Rare copy of Shakespeare’s First Folio sold for almost $10 million Wednesday, becoming the most expensive work of literature ever to appear at auction.

The First Folio is considered among the most important collections of literature in the English language. It contains 18 works that had not     1     appeared in print, and would otherwise have been lost to history, including “Macbeth” and “Twelfth Night.”

Published in 1623 by the actors John Heminge and Henry Condell, friends of the English playwright, the book is formally titled “Comedies, Histories, and Tragedies,” based on the three genres the part used to     2     the plays.

The     3     sold on Wednesday was the first complete copy to appear at auction since one went for $6.1 million in 2001. After a six-minute     4     battle between three telephone buyers, the item was purchased by book dealer and     5     Stephan Loewentheil for $9.98 million. In a phone interview following the sale, he described Shakespeare’s original folios as the “holy grail(圣杯)of books.”

“It is the greatest work in the English language, surely the greatest work of theater, so it’s something that anyone who loves intellectualism has to consider a holy object,” said Loewentheil, who owns stores     6     in rare books and photography in New York and Maryland.

Although around 750 copies of the First Folio were produced, just 235 are known to have     7     to the present day. Of these, only 56 are considered to be complete, with almost all of them now held by institutions in the US and UK, according to Christie’s, whose sale catalog said the item’s “extraordinary rarity ... cannot be     8    .”

The book came in a binding dating back to the early 19th century. It was sold alongside a letter by Shakespeare scholar Edmond Malone from 1809 confirming its     9    .

The final sale price     10     the auction house’s estimates, which had predicted top bids of $4 million to $6 million.