AS A SHAKESPEARE scholar, Emma Smith is known for her work on the First Folio, a newly-discovered copy of which she authenticated in 2016. But it was with This is Shakespeare (2019) that she reached a wider readership, delighting non-specialists with her subtle yet no-nonsense insights into the plays. That book was based on a series of podcast lectures, its oral origins traceable in the lively accessibility of its literary voice.
Her talent for communicating complex material in conversational, occasionally irreverent, prose, is apparent in Portable Magic, which transforms the dusty scholarly discipline of bibliography into a world of wonders.
Despite the subtitle, this is not a
