Engaging with special collections material often requires specialist skills, and the best way to acquire these is practical experience. Hands-on teaching is therefore central to undergraduates’ learning experience, building their confidence and preparing them for independent research. To pre-empt requests from tutors, Amy spent her traineeship planning displays carefully tailored to Prelims and Final Honours Scheme (FHS) syllabi.
The Starry Messenger, William Lilly, Wellcome Collection, CC PDM 1.0.
Christ Church Library caters to many disciplines but is particularly well-placed to support humanities subjects. Amy began by identifying modules across four subjects (History, English, Music, and Geography) where special collections formed a component of undergraduate studies. For each selected module, she created a longlist of potentially relevant works, selected ones that were suitable for teaching, and wrote up new captions where needed (88 in total!). In the process, she unearthed various treasures, including The Wonderful Discoverie of the Witchcrafts of Margaret and Phillip and The Starry Messenger (pictured).
After surveying the selected items, she was able to finalise plans for thirteen displays. Each corresponded to a module, such as ‘The Scientific Movement in the 17th Century’ (BA History FHS Special Subject), ‘The Renaissance Madrigal’ (BA Music FHS), or ‘Historical Geography’ (BA Geography Prelims and FHS). These featured include items on faculty reading lists, works by named authors, and other potentially relevant items. For example, for ‘Gender and Protestant Cultures in England, 1558-1659’, Amy selected a mid-16th century manuscript copy of Katherine Parr’s Prayers or Meditations. This is the first work ever published by an English woman under her own name!
Amy’s hard work has produced a valuable set of resources that serve as a blueprint for future work (should any future trainees want to pick up where she left off). The displays will hopefully inspire both tutors and undergraduates to explore Christ Church’s overlooked collections.
Meinen lieben Eltern!: Cataloguing 155 Doctoral Theses (in German, French, Spanish, and Dutch)
Gemma, Law Library
Written by Amy Fry
Gemma’s project involved creating and updating catalogue records for a collection of antique legal theses in the Law Library. There are 14450 foreign theses at the library dating from the 1850s to the 1930s and mostly in French and German, which can currently be browsed by going onto their website and using the ‘Search foreign dissertations’ page. These items are taking up a lot of space, but before they are sent to the Collections Storage Facility (CSF) for off-site housing, they need to be properly catalogued. Gemma identified that there were over 100 records that had insufficient data to allow for CSF processing.
A blank example of the Alma record that Gemma was creating.
Thus, her task was to locate all of the missing data, by examining the items herself, and then to add it to the catalogue entry on Alma, our Library Management System.
However, the task was not without its challenges. These dissertations are not in English, so Gemma had to stretch herself to work in languages in which she was not fluent. Further, she had to assign the theses subject areas, a very important aspect of cataloguing that allows for a better browsing experience, but, as many cataloguers would tell you, a surprisingly tricky one. In total, she catalogued 155, and succeeded in refining the catalogue by eliminating duplicate entries and existing errors in the entry fields.
Gemma showed us some highlights that she had found when assessing the theses. These involved touching dedications to parents and siblings, some of which show their era with marks of respect to those who died in the First World War.
In memory of my dear brother Emile le Corre, law student, Sergeant in the 91st Infantry regiment, killed in action on 20th October 1917, awarded the Croix de Guerre with palm, mentioned in dispatches by the Sixth Army in the following terms: “On 7th October 1916, he bravely captured a German machine gun battery, turned it around and used it to our advantage. He left the lines carrying this machine gun under fire and brought it back to the rear.”
To my dear parents
Another fascinating discovery was seeing evidence of students who had travelled far to make their studies possible: students from Greece to Germany, from Japan to France.
Submitted to the Georg August University of Göttingen by Agis P. Tambacopoulos from Athens
Looking to the future, there is scope to develop what this project started, by cataloguing the non-dissertations and creating more records, before the move to the CSF.
Gemma’s project was really interesting for a variety of reasons. Firstly, from a nerdier library perspective, it demonstrated the importance of proper cataloguing in order to make items both searchable, and to enable them to be more effectively housed offsite. However, it also reminded us of the human side of libraries and the items that they hold, with the moving familial dedications and the evidence of life behind academia.
The Many Books of the Bennigsen Donation and How to Process Them
Summer, Social Science Library
Written by Summer Mainstone-Cotton
I had the dubious honour of being the only trainee this year who didn’t present at the showcase, the consequence of leaving the trainee programme at the end of May for permanent employment with the Bodleian. As such, I thought I’d take the opportunity to detail my trainee project here instead:
Back in the spring of 2025, a donor got in touch with the Bodleian regarding his late wife’s book collection. His wife, Marie Bennigsen-Broxup, was an expert on the Caucasus and Central Asia, particularly on Muslim resistance within the former Soviet Union. Her collection consequently contained a wealth of rare and potentially invaluable material for the Bodleian’s collections. There was, however, one small problem: the collection contained more than 70 shelves of books and journals, with plenty of material that was not relevant to the Bodleian. Rather than transporting around 1,700 books to the Social Science Library (SSL) and sorting through them there, the subject librarian for Slavonic and East European Studies travelled to the donor’s house and photographed the shelves. This meant that the collection could be assessed digitally before deciding which books were worth bringing back to the library. However, the process of sorting through hundreds of images of books (264 photos were taken) and transcribing all legible bibliographic data is a long and arduous task, and so the images were left to collect digital dust until someone had too much time on their hands.
Jump forward to November 2025, where I was firmly settled into my trainee role at the SSL and needed a project, the perfect opportunity for this project to land on my desk. Luckily, I only had to work on the texts that were written in Latin script, as my Cyrillic is non-existent. Over the course of about three months (minus time for Christmas), I carefully trawled through the photographs, noting down any information on the title, author, publisher, place of publication, date of publication, ISBN, and any notable physical descriptions of the texts. While this task was mostly straightforward, it did involve some investigative elements – quite a few of the spines were only partially legible due to lighting, wear and tear. For example, I may have had only the author’s surname and a publisher to go on when trying to identify a text. Once I had enough information to determine the text, I would then check to see if it was listed on SOLO and already part of the Bodleian’s collections.
An example of the photos I was working from
While I know little about this subject area, some of the texts chosen seem obviously relevant just from their titles, such as Muslim Eurasia: Conflicting Legacies and The Soviet Empire: A Study in Discrimination. Notably, we did not take Delia’s Complete Cookery Course or Slow Cooker Favourites from the offered collection, but don’t worry, I have checked and both of these titles are already in the Bodleian Libraries’ collection.
…and with that, we’re done!
Unfortunately this is our last post as trainees before we scatter to new roles, within Oxford and beyond. Thank you to everyone who’s supported us as we found our feet within libraries, and especially thank you to anyone still reading; it’s nice to think we’re not posting into the void! Huge congratulations to the new trainees who’ll be starting soon – we hope this won’t be the last you see of us, but in case it is, good luck and we hope you have a fantastic year.
Somewhere the library has every book ever written, that will ever be written, and, notably, every book that it is possible to write. These are not on the public shelves lest untrained browsing cause the collapse of everything that is possible to imagine.
Working With Livres d’Artiste: a Tale of Creative Outreach and Organising
Jules, Taylor Institution Library
Written by Heidi Cruft
Jules introducing local poets and artists to special collections on the ‘Myths, Beasts, Artist’s Books’ creative outreach day
Jules’ project involved organising a creative workshop and exhibition for the Strachan Collection, a selection of livres d’artiste currently housed in the Art, Archaeology and Ancient World Library. Throughout their presentation, Jules’ enthusiasm for both creative outreach and special collections really shone through, and I will try my best to do their attitude justice here!
Although Jules organised several events related to the collection, including a staff taster session and a show-and-tell for French and History of Art students, the centre of their project for me was the workshop: Myths, Beasts, Artist’s Books. Bringing local poets and artists together with the Strachan Collection, the day was divided between an introduction to the special items and a collaborative creation session. By the end of the day, the group had created five artist’s books inspired by the collection, and some participants went on to attend a letterpress workshop to produce colophons for their finished books.
Poets and artists creating their responses during ‘Myths, Beasts, Artist’s Books’
What impressed me most was just how much behind-the-scenes organisation and collaboration with colleagues from different departments had gone into making the workshop a success. Everything from setting up the space to figuring out how to reach potential attendees had to be arranged beforehand, not to mention the design of an evaluation survey to understand participant experiences. This survey was invaluable for proving the positive impact of the workshop, with 78% of respondents rating the event as “above expectations” and 100% saying that this was their first time attending an event like this.
Part of the display in the Voltaire Room
To showcase participant efforts, the project did not end with the workshop. Instead, the five collaborative artist’s books were first displayed at the Bodleian Bibliographical Press during Oxfordshire Artweeks, before being exhibited alongside selected items from the Strachan Collection for two weeks in the Voltaire Room of the Taylorian. Displaying the collection required extensive planning, including preventative conservation measures to ensure that the light-sensitive materials could be displayed safely.
Alongside the public-facing aspects, the project also had a positive impact on how the Strachan Collection is organised and housed. Jules’ review of the collection, which included reuniting missing parts of 37 items, gathering information to catalogue 60 previously-uncatalogued items, and improving the labelling and retrieval process, has helped make these artist’s books more accessible for future researchers and outreach projects alike.
Overall, I really enjoyed hearing about Jules’ project. It demonstrated their ability to organise complicated events and bring people together around a shared interest, which are skills that will serve them well as they move beyond the traineeship. I also believe the project highlights the potential of creative outreach within the Oxford community and has enormous potential to inspire similar projects in the future. Already there are plans to hold another show-and-tell session next year, and potentially another creative outreach event, making me excited to see the project continue to grow!
“Pieces of Wisdom” in the Pierre Wack Memorial Library
Heidi, Sainsbury Library
Written byLeah Duffin
Heidi’s project centred around cataloguing the fascinating collection of the Pierre Wack Memorial Library. The collection consists of the professional archive of the Shell executive and scenario planning pioneer Pierre Wack (1922–1997). Heidi opened her presentation with a brief overview of how the collection came to Oxford, detailing its journey from the Global Business Network offices in The Hague to its donation to Green Templeton College in 2005. Today it forms part of the Oxford Futures Library and is held at the CSF.
This project was well planned and meticulous executed. Along with her colleagues at the Sainsbury Library, Heidi has spent the last few months sifting through this vast collection, discovering intriguing documents, and cataloguing the items for ease of navigation. Heidi outlined her task of standardising and expanding the existing catalogue as well as identifying missing items and those in need of conservation intervention—a vital part of collection management.
In her presentation, Heidi explained the scope of the 2,000 item collection through an accessible chart, revealing that the portion of catalogued items was made up of reports (27%), journals (19%), magazines (11%), and correspondence (6%), with the rest of the collection given over to conference notes, presentations, graphs, newsletters, drafts, and books.
Heidi spoke about the Pierre Wack Memorial Library with such enthusiasm and took us on a journey of the collection highlights. These included an article from The Financial Times detailing the establishment of the business schools in Oxford and Cambridge.
In addition, the newspaper and magazine holdings revealed advertisements that defined 20th century consumer culture, including graphics centred around domestic family ideals and a rather humorous diamond advert. Such materials are essential to understanding how diamond companies like De Beers have developed their advertising strategies over time, embracing stereotypes as well as challenging them.
Heidi was inspired by Pierre Wack’s commitment to his work and variety of the collection. This is reflected in her choice of title: ‘Pieces of Wisdom’. Wack’s handwritten notes detail the finer points of scenario planning, cognition, and business strategy as well as some motivational quotes . . . Heidi’s diligence over the year has been invaluable, with the cataloguing project about 70% complete—a great result for both Heidi and the team at the Sainsbury library.
The materials in the Pierre Wack Memorial Library will become increasingly more accessible for students and researchers interested in scenario planning, economic and social history, and the legacy of the remarkable Pierre Wack.
Haverfield Hijinks: Auditing an Overflowing Collection
Olly, Art, Archaeology and Ancient World Library
Written by Gemma Hammond
Olly’s presentation focused on his attempts to solve the various problems posed by the Haverfield Room in the Art Library. The Haverfield Room, located just off the main Ground Floor reading room and named after Francis Haverfield (Camden Professor of Ancient History at Oxford in the early 20th century), contains an open shelf collection that includes books on numismatics (the study of coins), coin catalogues, museum bulletins, auction catalogues, and periodicals from most of the library’s subject areas.
However, there’s also other books stored in the room which have not been looked at for a while and a lot of overflow, with periodicals or bulletins now continuing their sequence on trolleys or stacked on top of each other on the shelves – and the room itself is not getting any bigger! The library has done its best to keep everything organised but it’s been a (growing) problem for a number of years.
Olly’s plan was to get a better grasp of the situation by identifying what the problems were and the scale of them, and then to look at potential solutions. He undertook an audit of some little-used folios at the very back of the room, where he found that 103 of them belonged to the Art Library but 142 actually belonged to the Oxfordshire Architectural and Historical Society which had stored them there some time ago. Olly said he’d been fascinated by the variety of topics covered by these folios, particularly the coins, but also ceremonial coats of arms, maps, and architectural drawings.
The overflowing journals posed the biggest problem because many runs had not been fully itemised and before they could go to the Bodleian Offsite Storage Facility to create some much-needed space they would need to be barcoded and have an item record on the system.
Olly used a lot of spreadsheets to narrow down which journal runs should be prioritised for this treatment and as a next step he created instructions and a spreadsheet for library staff to physically check the shelves and collect data on which journal runs are currently taking up the most space. He then made use of an itemisation entry form designed for staff to input data about a journal item. The data can then be fed into OLIS to create a record on the system, hugely simplifying the process of itemising. However, Olly also pointed out problems that might come up during this process, such as journals changing their names or having previously been recorded in the system under different names.
The plan is that library staff will continue with the tasks of measuring shelf space and then itemising the journals, meaning that a lot of material can then be sent offsite but still be easily findable, while the Haverfield Room will be a lot more user-friendly.
I really enjoyed Olly’s presentation and admire him for getting stuck into such a huge task and making progress on taming the chaos of the Haverfield Room! The journal itemising in particular clearly took a lot of work and it’s impressive that he’s come up with detailed and methodical long-term solutions that will hopefully be continued and built on in the future.
Now that Trinity term has begun, library use has picked up and the reading rooms are packed with students preparing for exams. Despite the warm weather, there’s no time to relax in the sun just yet! As if endless studying and constant coursework wasn’t enough, second-year History students are already having to decide on their dissertation topics ahead of a long summer of research. To help them get started, the Bodleian recently put on its annual undergraduate History Thesis Fair – naturally, a few trainees ended up helping out.
For those unaware, a thesis fair is an opportunity for students to discover what resources they have access to, get guidance on research, and determine their subject of interest. Attendees have the opportunity to speak with a wide variety of academics, librarians, and other subject specialists about all the different topics or areas they might be curious about. It’s not a taught session or a mandatory process: attendance is fully voluntary and the stalls are designed to be interactive and informal so that students can explore at their own pace. It’s also a space to develop information skills, with stalls dedicated to research methods and practical advice. Ultimately, a thesis fair is designed to help students understand what help is available to them so they can get started on their work more confidently.
Setting up and running reception
Catherine & Rebecca (Bodleian Library)
The fair was organised and managed by the history subject librarians Isabel Holowaty and Rachel D’Arcy-Brown – as the trainees based in the Old Bodleian and HFL, we’ve both worked alongside Rachel and Isabel a lot, so we were invited to come along and help them run the event! Armed with a suitcase full of signage and several packs of pushpins, we made the (thankfully short) trip from our libraries down to the exam schools and began setting up. With only an hour to put everything together we were concerned about running out of time, but when we arrived the staff had already transformed the North Writing School from exam conditions into an exhibition hall in record time. All that was left for us to do was put up our masses of signs and posters, make sure everyone had enough extension cables, and direct staff (and later students) to the right place once they arrived.
Once the fair had actually started, working reception was a relatively simple task which mostly just involved handing out paper and giving directions. We had a good few chats with students about their various areas of interest, and it was great getting to hear the range of ideas people were considering. Once we knew what they were looking for we provided attendees with a map of the fair and a guide to further resources for afterwards, then pointed them towards some stalls which might be useful to start with.
Getting to look around those stalls during quiet moments was also fun. Some interesting sections this year included English Literature, Visual Culture, and a brand-new Environmental History stall which drew a lot of attention. We also had ambassadors from Gale Primary Sources, AM Digital, and Oxford Brookes Archives come in to help students use their collections, and some current third-year students who had recently finished their own dissertations ran a very popular booth offering first-hand guidance and advice. With loads of subject librarians and faculty on hand to help, we had the last 2000 years broadly covered, but one thing to love about History is the sheer scale of it: from medieval burials to wartime fashion to eighteenth-century dentistry, there’s no end to your options.
Running a subject stall
Olly (Art, Archaeology and Ancient World Library)
A small team of us from the Art library all came along at about 2:30 to set up our stall for Visual Culture. Here we were representing two subject areas, Art & Architecture and Film Studies. We had to do a bit of shuffling around with tables, borrow some pushpins to display our signs and quickly charge the laptop, but then we were ready for the students!
For the next two hours we had students queuing up to run their dissertation ideas by us in more detail and find out what kind of resources we could point them to. I was worried that I wouldn’t know enough about the visual culture resources we have, but it turns out I knew more than I realised, and I was able to direct people to some things that should really help them. Tasks like helping review LibGuides or checking the reading lists that faculty give to librarians were really helpful in showing me what’s out there in terms of books, journals and databases for art history.
We heard about an amazing variety of subjects people were interested in – witchcraft in Ireland, Turkish election campaigns, British new wave film, trans art collectives, and slingshot weaponry, to name just a few. Some of these questions I was way more prepared to answer than others (if you want me to talk at you excitedly for several minutes, please ask me about British new wave film), but I think that even if we didn’t know anything at all about the subject someone was interested in, we were hopefully able to give them some tips on searching for resources.
Winding down and next steps
After two hours, the crowds thinned out and it was time for us to pack up and leave. Shutting down was even quicker than setting up, although we did have a few very interested students hang on right until the end! In the end, we had 185 people turn up – definitely not a bad turnout for a gorgeous sunny day. Most students seemed like they’d found what they were looking for, and it was nice to be able to help them get started and make the whole thing less daunting.
Getting involved in the fair was a unique way to spend an afternoon, and it’s a good example of how varied work at the Bodleian can be. Opportunities for teaching and student support aren’t a direct part of our traineeship, but if they’re something you’re interested in then speaking to subject librarians and attending events like this are great ways to get involved. If you want more information on how the thesis fair runs and what sort of resources are available for research support in the libraries, have a look at this page of the History LibGuide, or check out this blog post about a previous fair. The Bodleian also regularly runs information skills sessions on introductions to sources, research guidance, and referencing tips – have a look at the iSkills programme for Trinity term to see what’s on offer. To those preparing for their dissertation, good luck, and to anyone else, we hope to see you at the next fair!
by Catherine Birch, Jules McGee-Russell, and Summer Mainstone-Cotton
On 24th September, the Weston Library hosted a screening of The Librarians, a new documentary about banned books, censorship, and free speech in libraries across the USA. The documentary premiered at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year, but this was only its second screening in the UK, and the audience was packed with librarians, readers, and film buffs alike. Naturally, a few trainees decided that an entire day spent working in a library wasn’t enough, so we decided to go along that evening too.
The Weston was steadily filling up with people as we arrived, and there was a lively atmosphere full of conversation and laughter throughout the building. We mingled, chatted, networked, and partook in the drinks and nibbles on offer. However, we didn’t have long to mill around, as seats were being taken fast, and it was time for the event to begin.
The welcome reception in Blackwell Hall@cyrusoxford
Before the film screening, there was a small ceremony held by the Royal Society of Literature to celebrate the Bodleian’s own Richard Ovenden. Richard was recently awarded the RSL’s Benson Medal for outstanding services to literature – in this case, his significant career as a librarian, and his roles leading organisations like the Digital Preservation Coalition and the university’s Gardens, Libraries, and Museums group. On top of this, he also recently wrote a book on the history of book burnings – Burning the Books: A History of Knowledge Under Attack – which makes a brief cameo in The Librarians! The award was certainly well-deserved, and the audience were enthusiastic with cheers and applause. After a short speech and some votes of thanks, he handed over to the director, Kim A. Synder, for a short introduction to the film. From there, all that was left to do was dim the lights, set the stage, and start the screening.
Richard Ovenden accepting the Benson Medal& his acceptance speech @cyrusoxford
The film itself was a compelling look at the recent wave of protests against school libraries in the United States. For those unaware: in 2021, public school superintendents across Texas were sent a list of 850 books challenged for potentially causing “discomfort, guilt, anguish, or…psychological distress” to schoolchildren.1 The list was compiled by state representative Matt Krause and predominantly included books which featured sex education, black history, and LGBTQ+ characters; many were also simply written by LGBTQ+ or non-white authors.2 School districts in other parts of the country began similar investigations, and soon libraries throughout the US were facing book bans. Parents began calling for the removal of material that they deemed sexually explicit or inappropriate for children, schools pulled up to hundreds of books from their shelves out of caution, and librarians who protested this were silenced.3The Librarians follows the people who pushed back against these investigations, exploring their stories and their struggles.
The film began in Texas but didn’t stop there, travelling to Florida, New Jersey, and other states impacted by book bans. It exposed how school librarians were subjected to bullying, victimisation, and even unemployment for questioning these book bans, and how those who protested more vocally received targeted online harassment and threats of physical violence. The film featured interviews with these librarians, as well as the students and school board members directly impacted by these bans. It also examined the role of politicians, pressure groups, and parents in this ongoing struggle, combining original documentary footage with social media content and relevant news stories for a more complete view of the situation. Interspersed throughout were clips from The Twilight Zone, Fahrenheit 451 (1966), and Storm Centre (1956), as well as archival footage of Nazi book burnings and Joseph McCarthy speeches. Time and again the film returned to these examples of historical censorship to emphasise the necessity of information, the dangers of book bans, and the inalienable right to freedom of expression. It was a moving watch, balancing humour and emotion with a poignant lasting message about the importance of libraries and literature to society.
The crowd applauding Julie Miller and Amanda Jones& a close up on the discussion panel@cyrusoxford
After the screening, a panel sat down to discuss the film and take questions from the audience. As well as the director and producers, it featured Dame Mary Beard, Richard Ovenden, and two of the librarians who featured most prominently within the documentary: Julie Miller and Amanda Jones. Discussion quickly turned to the Bodleian’s own experiences with book bans over the centuries, as Richard explained how the original Bodley’s Librarian specifically collected books denounced by religious authorities, preserving this information against censorship or wilful destruction. However, as Dame Mary then pointed out, it is important not to just rest on this legacy. She advised the librarians present to be conscious of how we treat ideas or books that we don’t personally endorse, reminding us that to fight against censorship we must fight for all speech to be free. As the panel reflected on the position of foreign academic librarians in this struggle, they returned to a central motif of the film – that silence is compliance when faced with systematic suppression.
The panel also discussed how these attacks on librarians have progressed since the film was finished in late 2024: perhaps most notably, in May 2025, the President unceremoniously fired the fourteenth Librarian of Congress.4 Carla Hayden, both the first woman and first African American to hold this post, was removed on the grounds that she had promoted DEI and placed “inappropriate books for children” in the library.5 This directly echoes the sentiments expressed about school librarians within the documentary, emphasising the increasing scope and scale of this crisis. Julie and Amanda took this opportunity to speak about their continued activism within their local communities and beyond, while the producers explained their plans to publicise the film further and gain international support for the librarians affected by these repressive campaigns. Discussion ended shortly after this, but not without a final round of applause for the librarians, politicians, and everyone behind the film continuing to fight to speak freely and be heard.
Some familiar faces deep in conversation@cyrusoxford
After all that talking, it was finally time for… more talking! There was a short drinks reception in Blackwell Hall following the screening, which gave us the opportunity to chat with other library staff and visitors who’d come to the viewing. The room really came alive, and the hall was buzzing with noise as the film gave everyone a lot to talk about. We had some interesting conversations about public services, the accessibility of our libraries, and our responsibilities in this struggle as new professionals. We also got the chance to tell some other attendees about our traineeships, and found time to catch up with some former trainees! All-in-all, a great end to the night.
The Librarians is an ambitious project – creating a film about a rapidly developing political storm and screening it internationally is no easy feat – but it is certainly a worthwhile one. The documentary highlights the cultural role of libraries in the past and present, providing useful insight into the politics of information and the tactics used to undermine it. While many of us had heard about these book bans across the US, we weren’t aware of the scale of the issue or the extent of the harm it was causing to individual librarians, and the film was an eye-opening call to act. As trainees, we are just entering the world of libraries: this film urges us to work to ensure the libraries are still there for us in future. The Librarians was released in the UK on the 26th of September, with more details of showtimes available here. It will also be available on BBC iPlayer for over a year. If you’re at all interested in libraries and literature, it’s definitely worth a watch. And if our review still hasn’t convinced you, here’s the trailer to speak for itself.
With thanks to Cyrus Mower (@cyrusoxford) for taking all of the photos included in this blog post
After a very delicious selection of sandwiches, it was time to hear from the last few trainees yet to present. We heard from Xanthe, whose project was all about cataloguing grey literature; Fran, who in a similar vein was tidying up a collection of anthropological material; Clara, who was helping people navigate their way round the labyrinth that is the Taylor Institution Library; and Anna, who did a deep dive into the Sainsbury Library’s collections, and how to make them more accessible to readers. More on these projects below!
After these interesting presentations, we heard from Ant Brewerton, Associate Director for Academic Library Services, and Keeper of Collections. He gave a great speech congratulating us on our work!
Well done to all the trainees and especially to Clara, Anna, and Connie, for organising the day, which was a massive success.
Xanthe Malcolm- HML Grey Literature : Recording an uncatalogued collection at the History of Medicine Library for ingest into the CSF
The ‘Cupboard of Doom’ at the HML- AKA, the manuscript room
By Elena Trowsdale
In anticipation of many humanities collections moving to the Schwartzman centre, Xanthe’s project focused on the ‘History of Medicine Library’ and its ‘grey literature’. Grey literature is a term which encompasses material produced outside traditional commercial or academic publishing. The manuscript room at the HML library is full of these tricky items, most of which are undiscoverable as they have not been catalogued. Xanthe’s goal was: to move unique items from the Manuscript Room to the CSF; make these items discoverable on SOLO so they can be used by readers; and describe the collection on the HML LibGuide.
The starting point was that half the room had been roughly listed, and half only had ‘unique items’ detailed in a spreadsheet. Xanthe consulted wit
h the CR&D team and was given an optimised spreadsheet to record all the information of the uncatalogued material without the need for cataloguing training. This was an excellent, efficient idea which I believe was successful in its aim.
To obtain accurate data, Xanthe spent one afternoon a week at the HML barcoding, measuring items and taking lots of pictures. She was very well prepared and speedy at this task because of her excellent planning and efficiency. Many items were in boxes, which she listed at box level and with individual item information.
She achieved a lot of progress and has made sure the work can continue. Her current progress at time of presenting included: recording 161 monograph titles and 39 serial titles; ensuring the vast majority of the pre-marked “unique” items were ready to send to CSF; creating a handlist of everything currently recorded; creating the initial draft of the LibGuide; and arranging the right-hand shelves by area. She is currently continuing the work she has planned and is ready to hand over [two words when not used as a noun].
I was extremely impressed with Xanthe’s work and her presentation, as were (in my opinion) the captive audience of librarians. I am sure they could all relate to her organisational aims, and the immense complexity of the material she was dealing with.
Fran Allen- Tidying up the Tylor
By Anna Roberts
Fran’s project work had two parts: the first being very technical, record and catalogue focussed; the second involving her creative and graphic design skills!
Firstly, Fran joined in with the ongoing journey (some may say saga!) of tidying up the Tylor library. She explained that the Tylor collection houses materials for social and cultural anthropology. It used to be the Anthropology departmental library housed at the institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology, set up by Sir Edward Burnett Tylor.
The Tylor collection was moved two years ago to the Social Sciences Library but with 20135 item records this turned out be a messy task!
To describe the journey using numbers, Fran designed a lovely
flowchart. In total the Tylor had 20135 item records, of these many were sent to the CSF or SSL, some were dummy/ expected serials for cancelled subscriptions, but still approximately 1000 item records were unaccounted for.
This is where Fran entered the world of the Tylor items. Fran did a fantastic job investigating these unaccounted records. She had to use her SOLO searching techniques and ALMA skills to find items and go through records. Often, these items were in a grey archive box and not missing. Wahey! Fran could delete the individual item records and tick as sorted. She also deleted 500 item records as miscellaneous. This was clearly a time-consuming process, but Fran managed to account for 89% of the unaccounted items which was very impressive!
One of Fran’s book displays, this one focussing on ‘Winter Wellbeing’
The second part of Fran’s presentation focussed on all the many book displays that she curated throughout the year. These had themes marking different months like Disability History and Women’s History Month, as well as seasonal ones like Winter Wellbeing and Spring Books (for which she handcrafted cute paper daffodils). A particularly fun theme was Ghoulish Reads, featuring Slime: A natural history, The Economic Horror, and Zombie Economics. Of course, being the SLL library trainee meant she highlighted the General Election with a book display, cunningly avoiding party affiliations by using a “neutral” teal colour.
Fran enhanced these displays by designing lovely posters and, perhaps most importantly for avid readers, bookmarks to match the theme! This included a designing ghoul bookmarks for her ghoulish reads… I wonder if she has any spare.
Clara Oxley- Wayfinding at the Taylor Institution Library
By Erin Minogue
In the final section of the day, Clara described her project which centered around improving wayfinding at the Taylor Institution Library (also referred to as the Taylorian).
To explain how the project came about, Clara began by providing some details about the design of the Taylor Institution Library. Evolving over the 19th and 20th centuries, the library incorporates two buildings designed at different times (the first part built in the 1840s, and the second part in the 1930s). This history has led to several design quirks, notably the uneven floors in different sections of the building, leading to a confusing enumeration of levels of the building.
As well as several staircases, the Taylorian also boasts rooms that are only accessible by winding through a series of rooms and descending a specific staircase, and similarly named reading rooms in opposite parts of the building. The user experience, for a reader unfamiliar with the building, is disorientating to say the least. But, luckily for Taylorian readers, Clara was on hand to design a project which aimed to: utilise user experience to gain an idea of what students need to navigate the library, identify issues, and then feed these findings back into changes that could tackle these issues.
Clara aimed to investigate different SOLO record location descriptions and how navigational aids help or hinder student journeys around the library.
Trail signs designed by Clara
To achieve this, Clara designed a series of trail signs which would point to different locations around the library, decided on standardized names for different locations and then tested these changes by running ‘treasure hunts’ around the library with student participants .
I particularly enjoyed hearing about Clara’s ‘Russian Doll’ inspired method to improving SOLO location descriptions. Clara’s method aimed to help readers locate an item by providing location details on a macro level and then providing more specific details – the specific floor, the specific room and then lastly, shelfmark information. This, however, was not as simple as it sounded; the third floor of the Teaching Collection on the St Giles’ side of the building doesn’t, of course, line up with the third floor of the Beaumont Street side of the building – why would it? However, with improved trail signs and more detailed location information on SOLO records, Clara began her ‘treasure hunts’ with student participants. Students were tasked with finding items in different areas of the library while Clara noted anything that helped or hindered them with navigating the library. The findings were particularly interesting – even comments such as “[n]ow I’m confused” helped to give a greater insight into how readers interact with the Taylorian.
The findings of Clara’s project pointed to the utility of trail signs around the library, suggesting the need for these and the desire to perhaps increase them. Most readers agreed it would be helpful to differentiate the staircases with different names and that the name 3rd Floor rather than ‘upper’ stack was helpful. Ultimately Clara’s project placed user experience at the heart of her considerations in making the Taylorian more navigable and has produced excellent findings which can be built on in the future.
Anna Roberts- A Spotlight on the Sainsbury Library Collections and Faculty Books
By Jess Hodgkinson
Focussing on the Sainsbury Library’s collections, Anna’s trainee project took a three-pronged approach to enhancing the library’s provision for readers.
Anna’s pie-chart showing the global diversity of books in the library
The first aspect of the project entailed creating a plan for weeding the Sainsbury Library’s annexe, which houses its general-purpose business collection. Using the library management software’s (ALMA) analytics function, Anna generated inventory item reports which she exported to a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet. Anna filtered the spreadsheet by publication date and number of loans to identify little-used and outdated books which could be removed from circulation, thus freeing up space for new acquisitions.
The second, and main, focus of Anna’s project assessed the global diversity of the Sainsbury Library’s collection housed at the Saïd Business School’s Egrove Park site. Inspired by the Building Global Collections workshop she attended, Anna set out to investigate what proportion of these books were on the topic of international business, or focussed on business practices outside of the UK and USA. Using key terms derived from the London Business School’s categorisation scheme and Library of Congress subject headings, Anna searched the collection for relevant titles. Anna identified that only 11% of the collection has an international topic and that, among these books, cross-cultural management studies were the most common. Based on these findings, Anna proposed in her presentation that future acquisitions should include more books about geographical areas currently under-represented within the collection, including, for example, North Africa, Latin America, and the Caribbean. Anna also highlighted the importance of purchasing books written from perspectives other than those of British and American authors, especially regarding topics such as globalisation and social responsibility.
The third, and final, aspect of Anna’s trainee project saw her create an inventory of monograph books and chapters in edited collections authored by academics from the University’s Business & Management school. Responding to a reader’s request for such a list, Anna used code designed by a colleague to match a register of faculty members with inventory item reports from ALMA, creating a list of faculty publications. Given the scale of the task, Anna chose to focus on two research areas—international business and major programme management.
Anna intends to expand and update the list of faculty publications, and continue to contribute to weeding, auditing, and enhancing the Sainsbury Library’s collections as she transitions into her exciting new role as the Collections & Instructional Materials Assistant. She will undoubtedly continue to be an asset to the library team!
What’s in a library? “Information” is perhaps the most exhaustive answer to that question. But what counts as information, and who decides? Even as library trainees, especially in a digital age, we might be tempted to think of the words on the page as rather abstract concepts, rather than of their shape, the page that carries them, the material book that preserves them, or any of the ways in which the physical material of library and archive collections – paper, pictures, binding, type – can be meaningfully shaped. These, however, are important things, and not only for the archivist. On this blog, we like to think about questions like this, and highlight the library talks and events that suggest them. Because that is another thing that can be in a library: discussion, the library as a space for figuring out its own role, the nature of books, images and text, and the ways they interact with and are shaped by their social context. A library is anything but silent. Just like a book is anything but silent, and its very materiality can itself serve as a medium for relevant artistic expression. More than that: as Tia Blassingame argued at the Weston Library this week, the artist book – art in the form of the book – can serve as a ‘vehicle for social change and racial unity’.
Tia Blassingame at work
Tia Blassingame, an example of whose work is featured in the new Weston Library exhibition Alphabets Alive!, is a book artist, printmaker, educator, Associate Professor at Scripps College, current printer in residence at the Bodleian Bibliographical Press, and founder of the Book/Print Artist/Scholar of Color Collective. Her talk, ‘We Rise (Together): Taking and Making Space for BIPOC Book Arts Creatives, Cultures, and Histories’ (part of the We Are Our History Conversations at the Bodleian), presented the work of the Collective in advocating for and forging collaborations between BIPOC/Global Majority book artists and scholars, illustrated by a wealth of wonderful photographs. Its audience was introduced to, among many other works and artists, the giant pop-up books of Colette Fu celebrating ethnic minorities in China, the traditional handmade Korean paper (Hanji) dresses of Aimee Lee, Colette Gaiter‘s handcrafted editions of Black Panther artist Emory Douglas’ writing, and the woven book art of Skye Tafoya. It was interesting to see how books can evoke meaning not only in the words and information that they contain, but in their actual physical composition, like Sun Young Kang’s work In Between Presence and Absence, I. And fascinating questions were asked: what qualifies as paper, for instance, and why? What if we remove those qualifiers, and see links between fibre-working traditions from Hawaii to Korea? What if quilting might be regarded as a very meaningful African American paper making tradition?
Amidst all her examples, from paper cast sculptures over Japanese woodblock printing to miniature illumination and experiments in bookbinding, Tia Blassingame was pointedly sparse in talking about her own work in letterpress and print. Instead, she practised the solidarity at the heart of the Collective’s purpose of what she called taking and sharing space, through project grants, artist residencies, and celebrating members’ work. At the same time, she also noted the importance of established institutions’ (like the Bodleian) and individuals’ allyship – making space, through fundraising assistance, commissions, and more thoughtfulness in giving space to artists and scholars. A thought-provoking talk, that opened up to us the social aspects of book arts, as well as the material side of library information, and how the library can be a venue for discussing and creatively thinking about both.
As a final goodbye from the Trainees of the year 22-23 we thought we’d share with you a look at some of the trainee projects which were presented at the showcase this year! These descriptions, each written by another trainee who viewed the original presentation, are designed to give you a flavour of what our year with the Bodleian and College libraries have been like.
Jenna Ilett: Creating an interactive map of the Nizami Ganjavi Library
By Alice S
Kicking off our Trainee showcase with a bang, Jenna’s presentation hit all the right buttons. With an amusing title and appropriately themed presentation, Jenna talked us through the ins and outs of coding an interactive map, complete with hoverable shelfmark labels!
The inspiration for this project came from a slew of wayfinding projects that have been taking place across the ‘Section 3’ Libraries (which include the Taylor, The Art Archelogy and Ancient World and the Nizami Ganjavi libraries) as well as Jenna’s own background in tech thanks to a GCSE in Computer Science and a module in Web Design during her undergraduate degree.
Using Inkscape, Jenna made the underlying vector graphic for the map itself, working off a previous design, but keeping the styling consistent with maps currently available at the AAAW Library. She used the feedback she received to refine her design before moving on to the coding itself.
The coding was done on a code editor called CodePen which allowed her to keep track of the HTML, CSS and JavaScript code all in one view. Jenna whizzed us through an impressive array of coding tips including running through how she used tooltips to enable the hoverable shelfmarks to display over the appropriate shelves.
Remaining humble throughout, Jenna also treated us to an inside look at her thought processes in the form of increasingly anxious WhatsApp messages she had sent about her project to friends and colleagues, as well as a demonstration of a particular bug that caused her map to flip itself over when zoomed out, both of which earned a hearty chuckle from the audience. But with the amount of skilled work Jenna has put in already, the audience and I are in no doubt that Jenna will soon have the kinks worked out, and the Nizami Ganjavi Library will have a swanky new interactive map!
The most interesting thing I learnt from Jenna’s presentation would probably have to be the benefits of scalable vector graphics. As someone who has all too often fallen foul of the perils of trying to resize images only to be left with a grainy and illegible mess, it’s great to know that using a vector graphic will allow me to scale an image to any size my heart could desire. Through the magic of mathematical graphing it preserves the shape and position of a line so that it can be viewed at any scale. Thanks to Jenna for a fabulous presentation and enlightening me to the wonders of vector graphics!
Alice Zamboni: Audio-visual archive of former Prime Minister Edward Heath
By Charlie
The second presentation of the day came from Alice Zamboni, one of the two Digital Archivist trainees based for two years with the Special Collections team at the Weston Library. Alice’s project was concerned with adding the audio-visual material donated by former Conservative Prime Minister Edward (Ted) Heath to our catalogue.
Edward Heath outside No.10
As with most of his predecessors and successors in the role of Prime Minister since the Second World War, Ted Heath began his political involvement at Oxford, studying PPE at Balliol College and winning the Presidency of the Oxford Union in 1937. Therefore, it is no surprise that the Bodleian chose to purchase his personal archive in 2011 to add to its collection. Covering mainly the period from the mid-1970s to the early 2000s, Alice related how many of the cassettes and tape reels held information on music and yacht racing connected to the love of European culture which inspired Heath’s drive – and eventual success – to gain admission for the UK in the European Community in 1973.
Most of the material was held in analogue formats so Alice’s first step before cataloguing was to convert them into digital MP3 files. Then, one of the main challenges she faced was that the sheer scale of the material (481 tapes some up to ninety minutes long) meant that not every recording could be listened to in its entirety. An educated assessment on the contents, and how it should be catalogued, had to be made from listening to a portion of each. This allowed some of the material, such as recordings made from radio programmes, to be weeded out of the collection.
Perhaps the most interested thing I learned from Alice’s talk was the broad scope of Heath’s recordings, including some in foreign languages. One interestingly was in Mandarin Chinese, and of a children’s programme on learning languages.
As with most of the trainee projects, there is always more to be done after the showcase and Alice’s next main step is to place the original tapes back into boxes according to how she has catalogued them. An even longer-term plan for ensuring that the archive can be opened to researchers is acquiring the rights for many tapes recorded from musical recitals, for instance, where the copyright is owned by the composer or conductor rather than Heath himself.
Miranda Scarlata: Web archiving and the invasion of Ukraine.
By Jenna
Although the phrase ‘once it’s on the internet, it’s there forever,’ is common, Miranda’s talk highlighted the ephemeral and volatile nature of websites, and the importance of capturing and preserving information from these sites.
Although it would be impossible to capture every single website in existence, there are times when the digital archivists undertake a rapid response project – for example capturing information on Covid-19, or the ongoing war in Ukraine – the latter being the focus of Miranda’s talk.
Soon after the Russian invasion of Ukraine (on the 24th of January 2022), the Digital Archivist team launched a rapid response project to preserve information regarding Ukrainian life and culture, as well as the war itself, which was at risk of being lost. A campaign was launched that asked people to nominate websites that fit certain criteria.
Miranda discussed some of the challenges involved in a project like this. Although 53 sites were nominated, only 21 were deemed viable. Twitter accounts of Ukrainian citizens were also included, and additional news, cultural and war specific sites were crawled, leading to a total of 72 sites. There is a limit on how many sites can be preserved due to the strict data budget, which means that difficult decisions had to be made about what to prioritise. Another added level of complexity was the limited Ukrainian and Russian language skills within the department, which made it difficult to determine types of content and assign metadata tags.
The normal processes when archiving websites involves contacting site owners to obtain permission before beginning the capturing process, but due to the high risk of information loss, site owners were contacted after capturing the sites to gain permission for publication. With the help of a Ukrainian and Russian speaking intern, site owners were contacted, but there was an understandable lack of response given that many of the site owners would have been directly impacted by the war.
Miranda’s talk was a fascinating insight into the world of digital archiving and the challenges within, particularly with the more arduous and intricate rapid response projects, which are hugely important when it comes to capturing important events as they are happening.
The most interesting thing I learnt was that digital archiving involves capturing a functional version of the site that could continue to exist even if the original host site was removed, rather than a static capture, which leads to added complexity when it comes to external links and embedded content.
If you are interested in this project and want to nominate a website for archiving please fil in the nomination form here: BEAM | Nominate for archiving (ox.ac.uk)
Caitlín Kane: Maleficia: Curating a public exhibition at New College Library
By Alice Z
In her talk on the exhibition that she undertook as her trainee project, Caitlín focused on her experience of organising and curating the exhibition of rare books and manuscripts from the collection at New College. A chance encounter with the New College copy of Malleus Maleficarum (The Hammer of Witches), a well-known 15th century treatise about witchcraft, sparked in Caitlin the idea of organising a display of special collections about magic, witchcraft, and astrology.
The Maleficia exhibition at New College
The promotional material devised by Caitlín to advertise the exhibition on social media and in print was what stood out most for its originality and it is clearly something that contributed to making the exhibition a success in terms of visitor numbers. I think the most interesting thing I learned from her talk was how you can create moving graphics using services such as Canva and how these can be used on social media to promote events such as exhibitions.
Caitlín reflected on some of the logistical challenges of organising this kind of collection-focused public engagement event, such as the selection of material and collection interpretation. For one thing, identifying relevant material from New College’s collection of manuscripts was more difficult in the absence of an online catalogue. Without the benefits of a neatly catalogued SOLO record to guide her, she was required to rely on previous staff members’ handlists as well as serendipitous browsing of New College’s rare books shelves.
Another aspect of the exhibition she touched upon was the interpretation of the materials. It was important for the labels accompanying the items on display to strike the right balance between content and context. Providing insights into the objects themselves was key, especially as many were texts written in Latin, but so was giving visitors enough background on the early modern philosophical and theological debates underpinning witchcraft.
Caitlin’s work clearly resulted in a fascinating and well-attended exhibition, and she was able to make great advances in increasing awareness of some of the amazing collections held by her library.
Abby Evans: Professor Napier and the English Faculty Library
By Miranda
Abby’s trainee project concerned a fascinating collection of dissertations and offprints gathered by Professor Arthur Napier, a philologist and Professor at Merton College in 1885. Held by the English faculty library, this collection consists of 92 boxes
The Napier collection at the EFL
containing 1058 items that needed to be reassessed ahead of the library’s move to the new Schwarzman centre for the Humanities in 2025.
Her project showcased the speedy decisions and minute details that must be considered when working at a library as she had only two weeks to determine the content of the collection and assess what material was worthy of making the move to the new building. The process required lots of skimming through documents to understand their content, the deciphering of previous systems from librarians past, and a strong head for organisation!
The collection itself was also able to provide some insight into how the English Faculty used to operate. Many of the materials were annotated with small markings and references to an older organization involving different box numbers and labels.
The collection also surprisingly held works from female authors – a rarity for the time – but their work was clearly well-enough regarded that Professor Napier saw the benefit in collecting and preserving it in his collection.
The most interesting insight the Napier collection provided however is perhaps its demonstration of the of the workings of Royal Mail years gone by. The collection contained several items which bore evidence of travelling through the UK postal system, some which were simply folded up with the address written on the back – no envelope required! Additionally, a simple name and general neighbourhood were enough to get the letter to its intended location, postcodes clearly had yet to hit it off!
Overall, Abby’s talk demonstrated the myriad of small and large details that must be considered when continually maintaining library collections. And the efficiency with which she was able to work through the collection is an example to us all!
Morgan Ashby-Crane: Making Collections More Visible: Displays and Data Cleanup
By Caitlín
At the SSL, Morgan embarked on a mission to improve the visibility of collections, both in making items easier to locate within the library system, and in highlighting diverse voices in the collections.
During awareness months throughout the year they curated book displays which allowed them to improve the circulation and physical accessibility of collections such as those for Black and LGBTQ+ History. For Black History Month, they asked subject librarians to recommend a book with an accompanying caption. Morgan then curated the display, and added QR codes linked to e-resources that the subject librarians recommended. They then collated these into a post on the SSL blog to reach those who couldn’t access the display physically.
The SSL Display for Black History Month
For LGBT+ History month, Morgan organised another pop-up display, but this time the focus was on recommendations from readers in previous years. One of the most interesting ideas I gleaned from Morgan’s presentation was their approach in designing new recommendation slips for readers to fill in and recommend their own books to make sure the displays stayed relevant to reader interests. As books were borrowed and recommendation slips filled in, Morgan was able to track the circulation of items and provide evidence of engagement.
Another way in which Morgan improved accessibility to the collections was in cleaning up data on Aleph, our old library system. Over the past few months, the trainees have been busy helping our libraries prepare for the changeover to a new library system, Alma. With thousands of records being transferred across, a lot of data clean-up has been required to make sure records display correctly in the new system.
Some outdated process statuses, such as AM (Apply Staff – Music), can be left attached to records long after they fall out of use. Other books, that are on the shelves to be loaned, can be left marked as BD (At bindery). To single out any irregularities, Morgan made a collection code report to see if any items stood out as unusual. When items appeared under unusual process statuses, Morgan investigated them further to see if their statuses needed changing.
Similarly, some items without shelfmarks had slipped under the radar, and Morgan set about adding them back to the books’ holdings records. They worked backwards from potential Library of Congress classifications to figure out where the books might be on the shelves and, once they’d identified the physical shelfmark, restored it to the item’s holdings record. These data cleanup tasks will make it easier both for readers in locating the items they need and will help the collections transition smoothly from Aleph to Alma.
Ruth Holliday: Investigating the Christ Church Library Donors: Research and rabbit holes
By Abby
For her presentation, Ruth discussed her project to research donors to Christ Church’s ‘New Library’, with a particular focus on their links to slavery. The incongruously named New Library was constructed between 1717 and 1772, and over 300 benefactors contributed to the project! Given the time constraints involved, in this presentation Ruth chose to focus on just three:
The book Ruth used to research the library finances
The first donor Ruth spoke about was Noel Broxholme, a physician and an alumnus of Christ Church, who during his time there was one of the first recipients of the Radcliffe travelling fellowship. This was a grant established by Dr John Radcliffe (a rather omnipresent figure in Oxford) that required medical students to spend years studying medicine in a foreign country. Ruth was able to establish that at one time Doctor Broxholme was paid for his services not in cash, but instead in ‘Mississippi stock’. As one might be able to deduce from the name, this was effectively shares in companies who had strong ties to the slave trade.
The next donor Ruth discussed was George Smallridge, Bishop of Bristol. Again, we have a man whose profession is seemingly at odds with involvement in the trade of human lives. However, as part of his donation for the foundation of the new library he included two lottery tickets. One of the prize options for that lottery was South Sea Stock – more shares with ties to the slave trade. It has proven difficult to determine whether the tickets he donated were, in fact, winning tickets, or whether they were ever cashed in, but once again the foundation of this library has found itself fiscally linked to slavery.
The final donor to feature in Ruth’s presentation was Charles Doulgas, 3rd Duke of Queensbury, whose financial investments included shares in the British Linen Company. Whilst British linen does not ostensibly appear to have clear ties to slavery – being both grown and manufactured domestically by paid labour – there is in fact a significant connection. Whilst cotton was becoming the more popular fabric for textile production in the mid-late eighteenth century, the fabric was seen as too good to be used to clothe the people forced to grow it. As such, linen, in its cheapest and least comfortable format, was exported in droves to be used to clothe the slaves labouring on cotton plantations.
What all these donor case studies in Ruth’s fascinating presentation showed, and probably the most interesting thing I learned, was how enmeshed slavery was in the eighteenth-century economy. Whether in the form of shares received in lieu of payment, shares won as prizes, or as custom to the textile industry it was growing to dominate, Ruth’s project demonstrated that making money in the eighteenth century was almost inextricably tied to slavery.
Rose Zhang: As She Likes It: The Woman who Gatecrashed the Oxford Union
By Morgan
Rose’s project and subsequent presentation touched on a captivating aspect of the history of women at Oxford. As the trainee for the Oxford Union, she undertook some first-hand research on an unusual event in the early history of women’s involvement in the Union’s debates.
A Union Poll sparked by the admission of women to the Society
Rose first gave us a summary of the Union’s history. Set up in 1823 (and therefore currently celebrating their bicentenary), The Oxford Union has been famous (and infamous) for its dedication to free speech over the years. As women were only formally admitted to the University itself in 1920, it is unsurprising that they were also barred from entry to the Union debating society. This restriction against women members continued until well into the latter half of the 20th century, although rules had become laxer by this point, allowing women into the debating hall itself, but only in the upper galleries.
By the 1960s, there was increasing pressure from female students who wished to access the main floor of the debating hall, rather than be confined to the gallery, where they were expected to be silent, and could not get a good view of the proceedings. The pressure built to a point in 1961, when two students achieved national press coverage for their successful gate-crashing of the debating chamber, which they did in disguise as men!
Rose gave us a captivating account of the gatecrashing, using newspaper clippings from the time and information from one of the gatecrashes herself, Jenny Grove (now a published journalist), to really bring this moment of Oxford History to life. One of the most interesting things I learned from Rose’s presentation was how library projects can handle, preserve and communicate data that’s less discrete – which tied in well with our keynote talk from Phillip Roberts, especially focussed on how heritage organisations have a power to preserve and convey stories that otherwise might be suppressed or overlooked.
Thankfully, the actions of Jenny grove and her co-conspirator Rose Dugdale were successful in bringing wider attention to the issue, and within two years successive votes won women the right to be full and contributing union members.
Rose’s presentation on this project was interesting not just for such a fascinating bit of history, told with good humour, but also for how it differed to most trainee projects methodologically in using first-hand oral histories to bring context to her library and its collections.
Grace Exley: Creating online exhibitions
By Ruth
One of the later presentations in the day, Grace kept the energy flowing as she discussed her experience creating online exhibitions. The inspiration for Grace’s project was accessibility. While Jesus College puts on termly exhibitions in the Fellows’ Library, not everyone can make it on the day, and having some kind of record of past exhibitions would be beneficial to many.
A screenshot of one of the pages of Grace’s ‘Botanical Books’ Exhibition
Taking the initiative, Grace sought out training on how to curate and manage online exhibitions. She worked her way through a course which introduced her to the platform Omeka. Using Omeka, visitors can scroll through photos of the exhibition items and read captions for each one, making it both a great way to experience exhibitions that you cannot make it to physically, and a way of preserving physical exhibitions in a digital space.
With this new knowledge at her fingertips, Grace set out to organise her own exhibitions that she would subsequently upload to the Jesus College website using the Omeka platform. The books that featured in these exhibitions were selected by Grace from the Fellows’ Library at Jesus College – a stunning 17th century room that holds 11,500 early printed books.
Grace told us about the botany exhibition she curated in Michaelmas term, which featured a first-time find of an inscription in John Parkinson’s Theatrum Botanicum. One of the most interesting things I learned from Grace’s presentation is that this is one of the very few books in the Fellows’ Library to have had its title page inscribed by a female owner, Elizabeth Burghess. From the style of the handwriting, we can tell that the signature is likely to have been penned near to the time of publication, though we don’t know for sure who Elizabeth Burghess was.
We were in a Jesus College lecture theatre for the showcase, and due to running ahead of our schedule we were able to sneak into the Fellows’ Library and look around. It’s a gorgeous space, and it was great to see where the exhibitions take place when they’re in 3D! If you’re interested, you can view Grace’s Botanical Books exhibition along with some of Jesus College’s other exhibitions on the website the Grace created here: Collections from the Fellows’ Library and Archives, at Jesus College Oxford (omeka.net)
Alice Shepherd: The Making of a Disability History LibGuide
By Rose
A screenshot of the draft Disability History LibGuide
A theme running through many of the trainee projects this year was accessibility, and Alice proved no exception. For her trainee project, she worked on creating a LibGuide on Disability History, to help people find resources relevant to researching that topic.
A LibGuide is an online collection of resources that aims to provide insights into a specific topic of interest. They are created across all Bodleian Libraries and often act as a launch pad for a particular subject to signpost readers to the plethora of resources available. The resources for Alice’s LibGuide were largely collated during a Hackathon event organised by the Bodleian Libraries team, during which 36 volunteers shared their expertise on Disability History and put together a list of over 231 relevant electronic resources on this topic.
Alice started by working through this long list of resources. She spent a considerable amount of time cleaning, screening, and processing the data collected at the Hackathon. Specifically, she removed website links that were no longer active, evaluated the quality of the materials, and carefully selected those that were most appropriate and relevant to the topic of Disability History.
With this newly complied ‘shortlist’ of scholarly resources, Alice then started putting them together on the LibGuide website, adapting the standardised Bodleian LibGuide template to better fit the needs of researchers by including resources grouped by date, topic, and format. With the resources carefully curated and added to the LibGuide, Alice put some finishing touches on the guide by doing her own research to fill in some of the gaps left after the Hackathon.
There will be a soft launch of the LibGuide in the Disability History month this year. Although this LibGuide is mainly created for students and scholars with research interests in Disability History, the LibGuide will be available to the public as a valuable educational resource.
Charlie Ough: Duke Humfrey’s Library Open Shelf Collections
By Grace
As the trainee for the Bodleian Old Library, Charlie gets the tremendous pleasure of working in the Medieval precursor to Oxford’s centralised Bodleian libraries, Duke Humfrey’s Library.
A view of Duke Humfrey’s Library
Whilst the setting and atmosphere may be one of academic serenity, after a few months of working there, Charlie identified that something ought to be done to make the organisation of its Open Shelves Collection slightly less chaotic. He had found that books were difficult to locate, some were physically difficult to access, the shelf marks were confusing, and certain volumes from the collection were missing entirely.
With a plan in mind, the first task in addressing this issue was to create a comprehensive list of everything on the shelves. Part way through this venture, Charlie stumbled across a file hidden away in an archived shared folder from 2017 and discovered that a previous trainee had already make a handlist for Duke Humfrey’s. This saved lots of time and allowed him to focus on making improvements to this cache of information by slimming it down, rearranging it according to area, and dividing it into different sections.
During this time Chalrie also designed and conducted a reader survey that was distributed within Duke Humfrey’s to determine who the main users of the library are, and whether they were there to use the Open shelf books specifically, or more because they enjoyed using the space. With the results of that survey to sort through and analyse, Charlie now has a permanent position working at the Bodleian Old Library and intends to continue working with the Duke Humfrey’s Open Shelves Collection. His plans involve new shelf marks, updating the LibGuide, a complete stock check, and barcoding the collection.
The most interesting (and mildly terrifying) thing I learned from Charlie’s talk is that the population of cellar and common house spiders in the Duke Humfrey’s Library ceiling were intentionally introduced at the beginning of this century, to combat an infestation of deathwatch beetle that was burrowing into the wooden beams and panels. In fact, the spiders still thrive there to this day! Not something to think about when you’re peacefully studying in the picturesque Duke Humfrey’s Reading Room…
In April a few of us trainees adventured to the beautiful city of Cambridge, also known as “The Other Place”, for a whirlwind tour of some of their libraries.
Our first stop was the Judge Business School, located in the former Addenbrooke’s Hospital building with colourful balconies and floating staircases (think Hogwarts meets Art Deco meets 1920s fairground). The Library is a small but welcoming user-friendly space catering for the needs of Judge Business School staff and students, with access to the specialised business databases Bloomberg and Eikon. My personal highlight has to be beanbags within the stacks. Or potentially the graffiti wall for readers to leave question drawings, messages of hope (or dread), for the librarians to respond to. Student wellbeing and enjoyment of the space was clearly a key consideration, with sections such as ‘Boost’ for wellbeing books and a less formal ‘Weird Ideas and Disruptive Thinking’ section.
Judge Business School Library
Floating staircases in the Judge Business School (Photo Credit: JBS)
Next we took the bus over to the West Hub, a sustainable three-storey development open to all departments at Cambridge University and members of the public. The library in this building, forming part of the Technology Libraries Team and Biological Sciences Libraries, is on the upper floor, which is naturally quieter than the lower floors thanks to the architectural design of the building. There are study spaces to suit everyone, comfortable booths and sofas, areas for group work and individual study pods. With huge floor to ceiling windows looking out onto what we’re assured will soon be lakes, gardens, and urban orchards, the building was incredibly bright and open. It was incredible to visit such a green and modern space, a completely different world to some of the medieval libraries in both Oxford and Cambridge. I have since declared that every library should have a tree growing inside.
Trees growing in the West Hub
The West Hub (Photo Credit: Ståle Eriksen)
Our last stop was the Cambridge University Library, the main research library of the university. One of the six UK legal deposit libraries, the UL is a huge, imposing 1930s structure, designed by the very same Giles Gilbert Scott who designed the Weston Library building here in Oxford, Battersea Power Station, and the red telephone box. The library houses nearly 10 million books, maps, manuscripts, and photographs, stored across 17 floors and more than 130 miles of shelving (which I can imagine is easy to get lost in). Unlike other legal deposit libraries, such as the Bodleian, much of the UL’s material is kept on open shelving for readers to borrow. We got a chance to look around some of the reading rooms and inspect one of the UL’s old card catalogues. It really is an impressive space, with a great view from the tower.
The view from the Tower
Cambridge University Library
We finished the day with a walk around the market place and a quick pint by the river. It was great to see how some of the libraries in Cambridge function day-to-day and their different approaches to what a library should look like. I’m sure we all came away with lots to think about for our own libraries. We’re very grateful to the staff at the Judge Business School Library, the West Hub, and the UL for showing us around, as well as the Cambridge Libraries Graduate Trainees who joined us for some of the tours!
Sitting by the river after a long day (with some oh-so familiar punts!)
During the odd lunchtime during term, the Upper Library at Christ Church becomes host to pop-up displays of special collections material. Part of my Graduate Trainee role that I’ve really enjoyed is assisting with these displays, whether through invigilation, talking with visitors about the collection or selecting texts for display. Today I’ve put together a selection of texts that featured in our display on Early Modern conceptions of skin. Through the lens of travel books, anatomical texts and medical manuals we invited visitors to explore a range of cultural and medical understandings of skin during this period. I’ve chosen just three items from this display to share in this post today – read on for fugitives (of a kind), duels, and medical drama…
Johann Remmelin’s Catoptrum Microcosmicum
It’s possible that one comes across most lift the flap books during childhood. Literary giants such as Eric Hill’s Spot Bakes a Cake[1]come to mind. In this charming story flaps serve as an important ingredient of the mischief and excitement of the book. A flap that takes the form of a wave of chocolate cake batter can be lifted by the intrepid reader to reveal Spot stirring up a storm beneath, for example.
Literary masterpiece, Spot Bakes a Cake
Much to my dismay, we do not hold Spot Bakes a Cake in our collection at Christ Church, but that does not mean we are completely bereft of lift the flap books. Despite Abe Books listing this as the ‘Original Lift the Flap’, there are in fact earlier examples of such a technique, and one such text featured in our display.
Johann Remmelin’s Catoptrum Microcosmicum (Augsburg, 1619) is the first anatomical atlas to use flaps to illustrate layers of anatomy. Instead of joining Spot in his mission to bake a birthday cake for his dad, you are invited to step into the shoes of the 17th century physick, learning about the intricacies of the muscles, bones and beyond of the human body. The plates show first a male and a female figure surrounded by figures of isolated body parts, including the eye, ear, tongue and heart. All of these are represented at their different levels with flaps – the man and woman to a depth of 13 superimposed layers. Each new layer reveals what can be found in the body at different stages of a dissection.
A page from Johann Remmelin’s Catoptrum Microcosmicum
A closer look at the details
A later edition of this text, published in 1670, sets out on the title page that this book contains:
‘an anatomie of the bodies of man and woman wherein the skin, veins, nerves, muscles, bones, sinews and ligaments are accurately delineated. And curiously pasted together, so as at first sight you may behold all the outward parts of man and woman. And by turning up the several dissections of the paper take a view of all their inwards’ [2].
A Medusa-like figure with snake hair is the first layer to this pregnant body – a somewhat foreboding starting point…
The flaps themselves are referred to as ‘dissections’ here, the act of the reader lifting a flap becoming amalgamated with the incision of the anatomist’s scalpel. ‘Curiously pasted together’ is a good description – the nature of the ‘lift the flap’ anatomy book imbues the medical diagram with an enact-able curiosity that only increases with interaction with the different layers.
Despite my attempts to tip the balance with this blog post, when it comes to breath-taking 17th century anatomical books, the phrase ‘lift the flap’ is not bandied around with much regularity. Strange! Rather, they are grouped within a pioneering class of anatomical print known as the ‘fugitive sheet’ or ‘compound situs’. This technique is first recorded as being seen in 1538 in works by Heinrich Vogtherr, which made use of layers of pressed linen[3] to create the same effect we see in Remmelin’s Catoptrum Microcosmicum.
These fugitive sheets would have been a fantastic way for users to understand the internal workings of their bodies, even without proximity to a cadaver. However, writing about Remmelin’s anatomised Eve, one commentator notes how the figures in these engravings ‘[sit] amid the horrific attributes of sin and death […]. If this is self-knowledge, one might prefer extroversion.’[4]
Gaspare Tagliacozzi’s De curtorum chirurgia per insitionem
Also included in our display was Gaspare Tagliacozzi’s De curtorum chirurgia per insitionem (Venice, 1597). The copy held at Christ Church is a pirated edition of the first book devoted entirely to plastic surgery. In fact, multiple un-official editions of this text appeared soon after the original due to its popularity[5].
Tagliacozzi’s stylish suit in action
The realities of plastic surgery met a real need in the 1500s, largely because duelling and violence were pretty rife. If you had taken a rapier to the face in a duel for your honour (perhaps your reputation is on the line when the last slice of chocolate cake has disappeared and you are found with crumbs round your mouth) a spot of light plastic surgery might be just what you’re after.
Around thirty years before Tagliacozzi wrote De curtorum chirurgia per insitionem, the Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe was taking some time out from considering the stars and turned to the far more terrestrial pursuit of losing his nose in a duel against Manderup Parsberg, his third cousin. While he and Parsberg later became friends, Tycho was landed with wearing a prosthetic nose for the rest of his life. Word on the 16th century street was that this prosthesis was crafted from finest silver, but when Tycho’s corpse was exhumed in 2010, it was a brass nose that was found, not silver.[6]
While coming a little too late to be of use to Tycho, Tagliacozzi’s text focuses on the repair of mutilations of the nose, lips and ears, using skin grafts in an operation that became known as the ‘Italian graft’. This technique allowed for facial reconstruction via a skin graft taken from the left forearm. The graft would remain partially attached to the arm while grafted to the mutilated area so the skin cells would not decay. Tagliacozzi’s talents did not stop at medical innovation however – he also had an eye for (practical) fashion. Due to the importance of the patient being able to hold their arm to their face after the surgery to facilitate the complete adherence of the graft, Tagliacozzi designed a complex vest, not unlike a straightjacket, to make sure there was no unwarranted movement. The process was supposed to take from two to three weeks.
William Cowper’s Anatomia corporum humanorum
The final book that will feature in my post today is William Cowper’s Anatomia corporum humanorum (Leiden, 1750) and at the heart of this text is one of the most famous controversies in medical history.
The plates that feature in Anatomia corporum humanorum were not originally produced for this text, but rather the earlier Anatomia humani corporis, by Govard Bidloo (1649 – 1713). Originally published in 1685, Anatomia humani corporis features 105 striking copperplate engravings of the human body. The plates illustrate the muscular, skeletal, reproductive, and systemic organization of the human body and are seen alongside scientific commentary.
An English contemporary of Bidloo, William Cowper, bought the printing plates from the printing house and reissued them under his own name with new accompanying text in his Anatomy of humane bodies. A text that, in a profound lack of tact, also featured ‘numerous harsh criticisms towards Bidloo’s contributions’[7]. Unlike today, plagiarism – especially over national boundaries – was largely tolerated at the time, as it was difficult to police. Bidloo objected strongly to this instance of plagiarism from Cowper, however, promptly and publicly excoriating him in a published communication to the Royal Society.
What could be termed as Cowper’s lack of imagination when swiping someone else’s prints was more than made up for by Bidloo’s creative insults in this pamphlet – on one occasion calling him a ‘highwayman’, and another a ‘miserable anatomist who writes like a Dutch barber’[8]. I think I’d rather be on the anatomist’s table than have such lines about me circulating in print. All’s fair in love and science I suppose…
A closer look at skin in this text
Title page from Vesalius’s De humani corporis fabrica
The plates in question were produced by the Dutch painter Gerard de Lairesse. For Lairesse, the anatomical illustrations commissioned by Bidloo were an opportunity for an artistic reflection on anatomy. They are very different from the tradition kick-started by the Vesalian woodcuts in De humani corporis fabrica[9].
Lairesse displays his figures with a tender realism and sensuality, which at first glance seems unfitting for an anatomy book. The figures seem docile, as if in a light sleep rather than deliberately posed objects of scientific inquiry. In these illustrations dissected parts of the body are contrasted with soft surfaces of un-dissected skin and draped material. Flayed, bound figures are depicted in ordinary nightclothes or bedding, as if they will soon be put back together again and woken up.
That’s all I’ll share today – I’m off to make a case for Spot Bakes a Cake as being a prime investment for Christ Church library’s collection.
This is Part IV of our four-part series on our interview with Richard Ovenden.
For more background information on who Richard Ovenden is and how he came to be Bodley’s Librarian please see Part I.
For information about how libraries and the Bodleian itself aim to tackle issues of accessibility, please see Part II.
For a discussion of the role of libraries moving forward into the digital age, please see Part III.
Last week we discussed the duty and future of libraries and archives especially with regards to the digital age. This week, in our final post of the Richard Ovenden Blog Post series, we will look at some examples of how libraries are able to collaborate and serve their various communities.
“we’re [not] just a supporting service … we are actually part of the University.”
As previously mentioned in our first post of this series, Richard Ovenden is Head of Gardens, Libraries & Museums (GLAM) as well as being Bodley’s Librarian. This is a post he took over from Professor Anne Trefethen early last year, “I became head of GLAM in February”, which Richard Ovenden has described as involving “trying to build on all of the work of my predecessors as head of GLAM in supporting the cultural and scientific collections in the University”. Following our interview, Richard Ovenden mentioned that he had a meeting with “the University and Strategy Plan Programme Board which is working on the University’s new strategy”. In particular, Richard highlighted his aim of emphasising the importance of libraries, and their contribution to the University of Oxford: “What I’m trying to do is to help the University develop a strategy that has these kinds of issues that we have just been talking about, as centrally as possible” libraries are “[not] just a supporting service” but instead “we are actually part of the University.”
Richard and Uma Mahadevan Dasgupta at the Weston Library
Throughout our interview, Richard makes a point of discussing Libraries within the context of the communities that they serve. For the Bodleian that primarily encompasses the staff and students at the University of Oxford (although not insignificant are the various independent researchers and even members of the general public who may also interact with our collections). But each library will have diverse communities that they need to determine how best to provide for.
One anecdote in particular that stood out was Richard’s mention of Uma-Mahadevan-Dasgupta, a woman he met who is not a Librarian, but in fact “a civil servant in India … her whole raison-d’être is to build a public library network in rural India”. The community she serves in this process is one that is “disenfranchised from knowledge, if you like, and as part of their educational experience they don’t have those opportunities and that seems to me tragic.” But the work that she’s striving to achieve is “just incredible … it’s very, very simple stuff but it’s kind of transforming the opportunities for people in rural India – young people opening books for the first time, it’s just phenomenal.” Richard’s admiration for Uma and the work she’s doing is clear, and understandable. There are few library staff who wouldn’t see the appeal in getting to create, shape, and expand a new network of libraries across a nation with previously limited access to such resources. As Richard says, “she’s been one of the most inspirational people I’ve met in a long time, and just incredible.”
“Public libraries are on the front line serving their community in every possible way that they can.”
But one doesn’t need to travel all the way to India to see ways in which libraries can change to better serve their underrepresented communities. Richard mentions a recent trip to Berlin where he “gave a talk in a public library”. He describes the library itself as, “a very good public library with a children’s library section and books, but not many. Small, on a modest scale.” It serves “an area of Berlin that has a big immigrant community, they’re facing defacement and vandalism from the far right because they have services directed towards the Turkish” and other marginalised groups. These groups are just as fundamental a part of the local community as any of the other residents and these “public libraries are on the front line serving their community in every possible way that they can.” The talk Richard was giving was in fact directly intended to address the issues of vandalism faced by the library and the wider community, it was on the subject of “censorship and banning books” which shows just how much work even ‘modest’ libraries will put in to serve and protect its users. As Richard says, “they’re really standing up for [their community].”
Richard and Achim Bonte, the Director of the Staatsbibliotek in Berlin
On the same trip to Berlin, Richard made a visit to the director of the Staatsbibliotek, or ‘Berlin State Library’. The Staatsbibliotek is a part of a wider organisation called the Stiftung Preussischer Kulturbesitz, or ‘Prussian Culutural Heritage Foundation’ which is “responsible for the museum and state libraries and state archives, state everything.” The Foundation is one of the largest cultural organisations in the world and “responsible for these amazing institutions.” Lucky for us then that Oxford’s Gardens, Libraries and Museums (of which Richard is the head) already have “an MOU” (Memorandum of Understanding – a non-binding letter that says the institutions will work together.) “with that organisation, which sits alongside the MOU between Oxford university and the four Berlin universities.” As Richard says, “this is a cultural and knowledge partnership alongside the academic partnership,” the opportunity for two such prestigious institutions to be able to work together on future projects is a wonderful opportunity for both parties. However, as this MOU was signed just before the pandemic “we haven’t really been able to do much collaboration.” Now that restrictions are loosening however, “we actually have an agenda for collaboration between the Bodleian and the Staats.” This agenda is hopefully one that will continue into the future as, “next year we’re re-signing the MOU with the Stiftung and GLAM.”
One can’t help but feel that this all harks back to the advice Richard gave in our first article. The importance of networks and connections between library staff is central, not just to developing one’s personal career trajectory, but also between institutions as a way of supporting global efforts to protect and preserve knowledge and serve individual communities. Libraries can only continue to do the fundamental work that they are engaged in if they cooperate, share knowledge, and support one another. After all, isn’t that really what libraries are all about?
We would like to thank Richard Ovenden for very generously giving up some of his time to meet with us. We really enjoyed our conversation with him and learned a lot by listening to his experiences of the library world. We hope these blog posts will be useful to those wanting to learn more about what happens behind the scenes at the Bodleian and the wider world of libraries!
Richard Ovenden with Ruth, Alice and Léa, the trainees who worked on this interview
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