How many comedies are included in Shakespeare's First Folio?

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Shakespeare's First Folio includes 14 comedies. Published in 1623, the volume grouped the plays under three headings: Comedies, Histories, and Tragedies. The comedy section begins with The Tempest and includes plays such as The Comedy of Errors, As You Like It, Twelfth Night, and The Winter's Tale.

The classification reflects the editors' arrangement rather than a modern, fixed theory of genre. Several plays now called romances or problem plays appear among the comedies, including Measure for Measure, The Merchant of Venice, The Tempest, and The Winter's Tale. Cymbeline, by contrast, was placed among the tragedies, even though many modern readers see it as a romance.

The First Folio contained 36 plays, so the familiar breakdown is 14 comedies, 10 histories, and 12 tragedies. The total matters because later scholarship sometimes counts plays differently, especially when including works absent from the Folio, such as Pericles and The Two Noble Kinsmen. Those later additions should not be included when answering the question specifically about the First Folio's comedy section.

Source: Wikipedia · fact-checked Aug. 2026

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