“Shakespeare Unbound: A Campuswide Special Exhibit,” a series of exhibits and events curated and hosted by the W.E.B. Du Bois Library and the Kinney Center for Interdisciplinary Renaissance Studies, is now on display through May 2024. Curated by Joe Black, Kirstin Kay and Marjorie Rubright, the exhibit marks the 400^th anniversary of the publication of the First Folio of William Shakespeare’s plays.

Image

At the Du Bois Library, the “Shakespeare Unbound” exhibit asks: what happens when Shakespeare appears in fragments or as momentary flashes in history? With selections from the Robert S. Cox Special Collections and University Archives Research Center, the works of W. E. B. Du Bois, Phillis Wheatley and others are joined in conversation with Shakespeare.

The exhibit will showcase selections from Shakespeare’s First Folio, Shakespeare’s Poems (1640) and a diverse array of materials that trace the history of Shakespeare’s plays—on page, stage and film—from the Restoration through the 20^th century. The exhibit also features the 1773 edition of Wheatley’s “Poems on Various Subjects.”  This copy was the two-millionth addition to the library, having been donated by former Chancellor Randolph Bromery.

“We are thrilled to partner with the Kinney Center on this exhibit, particularly as it showcases the depth and breadth of the materials available in UMass Amherst Libraries’ special collections,” says Nandita S. Mani, dean of University Libraries. “Being able to see Shakespeare in conversation with Du Bois and others across the centuries will allow our patrons and visitors to experience these literary figures in a new way, one that underscores the value of the humanities.”

At the Kinney Center, located at 650 E. Pleasant St., in Amherst, “A Noble Fragment” is the first of many exhibits that will rotate throughout the academic year. It tells the story of the print revolution in Renaissance Europe and the emergence of the book in its modern form. The exhibit’s title derives from publications in the 1920s that marketed leaves from damaged and disbound copies of the Gutenberg Bible (1454-1455) and Shakespeare’s First Folio (1623), iconic artifacts in the history of printing.

The fragments of this exhibit serve as reminders that books are unmade as well as made – they come apart over time, but they are also often reassembled and repurposed in ways that leave traces of that history on their pages. The exhibition concludes with a copy of Shakespeare’s Second Folio (1632), an important version of the most iconic gathering of “noble fragments” in English literature.

“We are looking forward to an extraordinary year at the Kinney Center where artists, students, scholars, and the public will pursue the unexpected legacies of Shakespeare in our world today,” says Rubright, director of the Kinney Center and associate professor in the Department of English. “Drawing on the treasures in this collection, a series of public exhibits will dovetail with artists-in-residence, hands-on workshops, and scholarly programming to explore connections between the early modern world (c. 1400-1700) and our own, including ‘Shakespeare and the Renaissance of the Earth’ (Winter 2024), ‘Glacial Shakespeare’ (Spring 2024) and ‘Shakespeare in the Age of Mass Incarceration’ (Spring 2024).”

Upcoming fall events at the Kinney Center include the Berlin Lecture with Debapriya Sarkar at 5 p.m. on Oct. 27; a workshop with Joe Black on making of early printed books, at 4:30 p.m. on Nov. 2; and a workshop with Adam Zucker on Shakespeare’s First Folio Unlearned, at 4:30 p.m. on Nov. 29.

“Shakespeare Unbound” is made possible through a private collection of rare books generously on loan to the University in honor of the collector’s lifelong friendship with former UMass Amherst Professor Pieter Elgers.  For more information, visit the “Shakespeare Unbound” exhibit site and the College of the Humanities and Fine Arts website.