from Nicholas Rowe (1709) to Boswell's (1821); all significant complete editions to the present; editions of individual plays including school texts, acting texts and adaptations.

Translations

Texts and critical studies in languages from Armenian to Yakut, including a significant collection of late nineteenth-century translations of Shakespeare's plays into Indic languages.

Biography

Early works containing allusions to Shakespeare; the earliest biographies from Thomas Fuller's The History of the Worthies of England (1662) and Nathan Drake's Shakespeare and his Times (1817) to the documentary discoveries of nineteenth-century antiquarian scholars and the reinterpretations of recent biographers.

Critical studies

Commentary covering every aspect of the literary, textual and sociological study of Shakespeare's work ranging from costume and character to sources, soliloquy and symbolism.

Pamphlets and Ephemera

Leaflets, press clippings, etc. covering Shakespeare's life; portraits of the playwright; buildings associated with Shakespeare and his family; the plays and their performance; programmes and proceedings of Shakespeare clubs, societies and associations throughout the world. A selection of material printed before 1930 has been published in microform in the series Shakespeare at Stratford-upon-Avon: Part 4: Pamphlet Collection (Haslemere: Emmett Publishing, 1991)

Private Papers

James Orchard Halliwell-Phillipps' collection of 128 volumes of notes on Shakespeare's plays which includes manuscript, commentary and excerpts cut from early printed books, as well as many rare books, prints, pamphlets and miscellaneous Shakespeariana, including copies of his own writings privately published in limited editions.

Performance History

Of individual plays; published theatrical memoirs and biographies of actors, directors and designers and histories of the English stage from the sixteenth century to the present; over 8000 printed playbills from the mid-eighteenth century to the end of the nineteenth or performances of Shakespeare's plays across the UK and a small number of mainly twentieth century foreign playbills; approximately 5500 theatre programmes for productions not associated with the RSC dating from the early nineteenth century onwards covering mainly London and regional theatres in the UK; commercially produced sound and video recordings of the plays.

A selection has been published in microform in the series Shakespeare at Stratford-upon-Avon: Part 3: Posters, Programmes, Playbills, Photographs and Pictures (Haslemere: Emmett Publishing, 1991)