Beyond the Reading Room

This weekend, Ann Arbor Civic Theatre presents Arcadia by Tom Stoppard, directed by Melissa Freilich, April 19-22, 2018, at the University of Michigan’s Arthur Miller Theatre, 1226 Murfin Ave, 48109. Performances are Thursday at 7:30 p.m., Friday-Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m. Come early to the performance (or catch us during intermission) on Saturday, April 21 for a Rare Book Meet & Greet with the Special Collections Research Center, displaying early 19th century books on landscape architecture, mathematics, dancing, and poetry.

The Special Collections Research Center is pleased to announce the opening of Seven Fantasy Classics for Children, a new exhibit in the Audubon Room, curated by Lisa Makman's English 313 course, Children's Literature and the Invention of Modern Childhood. Join us for an informal opening today on Tuesday, April 10th, 1:00-2:30pm in the Hatcher Gallery. Light refreshments will be served.

The Special Collections Research Center is pleased to announce a new online exhibit: The Life and Times of Lizzy Bennet. This exhibit features a selection of materials from the physical exhibit commemorating the 200th anniversary of Jane Austen's death, which was on display in the Audubon Room of Hatcher Graduate Library, November 20, 2017 - March 30, 2018.

We are very excited to announce that the Labadie Collection has acquired a new Emma Goldman archive. This is an important collection that had until recently been in private hands.

As the fashionable elite came to eat dinner later and later in the day, supper became almost obsolete. As Maria Rundell notes in the 1813 edition of A New System of Domestic Cookery, “hot suppers are not much in use where people dine very late.” One exception to this rule was a ball, when late hours and active exercise called for substantial evening fare. In Emma, several of the main characters visit a local inn to assess its ability to host a ball, and much is made of the question of where to serve the supper. In the absence of a suitable room, Mrs. Weston proposes simply having sandwiches, but is adamantly shot down. In the words of the narrator, “A private dance, without sitting down to supper, was pronounced an infamous fraud upon the rights of men and women.”

Have you ever wondered what the Bennet sisters' adventures in Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice might look like in the 21st century? On Wednesday, March 28th from 6:00-7:30pm, join Anne Charlotte Mecklenburg, PhD student in the University of Michigan's English Department, for a screening of selected mini-episodes from the web series The Lizzie Bennet Diaries, followed by discussion. This event will take place in the Shapiro Undergraduate Library, Screening Room 2160.

As noted in Dining with Jane Austen II: No Such Thing as Lunch?, dinner shifted from noon-time to evening over the course of the 18th century, but this change occurred slowly and unevenly, with the result that certain households - especially those with claims to urbanity and fashion - might eat their main meal of the day much later than others. In Sense and Sensibility, The Dashwoods dine at 4pm at home in Barton Cottage, but in London, Mrs. Jenning’s begins dinner at 5 o’clock. In Pride and Prejudice, dinner is served at Longbourne at 4:30, but the fashionable Bingleys bring their London hours to Netherfield and dine at 6:30pm.

Fifty years ago, on March 16, 1968, in the Vietnamese village of My Lai in Quảng Ngãi Province, American soldiers, led by Lt. William Calley, summarily executed over 500 men, women, children, and babies at point blank range.

Over the course of the eighteenth century, the time and contents of meals gradually shifted. By the turn of the 19th century, dinner had become detached from its earlier noontime association and might be eaten anytime from mid-afternoon to as late as six or seven o’clock in the evening. However, lunch had not yet become a commonly established sit-down meal. Dr. Johnson’s Dictionary of 1755 defines “lunch” or “luncheon” as “as much food as one’s hand can hold,” in other words, a sort of snack that might be eaten anytime between meals.

Don't miss "Handwritten Heritage: Arabic Texts in Manuscript" on display March 5th - April 13th in the Special Collections Exhibit Gallery (660J) on the 6th floor of Hatcher! The exhibit features a selection of iconic Arabic texts from the holdings of the Islamic Manuscripts Collection preserved in the University Library.