Simon McLeish

Bookbinding competition

The Bodleian’s Seminar Room, Room 132 in the New Library, contained a fresher collection of books than usual this week as judging began for the Designer Bookbinders International Competition, 2009. The judges (Tom Phillips, Faith Shannon, Jeff Clements, Ed Bayntun-Coward, and Richard Ovenden) were selecting from over 250 entries, all of a limited-edition text of poems and images on the subject of water, bound in a variety of materials and styles. Over 100 of the entries will be placed on special exhibition in the Bodleian in June and this exhibition will travel to the Boston Public Library in September, and on to the Grolier Club in New York in 2010. The winning entry will be announced on 11 June 2009.

Peep-show of engineering marvel

Peep show from John Johnson Collection, Bodleian Library

Designed by Marc Isambard Brunel and completed in 1843, the tunnel under the Thames between Rotherhithe and Wapping was constructed using Brunel’s invention, the cast-iron “Tunnel Shield”, enabling thirty-six workmen to excavate in separate cells, the whole device being slowly moved forward as the tunnel grew.

Originally a foot tunnel, it was converted to railway use in 1869, and eventually became part of the London Underground.

This folding paper peep show enables the viewer to see foot passengers promenading in the tunnel. The arches help to indicate perspective. It was probably sold as a souvenir. Even before completion of the tunnel, the canny businessman Brunel allowed visitors to tour the works, at the cost of one shilling.
Wikipedia : Thames Tunnel

Shelley’s ‘Symposium’

Mary Shelley's handwritten restorations of Percy Shelley's original words, in her printed copy of his prose works.

At the second Literary Manuscripts Masterclass, on 10 November, Michael O’Neill made the point that after Percy Shelley’s death, Mary Shelley wished to protect his reputation, promote his popularity, and preserve his words. But in the cultural and moral atmosphere of the time these were not always easily reconcilable goals.

In 1823 she transcribed Shelley’s prose works for publication, and Michael O’Neill showed the press copy (shelfmark: MS. Shelley adds. d.8, ) prepared by Mary, and marked in pencil by Leigh Hunt with suggested amendments. Both Hunt and Mary were concerned about passages in Shelley’s translation of Plato’s Symposium, and in Shelley’s own Essay on Love, describing love between men.

The photograph here shows the printed edition that did appear in 1840, but this is a copy (shelfmark: Shelley adds. e.19) interleaved with blank pages, on which, facing each printed page, Mary Shelley has restored the original words written by Shelley (such as “lover” for “friend”), preserving Shelley’s words despite the demands of publication and the prejudices of the time.

Jane Austen, ‘Volume the First’

At the first of the Literary Manuscript Masterclasses this term, on October 27, we were shown a small, mass-produced notebook, probably bought from a stationer in the mid-1780s, in which the young Jane Austen had set down a series of stories and plays. Kathryn Sutherland, professor of English literature, described the importance of this manuscript, one of three volumes of juvenilia.

Of Austen’s famous six published novels, only two chapters of Persuasion survive in manuscript form. The three juvenile notebooks (which include’ The History of England’, on display from the BL website) and other short pieces, working drafts of two novels and a fair copy of a novella, are all we have left from the author’s own hand

Andrew Honey of the Bodleian’s Conservation Department took the class on a tour of the physical aspects of the volume, including a session of paper folding and paper tearing (using copier paper!), to demonstrate that this was a machine-made notebook, a relatively cheap mass-produced item of stationery – the equivalent, though thank goodness in 18^th-century dress, of a Hello Kitty notepad.

Collection care is priority

“Do no harm” is the conservator’s creed. When books are put on display for exhibition, they are often laid open on a cardboard book cradle. The pages are strapped down, gently, with polypropylene straps. But these need to be cut to remove the book once the exhibition is over. Cut with sharp scissors, so close to the priceless pages of an early printed book or manuscript?! Now the exhibition officers have found a solution: multi-functional round-headed scissors maintain a smooth rounded surface near to the book allowing the sharp cutting edge to sever the temporary strap without endangering the ancient written treasure.

Radcliffe Camera model by Nicholas Hawksmoor

During the 1730s a number of architects were considered by the Radcliffe Trustees for the job of designing and managing the building of the new library, and two were asked to submit drawings for consideration: Nicholas Hawksmoor and James Gibbs. In 1734 or 5, Hawksmoor’s design for a round library was made into a model (below), presumably because this design was favoured by the Trustees. His plans show the Radcliffe Library was to be built abutting the Bodleian Library, rather than as a freestanding building, with the ground floor open to the elements and the entrance to the library reached from beneath. Unfortunately, Hawksmoor became seriously ill and died of “gout of the stomach” in March 1736, opening the way for Gibbs to be awarded the contract. Gibbs’s own library design had originally been a more conventional rectangular building, but by 1737 the current freestanding, circular design was submitted by Gibbs, clearly influenced by Hawksmoor’s model.

The model is made from wood (the lighter pieces are modern restoration), and it can be dismantled to show the interior rooms and spaces. The scale may be 1 inch =

4 feet, which would make the ground floor diameter just 100 feet. The model was made by John Smallwell, junior, of London, who was Master of the Joiners Company in 1731 and worked for Sir John Vanbrugh. He was paid £87.11s for his efforts.

The model found its way eventually to Ditchley Park, the home of the 3rd Earl of Lichfield, who was a Radcliffe Trustee from 1755 to 1772, where it seems to have spent much of its life being used as a dolls house, until it was given to the Bodleian Library in 1913 by Viscount Dillon.

Exit pursued by a Beare

The Globe Theatre Company will be occupying the Bodleian quadrangle in August, with performances of Shakespeare’s “Winter’s Tale” from August 17 to 22. Today our Exhibitions section was preparing a display including this long panorama of London in 1616, made by Claes Jansz Visscher of Amsterdam. It had been stored folded, and removing the heavy creases for display took several hours in a humidification chamber, followed by flattening with three heavy boards, carefully laid on top of thick felt squares. Even then it is too long, and the ends will have to be rolled to fit into the exhibition case. The 1616 panorama, the First Folio edition of Shakespeare’s plays (1623) [for the chequered history of this book, see the New York Times article from March 30, 1906, “Bodleian Library Acquires a Shakespeare Folio It Sold in 1664”], and other material will be shown in the Exhibition Room from August 2 – 25.

Announcement of event from Bodleian Library

See performance dates and times from the Globe Theatre website

Russian caricatures of “Boney”

The thirty Russian cartoons in the Curzon Collection are indicative of the prints favoured by collectors. From the collection of the Grand-Dukes Nikolai and Mikhail Mikhailovich, grandsons of Nicholas I, they passed into the hands of A.M. Broadley, whose collection was built initially from the sale of W. Fraser in 1901 and augmented by the finds of the Parisian art dealer Godefroy Mayer. Broadley’s collection was finally sold in 1916 to George, Marquis Curzon of Kedleston (1859-1925) who bequeathed it to the Bodleian Library.

In the Curzon prints, the palm of victory always belongs to the Russian peasant, distinguished by his moral values, guarantors of an empire ruled by divine right. A close second to him is the Cossack, symbol of Russian invincibility. These two are the standard bearers of patriotic glory, national unity, and Russian supremacy.

Importantly, the dating of images, made possible by publication announcements in the press and by permissions of the censor, allows us to detect a continuation of the caricature campaign throughout the period: the threat of a new invasion in 1813 and the uncertainties of the German campaign were exorcised by constant references to the victory of 1812. The body of the Curzon collection, which is in an optimal state of conservation, is partially composed of later impressions, from 1815 to 1818 judging by the watermarks.

— Dr. Marina Peltzer
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A modern binding with style

Broxbourne 52.53 Even though one might think that ancient bindings are by definition more precious and refined than the more recent ones, this can definitely be a misleading preconception. Indeed ancient bindings are precious and refined, but modern ones can well be as precious and refined as the ancient ones.

As an example, here is a beautiful French binding of the 1930’s. Particularly interesting are the quality of the leather joined to the refinement of the decorative pattern and the choice of the colour in relation to the brightness of the gold tooling. All these particulars make this binding both incredibly refined but also extremely simple at the same time.

Map of China from the early 17th century

This is a late Ming watercolour map of East Asia, including China, Korea, Japan, the Philippines, Indonesia, Southeast Asia and part of India, probably executed in the 1620s. The map has no title, and is very large, approximately 1×1.5m. The text is Chinese, but there are some Latin annotations by a later hand. The map shows shipping routes and compass bearings from the port of Quanzhou across the entire region. A panel of text on the left of the map near Calicut, its western extremity, gives directions of the routes to Aden and the Strait of Hormuz.

The shelfmark is MS Selden supra 105.

It came to the library from the estate of the London lawyer John Selden (d.1654) in 1659, along with a large collection of Oriental manuscripts, Greek marbles, a Chinese compass and the famous Aztec history known as the Codex Mendoza. It was most likely obtained in Southeast Asia through the East India Company’s base at Banten, but was almost certainly produced in the port of Quanzhou in Fujian province. It probably arrived in London towards the mid-17th century.

The map has always been known as an interesting curiousity from the time it arrived in the Library, but its importance was first recognised by the visiting American scholar Robert Bachelor in January 2008. He was the first to notice the shipping routes, which make the map unique among both Chinese and indeed European maps of the period, and has described it as “an object of globally recognizable significance”.