̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge - James Clements

Jane Austen treasure is on display today to mark the bicentenary of the novelist’s death

amb206 — Mon, 17 Jul 2017 09:20:56 +0000

When Jane Austen died on 18 July 1817 she had been working on a new novel. With four published novels (all published anonymously), she had accrued an enthusiastic following. ̽��ֱ��title she chose for this latest book was ̽��ֱ��Brothers. After her death, it was released as Sanditon, the name of the seaside town that features in the story.

̽��ֱ��three notebooks in which Austen wrote Sanditon are among the greatest treasures held by King’s College Archive. ̽��ֱ��College will today (18 July 2017) display two of these notebooks in an exhibition in its Old Library. ̽��ֱ��remaining notebook is on loan to the Bodleian Library in Oxford.

Sanditon is the star attraction of a Jane Austen Open Day organised to display around 40 items. ̽��ֱ��objects, arranged in three cases, comprise books and letters – and together represent King’s College’s biggest-ever display of Austen-related material.

̽��ֱ��autograph manuscript of Sanditon can only be described as priceless. ̽��ֱ��manuscript is rarely displayed as both the ink and paper used are vulnerable to light. It was last shown to the public for one day in 2013. Due to the significance of this year's anniversary, it will be displayed again later this year at Open Cambridge.

“A .digital version of Sanditon is available but we want people to have the chance to see the manuscript itself,” said Dr James Clements, King’s College Librarian.

“We know that Jane began writing Sanditon in January 1817 and that her last entry is dated 18th March 1817, by which time she’d completed 12 chapters. ̽��ֱ��novel begins with a carriage accident and charts familiar Austen territory with its wry and witty exploration of society politics.”

̽��ֱ��Sanditon manuscript was given to King’s College in 1930 by Austen’s great-great niece, Mary Isabella Lefroy, whose brother-in-law (Augustus Austen-Leigh) had been Provost of the College. ̽��ֱ��letter in which she talks about giving the notebooks to the College is on display. In it, she presents Sanditon in memory of “the most popular Provost, and Provostess ‘Kings’ has ever had”.

Also on display are first editions of the Austen novels published in her lifetime: Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Mansfield Park, and Emma, all published anonymously. Only after Austen’s death, when her novels Northanger Abbey and Persuasion were first published in December 1817 (also in the exhibition), was she identified as the author.

̽��ֱ��Georgian town of Bath figures in several Austen novels. A copy of ̽��ֱ��New Bath Guide for 1807, on display alongside the first edition of Persuasion, sets the scene with stunning engravings of life at the fashionable spa.

Other items of interest in the exhibition include a letter from Austen to her publisher, in which she takes a reviewer to task, and examples of early editions of Austen’s novels, including the first edition of Emma to appear in the USA, and a Railway Library edition of Pride and Prejudice “in fancy boards” priced one shilling.

̽��ֱ��Jane Austen Open Day at King’s College takes place today (18 July 2017) from 10am to 4pm. For details and directions, go to https://kcctreasures.com/ There will be another chance to see the display as part Open Cambridge on 8 and 9 September 2017.

̽��ֱ��exhibition has been made possible through a cataloguing and outreach project supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund.

Jane Austen fans will have a rare chance today (18 July 2017) to see the manuscript of the novelist’s final (unfinished) novel at King’s College. ̽��ֱ��one-day exhibition in the College's Old Library marks Austen’s death 200 years ago and is open to the public.

A digital version of Sanditon is available but we want people to have the chance to see the manuscript itself.

James Clements, King's College Librarian

̽��ֱ��New Bath Guide for 1807

̽��ֱ��Royal Crescent in Bath

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. For image use please see separate credits above.

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From Shakespeare to Austen: King’s College celebrates the Thackeray Collection of rare books

amb206 — Sat, 18 Jun 2016 09:00:00 +0000

When King’s College was bequeathed a library of some 4,000 books by George Thackeray, who was its Provost from 1814 to 1850, the gift arrived as a mixed blessing. Right up until the 1830s, the College library had been held in the side chapels of its world-famous chapel and there was nowhere suitable to house this large influx of volumes. Eventually bookcases were made for an outstanding collection of rare and precious books ranging in date of publication from the 1470s to 1850.

̽��ֱ��Thackeray Collection came to King’s in two instalments – a first donation on Thackeray’s death in 1850 and a second larger gift on the death of his daughter, Mary Ann, in 1879. Its contents reflect Thackeray’s interests in divinity, natural history, poetry and literature as well as travel and sport. ̽��ֱ��piecemeal nature of the donation, the wide range of books it encompasses and the lack of resources to organise it meant that a comprehensive and accurate catalogue of the collection in its entirety was never made.

Despite the lukewarm response to its arrival, and the absence of detailed descriptions of its contents, Thackeray’s library is now fully appreciated as one of the three most important gifts of books to King’s College in its long history, ranking alongside collections given by the scholar Jacob Bryant (1715-1804) and the economist John Maynard Keynes (1883-1946).

Last month King’s was awarded a generous grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund that will enable its librarians to catalogue and conserve around 1,600 of the volumes bequeathed by the Thackerays in a project titled ‘Shakespeare and Austen at Cambridge: Celebrating their Centenaries in 2016 and 2017’. Funding is earmarked for the 1,000 or so works of English literature in the collection, which includes titles by some of the foremost names in literary history, among them John Milton, John Donne, Edmund Spenser and Ben Jonson.

̽��ֱ��variety of subject matter covered by his books reveals Thackeray to be something of a polymath. He bought items that interested him personally and he purchased both antiquarian and contemporary titles. Among the works of literature, of particular note on the 400th anniversary of the playwright’s death is a First Folio of Shakespeare’s plays, collated and published in 1623.

̽��ֱ��First Folio is one of 233 known surviving copies (only about 45 of which are in the UK). Also in the collection are the Second (1632) and Fourth Folios (1685) of Shakespeare’s plays. ̽��ֱ��front cover of the Fourth Folio is detached and cannot currently be used in exhibitions. One of the first tasks will be to repair this book so it can feature in the forthcoming outreach activities marking Shakespeare’s death.

Next year marks the 200th anniversary of the death of Jane Austen: Thackeray’s collection includes a complete set of Austen’s works. Highlights in the Austen collection include rare first editions of her novels Emma, Northanger Abbey and Persuasion along with early editions of Sense and Sensibility, Mansfield Park and Pride and Prejudice.

̽��ֱ��creation of a comprehensive catalogue of the novels, poetry and plays acquired by Thackeray will entail producing detailed online catalogue records for each book that include full publication details, physical descriptions, collation, description of marginalia, illustrations of rare and historic bindings, Library of Congress Subject Headings, provenance information, and bibliographic references.

Once complete this catalogue will be made available online, allowing scholars worldwide to search the contents of the collection and to consult items in the Library’s established reading rooms or request copies through its imaging services. Outreach is a key aspect of the award: planned is a series of exhibitions, talks, open days and workshops for the public. An appeal for volunteers to help with the organisation of outreach projects has met with an enthusiastic response.

“Many of these books are in need of conservation and cannot be consulted by users or used in exhibitions because of the risk that handling them may cause further damage: covers are detached; spines damaged; fragile items need to be placed in bespoke archival boxes, and so on. ̽��ֱ��risk is that further deterioration to the books will occur if we do not act now,” said King’s College Librarian, Dr James Clements.

An intriguing and tragic personal story underlies the Thackeray collection. George Thackeray was born into a wealthy family and was a cousin of the novelist William Makepeace Thackeray, best known for his novel Vanity Fair. George Thackeray attended Eton College and then King’s, where he took a BA followed by an MA. He returned to Eton as a teacher and then became private chaplain to George III and three successive monarchs. In 1814 he was elected Provost of King’s. A preferred candidate had been deemed too young. Thackeray, whose health was known to be poor, was seen as a convenient stopgap.

Thackeray remained stubbornly alive for a further 36 years – and shortly before his death was reported by Makepeace Thackeray to be looking “perfectly healthy, handsome, stupid and happy”. But Thackeray’s life was marked by loss. His first wife died shortly after their marriage. When his second wife went into labour with the couple’s first child, the physician attending her had been badly affected by the death of a previous patient, the Princess Charlotte. When Mrs Thackeray showed similar symptoms, the doctor shot himself. Mrs Thackeray died five days later.

It’s thought that Thackeray never recovered from this terrible blow and that his book collecting may have offered solace for his grief. His obituary notes that “there was not a vendor of literary curiosities in London who had not some reason for knowing the provost of King’s”. ̽��ֱ��tribute continues: “He was an erudite classic, and an eminent naturalist; and his collection and library, in connection with his study, are reputed (as private ones) to rank among, even if they are not the best in England.” Many of the volumes he purchased were sumptuously and expensively rebound in leather. All were identified by the addition of a bookplate featuring the Thackeray coat of arms.

As Provost of King’s, Thackeray steadfastly resisted change and dealt with miscreants with “an almost Roman firmness”. He was, however, outstandingly generous both to individual King’s scholars and to the college itself – though he could be acerbic and crabby. He blocked reform to an antiquated system whereby students at King’s were exempt from ̽��ֱ�� examinations – and it was only after this death that the College was able to phase out this privilege.

̽��ֱ��writer of his obituary comes to a blunt conclusion: “Many men have been more widely popular.” But Thackeray’s alleged grumpiness was accompanied by huge generosity of spirit – and, thanks to a generous award , scholars worldwide will soon have increased access to an important collection of rare books.

A generous award will allow King’s College to catalogue and conserve an important part of an outstanding collection of rare books given to the College by George Thackeray, a former Provost. Behind the Thackeray Collection lies an intriguing and tragic personal story.

It’s thought that Thackeray never recovered from this terrible blow [the death of his wife] and that his book collecting may have offered solace for his grief.

King's College Library

Books from the Thackeray Collection

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. For image use please see separate credits above.

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