Beyond the Reading Room

As part of the upcoming exhibit "Shakespeare on Page and Stage: A Celebration" (Audubon Room, January 11- April 27) we decided to include a facsimile version of a quarto gathering based on a real seventeenth-century quarto edition of a play held at the Special Collections Library: The tempest, or, The enchanted island. A comedy. As it is now acted at Their Majesties theatre in Dorset-Garden (London: H. Herringman, 1690), edited by John Dryden & William Davenant. Read the rest of this blog post if you wish to learn more about what a quarto is and how the folks from the Wolverine Press printed this replica.

We have recently purchased an extremely rare illustrated history of Spain. It consists of just twenty-four oblong leaves (152 x 262 mm), each of them containing six illustrations with their respective descriptive narratives below. Each of these pairs highlights important events in Spanish history from Antiquity until the reign of Philip V (1700-1746). There is no letterpress involved in the making of this book. The rectos of the pages have been entirely designed and printed by using the process of copperplate engraving.

"Estévez’s handmade book arts are not only storied in out Special Collections and displayed in his newest exhibit, but have been passed down to eager students. Continuing in that tradition, which he helped begin, Estévez led a workshop for Michigan students on the art of bookmaking."
Read more of this guest blog post by students in Prof. Ruth Behar's course, "Cuba and Its Diaspora." Professor Behar is Victor Haim Parera Collegiate Professor of Anthropology.

"Reading about Ediciones Vigía and Rolando Estévez was amazing, but actually getting to touch and hold and interact with the books added a whole new element of emotion and experience." Read more of this guest blog post by students in Prof. Ruth Behar's course, "Cuba and Its Diaspora." Professor Behar is Victor Haim Parera Collegiate Professor of Anthropology.

On display at the AADL Downtown Library in the Lower Level Display cases from December 2, 2015-January 15, 2016, this exhibit invites visitors to explore a wealth of illustrated animal rhymes from the Special Collections Library. Join members of the Ann Arbor Storytellers Guild from 1-2pm on Saturday, December 5, 2015 in the AADL Multipurpose Room for animal stories for the Pre-K and early elementary crowd.

A commemoration of the 100th anniversary of the execution of Joe Hill, the famous Wobbly bard.

We have recently purchased this very rare Japanese book on surgery for our History of Medicine Collection, which is particularly comprehensive on the history of surgery from the Middle Ages throughout the Renaissance. Since our holdings on this subject mainly focus on Western medicine, this Japanese imprint is a long overdue addition, being an extraordinary witness of one of many cultural exchanges between Japan and Europe from the sixteenth century onward.

Join us this Thursday, November 12th at 4:00 p.m. in the Hatcher Library Gallery for a lecture by donor and adjunct curator Jan Longone on Dining Out: Menus, Chefs, Restaurants, Hotels, & Guidebooks. Jan's lecture will delve into the development, selection process, and contents of this exhibition of the history of the eating out experience. The Exhibit will be on display (Hatcher, 2nd floor) in the Clark Map Library through January 19, 2016.

If you go trick-or-treating this weekend, watch out for witches in candy-filled houses! As Hansel and Gretel learn in this fairy tale, you may get more tricks than treats.

On November 5th, 1916, the town of Everett, WA, witnessed a violent confrontation between a citizens’ militia hostile to labor unions and a group of Industrial Workers of the World members sailing into the town’s port to support local workers on strike. The Labadie Collection has secured a new set of archival documents about the Everett Massacre to be available to researchers.