Activity: Talk or presentation › Invited talk › Research
Description
Enriqueta Rylands (1843-1908) founded Manchester’s world-famous John Rylands Library, which opened to the public on 1st January 1900. Rylands is known as a philanthropist, but Elizabeth Gow’s research has revealed her as a remarkable bibliophile. In this talk, Elizabeth will tell the story of Rylands’s book collecting. This collecting narrative reveals the slipperiness of commonly held collecting dichotomies such as public and private, religious and secular, acquisitive and philanthropic. In particular, the talk will challenge the notion that bulk acquisition and/or institutional purpose are inimical to ‘true’ collecting. Illustrated with highlights from the collections alongside archival records, this talk is grounded in Elizabeth’s PhD research, but will also present a new discovery, hot off the press!
Period
13 Jun 2024
Held at
Society for the History of Collecting, United Kingdom