Sonnets, first edition variant

At first glance, this copy of Shakespeare’s Sonnets, also published in 1609, might look just like the copy at the University of Manchester Library. However, there is a slight difference in the second-to-last line of the imprint. While the book was still printed "AT LONDON By G. Eld for T.T.," this copy and others in this variant state "are to be solde by William Aspley" rather than John Wright. Of the thirteen extant copies of the 1609 Sonnets, only four bear this imprint.

William Aspley had moved the previous year to a shop in St. Paul's Churchyard, the center of the early modern English book trade, at the sign of the Parrot. John Wright's shop was located near Christ Church, which was not too far north, but Katherine Duncan-Jones notes that it was on one of the two main routes by which travelers would enter London. Selling the edition at two booksellers' shops might, then, have been an attempt to maximize the number of copies sold. 

Mr. and Mrs. Folger acquired this copy at an auction of books owned by the journalist and book collector Herschel V. Jones. The sale catalog advertised it as the "first copy to be sold in America" and emphasized that it was "ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY TO ROUND OUT A COLLECTION OF SHAKESPEARE QUARTOS."