“Satire’s my weapon. I was born a critic and a satirist; and my nurse remarked that I hissed as soon as I saw light.” In the vault of the Rare Book & Manuscript Library of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, we recently rediscovered a correspondence collection of the London actor and journalist Barnard Gregory […]
Month: June 2010
Collection of Danish plays uncovered
June 28, 2010
A collection of Danish plays from the 18th and 19th century has recently been cataloged. This collection of roughly 70 items includes translations of contemporary popular plays from France and Germany. The bulk of these items were found in the cataloging backlog section that our team is currently working through. The rest, which were in […]
Collection of Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century Spanish Romances (IUA19102-IUA19170)
June 21, 2010
While working through our miscellaneous backlog, we came across a stack of unbound short dramas printed in Barcelona. This small collection (about 70 items) turned out to be a group of Spanish Romanceros, or ballads, printed by two different printing families. The ballad was a popular form in Spain from the 15th century, and often […]
Unidentified coat of arms found in the Incunabula collection
June 17, 2010
While cataloging a copy of Leonardus de Utino’s Sermones aurei de Sanctis (Venice: Johann von Koln and Johann Manthen, 1475) we came across a coat of arms that is so far unidentified. This coat of arms has been added to the recto of leaf a2 and is located after the incipit to the prologue. […]
Three books from Alexander Pope’s library
June 10, 2010
While checking the special collections provenance file, three books owned by Alexander Pope were identified in our collections, in addition to the presentation copies of his collected letters that he inscribed to William Oliver. The Rare Book & Manuscript Library’s provenance file provides a wealth of information about notable former owners of the books in […]
Hans Christian Andersen Presentation Copy from the Library of Carl Sandburg (839.83 An2Eb)
June 3, 2010
While checking the recently-cataloged Hans Christian Andersen book inscribed to Mary Bruun against the special collections provenance file, a second book inscribed by Hans Christian Andersen was identified. This copy of The Sand-hills of Jutland has just as interesting a provenance as the last book. As soon as you open the book, a University of […]
Letters from John Ruskin primarily to Joan Severn (Post 1650 MS 0009)
June 2, 2010
Sitting quietly in our vault, awaiting further study is a cache of thirty unpublished letters from John Ruskin to his Scottish cousin Joan (Agnew Ruskin) Severn. Ruskin wrote over 3000 letters to Severn, many of which have been published in the thirty-nine volume edition of The Works of John Ruskin by Edward T. Cook and […]