Special Collections Research Center

Announcing New Acquisitions!

Special Collections has acquired two unique items of great interest for the study of manuscript production and illumination and the transition from handwritten manuscripts to printed books in the first century after the invention of printing. One of the new acquisitions is a Prayerbook in Latin and French, c. 1500-1520; the other is a printed Book of Hours, c. 1515-1530.

 
Left: Unfinished Prayerbook, f.36v, Two Angels Holding Scrolls

Right: Printed book of Hours, f.12v, Four Cardinal Virtues

 

The Prayerbook has several distinct features: there are decorations inspired by the Gőttingen Model Book, produced in Mainz in the mid-15^th century and used in manuscripts and early incunabula in the Lower Rhine; the text and illustrations are incomplete, enabling study of the work patterns in a medieval scriptorium; there is an initial of St.-Trond (infrequently depicted), suggesting an original provenance in the diocese of Liege; and linguistic evidence in the vernacular portions suggests that the Prayerbook or this part of it was made for a woman.

 
Unfinished Prayerbook, f.13, Historiated initial O (43x43mm) of St. Trond the Abbot, who holds a cross.
A scroll identifies the Saint: Sancte Trudo ora pro me.

Unfinished Prayerbook, f.24v, Crucifixion

The woodcuts in the Book of Hours (printed in Paris by Gillet Hardouyn, ca. 1515) are heavily painted by hand and are accompanied by added gold architectonic frames. The volume is so lavishly illuminated that is was most likely done by an artist active in the production of illuminated manuscripts, rather than a “colorist” employed by printers to create something that looked like an illuminated manuscript.

Printed Book of Hours, f.26, Nativity

      
The style resembles artists active in the workshop of Jean Pichore, who contributed designs for the large miniatures, which come from several different series of prints over different years.
Most of the smaller woodcuts are adaptations by the Master of the Très petites Heures of Anne of Brittany.

  
Printed Book of Hours, f.36, Fight Into Egypt

Popular Literature Collection - Entertaining and Enlightening

The University of Chicago Library recently completed an inventory of the Popular Literature Collection, a large collection of approximately 2,000 paperback novels and science fiction magazines.  The collection represents many of the major paperback publishers of the 20^th century, including Bantam, Popular Library, Permabooks, Ace and Dell.  It also covers a wide variety of subject matter, from the classic paperback genres (romance, mystery, science fiction) to the … less common, somewhat more lurid titles. The titles date from the 1930s to the 1960s.

As paper rationing ended after World War II, the paperback business boomed in the United States.  Many classic works of American literature got their largest exposure from paperback sales, and old favorites were often re-issued over and over again.  The low costs of publishing paperbacks also allowed smaller publishing houses to get into the game, and the collection includes many presses that only published a few titles.  These include some gay and lesbian literature, always produced by small presses in this era, and erotica. 

The most alluring part of these books is the cover art.  Paperbacks were designed to attract attention, and these certainly do.  The combination of lurid, often sexually suggestive covers with flashy titles (often changed from the hardcover edition to attract more readers), make for entertaining browsing today.  Many also capitalize on the American fascination with exotic lands: titles like “Musk, Hashish and Blood” and “Celeste, the Gold Coast Virgin” took readers on a (potentially inaccurate) journey away from their regular lives.

The science fiction magazines in the collection constitute nearly complete runs of some of the major magazines of the era, including Galaxy, Astounding Science Fiction, and Fantasy and Science Fiction.  Many of the most famous science fiction writers of the 20^th century, including Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein and others were originally published in these magazines, and the collection extends from the late 1930s to the early 1970s.

A finding aid for the collection will be available online soon.

University of Chicago Magazine writer delves into the Yoffee Collection

Carrie Golus blogs about Barbara and Bill Yoffee's (AB'52) gift of African American and children's literature in The book that dare not speak its name.

Gift of African American and Children's Literature

 

Barbara and Bill Yoffee, AB'52, of Chevy Chase, Maryland, have donated nearly 1,000 titles in African American and children's literature to the University of Chicago Library. Included are many editions and versions of Helen Bannerman's Little Black Sambo; and collections of Kate Greenaway, Beatrix Potter, and the Rev. W. Awdry, author of the Thomas the Tank Engine books. See the Fall 2009 issue of Libra for more information.

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