Favourite finds: First Mills & Boon

Posted on 22 April, 2014 by special-collections

Although Mills & Boon didn’t start life as a romance publisher, the company’s first publication in 1908 was in fact a romance – Arrows from the Dark, by Sophie Cole.

While working through our own collection of Mills & Boon books, we stumbled across this gem: the very first copy sold of this very first Mills & Boon book, signed by managing directors Gerald Mills and Charles Boon on 25 March 1909 to mark the occasion.

Sophie Cole, who was the sister of Professor Cole, Professor of Zoology in the University of Reading and collector of our Cole Collection, went on to write dozens more books for the publishing house.

Favourite Finds: Benjamin Britten, Herbert Read & the anarchists

Posted on 11 March, 2014 by special-collections

Brian Ryder is one of our volunteers here at Special Collections. Brian’s history with Reading collections is a long one; he used to be one of our project cataloguers and is now working his way through the Routledge & Kegan Paul archive.

On March 13^th 1952 the composer Benjamin Britten (1913-1976) – on holiday in Austria – replied to two letters from Herbert Read (1893-1968) which had been sent on to him from his home in Aldeburgh. Read’s first letter came from the publisher Routledge & Kegan Paul, where Read was a director, and mentioned the possibility of meeting for lunch to discuss an idea of Britten’s for a book he was contemplating writing (carbon copy on file RKP 1951-1952 BER-BRO held in the Routledge archive, Special Collections Service, University of Reading).

The second letter letter holds more personal interest. It came from Read the anarchist rather than Read the publisher and, unlike Britten’s reply, was not lodged in the company’s files. The two men had known each other for some years and had been founding members of the Freedom Defence Committee, of which Read was chairman. Active from 1945 to 1949, its aim had been to ‘defend the civil liberties of all citizens’.

Britten’s reply to this second letter implied that it had contained an invitation to attend a public meeting, and he responded as follows:

‘I don’t see how I can possibly attend the protest meeting on 27^th– I shall only just be back in England & must get down to Aldeburgh to work. But any message of mine, which may be useful to read out, I wish you would use – you know how interested I am, & how much I regret not being present personally to show my indignation.’

The last few words of this passage had been lightly underlined with a coloured crayon, presumably by Read with the idea that he might relay them to the meeting.

The protest concerned the assassination of five Spanish anarchists by Franco’s agents. A leaflet protesting at these executions reports that a large public meeting entitled ‘An appeal to the public conscience’ had been held in London on March 27 1952 at which the speakers included Herbert Read. Read remained heavily involved in the anarchist movement, although he accepted a knighthood in 1953, and his writings on politics, art and culture totaled over 1,000 titles.

Polar vortex? An explorer, a biscuit and the South Pole

Posted on 30 January, 2014 by special-collections

As the world freezes over (well, part of it – Reading is recovering from floods, not frost!), we thought it particularly appropriate to share the story of an intrepid (if tragic) explorer and his much loved biscuits.

As early 20th-century explorers raced to reach the South Pole, they considered their supplies carefully; the right provisions could (and did) make the difference between life and a chilly death. Captain Scott set out in 1910, and part of his provisions included Huntley & Palmers biscuits – not just any biscuits, but specially made ones.

British Antarctic Expedition header

Later arrivals at Cape Evans, where Scott began his last fateful journey, found several packing cases of Huntley & Palmers biscuits in remaining food stores. Records indicate that Scott initially set out with Digestive, Rich Tea, Petit Beurre, Fancy Lunch and Ginger Nuts biscuits among others (including fruit cake), as well as Emergency, Antarctic and Small Captain biscuits; later resupplies included digestives and Small Captains.

Huntley & Palmers was not an unusual choice for Scott; by the turn of the century, their biscuits accounted for 75% of the total export of biscuits and cakes from the UK. Scott commissioned a special recipe from the company (now available on their website); although later research suggests that the team’s diet may have fallen short in nutrition, Scott believed the biscuits to be ideal.

On 20 October 1911, Scott wrote to Huntley & Palmers: ‘Dear Sirs. After further full experience of the Antarctic and Emergency biscuits supplied by you to this Expedition I am of the opinion that no better biscuits could be made for travelling purposes. I consider that they especially meet the requirements of Polar work in their hardness, food value and palatability. Yours faithfully, R Scott’.

Although Scott and the last of his men died in March 1912, they were not found until much later that year, and preparations were made back in the UK to send a selection of fruit cakes to supply the men when they returned; Huntley & Palmers themselves supplied a special Christmas cake for Scott.

The biscuit and its fame live on, however. In 1999, a biscuit found next to Scott’s body was auctioned for nearly £4,000. Purchaser Sir Ranulph Fiennes, who called it ‘the most expensive biscuit in the world’, passed the biscuit to the UK Antarctic Heritage Trust based in Cambridge.

New featured item: Selectus Diplomatum et Numismatum Scotiae Thesaurus

Posted on 29 November, 2013 by special-collections

James Anderson, Selectus Diplomatum et Numismatum Scotiae Thesaurus, 1739

Engraved frontispiece from Selectus Diplomatum et Numismatum Scotiae Thesaurus

James Anderson (1662–1728) was a Scottish historiographer and antiquary. Born in Edinburgh in 1662, the son of a Presbyterian minister, he studied law at the University of Edinburgh from 1677 until 1680. As a lawyer, he was required to study old charters and documents, and became interested in antiquarian scholarship, eventually abandoning the legal profession altogether. He first gained notoriety from his involvement in the polemics over the Act of Settlement (1701), and was granted funding for his Diplomata Scotiae, which involved the collection and engraving of all available medieval Scottish charters and seals. It was his life’s work, and was finished and published after his death.

To read all about our copy and its history, see our newest featured item by Dr Esther Meijers on our website.

Favourite finds: Come to the Farm

Posted on 30 August, 2013 by special-collections

Come to the Farm [CHILDREN’S COLLECTIONS 360 GUN]

I’m Liz McCarthy, one of the two UMASCS Librarians. One of the best parts of my job is discovering things – whether that’s finding interesting material in our collections, adding items to the library or simply learning new things about our collections from a researcher.

Earlier this summer, I found a charming little book at a London bookseller’s shop, and I thought it was a perfect fit for us. It’s a tiny book, only about 10 cm tall, called Come to the Farm. It was published as part of a series called Tuck’s Better Little Books, and one of what were often called ‘Air Raid Booklets’. Published during the war, these small economic booklets (mainly for kids) could easily be carried in your pocket to an air raid. The subjects ranged from pure entertainment (bedtime stories, fairy tales) to educational or propaganda material (Brave Boys in War, I’m a Land Girl).

In Come to the Farm, two children named Joan and Peter explore a farm for the first time, learning about the buildings, animals and work as well as the answers to such pressing questions as ‘Why do the roads and hedges twist about so much?’ and ‘What do pigs eat?’ It’s ‘the most exciting day they’d had for months’, and it may be that the book was designed to help young children feel more secure about evacuations to the countryside. Although evacuations had largely scaled down by 1942, the uncertainty of the war made the possibility of further moves a very real one.

Come to the Farm is part of our Children’s Collection, but it touches on other areas of relevance to our readers and researchers. MERL researchers may be interested in the descriptions of farm life to children, and the wartime farm focus certainly complements our Evacuee Archive. Please do call up the book and take a look!

Freud at Reading

Posted on 13 August, 2013 by special-collections

One hundred years ago, Sigmund Freud despaired of ever seeing published (as The Interpretation of Dreams) the English translation of his book Die Traumdeutung. His publishers, George Allen & Company, normally corresponded on this matter with translator AA Brill, an Austrian disciple of Freud’s living in the United States. However, in January 1913 they wrote directly to the author asking that various references to sexual matters be omitted, pleading that were this not to be done the book would have to be restricted in its sale only to those with a professional interest in its subject.

Freud’s letter to his publishers

On 1 February 1913 Freud replied in German from Vienna (see AU C 2/13). Spencer Stallybrass, George Allen’s company secretary, translated the letter so that it could be considered by the editorial management. Stallybrass carefully folded the letter precisely in half and, in the hand which made the company’s board minutes so easily read and understood, wrote on the back the following:

Dear Sirs

I much regret that, in consequence of your opinion, you found it necessary to make such a request of me. In order not to embarrass either yourselves or the translator, I am prepared to consent to the desired omissions in so far as Dr Brill agrees to them, and I will write to him to this effect.

I wish you a speedy settlement of the matter, and success to the undertaking.

Yours respectfully

Freud

A translation of Freud’s letter by the company secretary

The book was immediately published and has been in print ever since. In 1914 George Allen & Company, unable to continue in business, was purchased from the receiver by Stanley Unwin and became George Allen & Unwin Ltd. Freud’s letter remained folded and unmentioned in any catalogue until it was discovered during preparations in 2000 for the Allen & Unwin archive to be made searchable online.

In 1929 Allen & Unwin published another book of interest to Freud and his circle, this time entitled A Young Girl’s Diary, anonymous but with an introduction by Freud. It was translated by Eden and Cedar Paul, favourites of Stanley Unwin who believed that no satisfactory translation could be completed which was other than into the translator’s first language (in the 1950s the translations of Freud’s work by Brill, for whom German was his first language, were replaced by new ones by James Strachey). A Young Girl’s Diary attracted the attentions of the Director of Public Prosecutions and the publisher was forced to do what George Allen had feared – booksellers who ordered it were instructed that it should only be sold to members of the medical, legal and educational professions (see AUC 5/15).

Recent highlights

Posted on 24 July, 2013 by special-collections

Do you follow us on Twitter (we’re @UniRdg_SpecColl)? Our staff regularly share images and snippets from our collections on Twitter, and we thought we’d share highlights from our recent tweets. Enjoy!

An unusual recent acquisition for our Great Exhibition Collection

A peek inside our copy of Kircher’s Musurgia Universalis, complete with singing chickens!

A colourful shelf from our HM Brock library

Favourite Find: Aubrey Beardsley’s illustrations for ‘The Rape of the Lock’

Posted on 20 July, 2013 by special-collections

I’m Fiona Melhuish, and in my work with the Special Collections rare books I get lots of opportunities to spotlight my favourite items from our wonderful book collections through our Featured Items on the Special Collections website. One of these include an edition of Oscar Wilde’s play Salome, with illustrations by Aubrey Beardsley, and for my first ‘Favourite Find’, I would like to focus on another of Beardsley’s masterpieces, his illustrations for The rape of the lock : an heroi-comical poem in five cantos by Alexander Pope. This small book, measuring 14.3 cm high, was published in London by Leonard Smithers in 1897, three years after Elkin Mathews & John Lane published Salome. It is a copy of the miniature ‘bijou’ edition of the book that Smithers had first published in 1896, and is one of 1000 copies printed on art paper.

Headpiece for the first canto: ‘The Billet-Doux’

Aubrey Beardsley was born in 1872 and died from tuberculosis in 1898 at the age of only twenty-five. He completed the ten Rape of the Lock drawings and a cover design for the first edition in just a few months despite his increasingly poor health. During his short and brilliant career he became notorious for his illustrations in two ‘decadent’ periodicals of the period, The Yellow Book and The Savoy. His designs and illustrations for books such as Le Morte D’arthur, Lysistrata, Salome and Volpone added to his notoriety as the most daring artist of the 1890s.

The exquisite illustrations for The Rape of the Lock, considered by many critics to be among Beardsley’s finest work, are almost like pieces of intricate needlework in their delicate rendering of line, texture and pattern. It is appropriate that the title page should credit the illustrations as having been “embroidered … by Aubrey Beardsley”. Close examination of the drawings also reveals that they are full of Beardsley’s mischievous wit, especially in his use of sexual imagery, and demonstrate his flair for satire, features which are characteristic of much of Beardsley’s art.

Plate: ‘The Toilet’ – Belinda at her dressing table.

Beardsley produced the illustrations in the style of eighteenth-century engravings, inspired by the French rococo style. The drawings are photoengravings, drawn on paper and then photographed directly onto the wood block, enabling the artist to make his drawing in any size he wanted since it could then be reduced by photography to the dimensions required for the publication. The eminent American artist James McNeill Whistler, who was known to dislike Beardsley’s work, was forced to change his opinion when shown a portfolio of The Rape of the Lock drawings by Beardsley himself, declaring that “Aubrey, I have made a very great mistake – you are a very great artist” whereupon Beardsley, overcome by the unexpected praise, burst into tears. Even Punch magazine, who had ridiculed the artist as ‘Aubrey Beardsley-Weirdsley’ because of his taste for the grotesque, came close to praise when it described The Rape of the Lock as “a dainty curiosity”.

Pope’s narrative poem was first published in 1712 and then later revised, expanded and reissued, appearing in its final form in 1717. The poem, a satire on contemporary society, centres on a ‘storm in a teacup’ incident of a theft of a lock of hair from the character of Belinda by her suitor, the Baron. The triviality of the incident is emphasised by Pope’s use of the formal and elaborate structure of a classical epic poem. The story was based on an actual incident recounted by Pope’s friend, John Caryll.

Plate: ‘The Rape of the Lock’ – the Baron can be seen on the left of the picture snipping off a lock of Belinda’s hair with a pair of scissors.

This book is one of a number of publications illustrated by Beardsley held in the University rare book collections. Other books include his illustrated edition of Ben Jonson’s Volpone (1898) and Under the Hill (1904), as well as a number of volumes of The Savoy and The Yellow Book. The University archives also hold correspondence and personal papers relating to Beardsley, which include family photographs. There are also a number of archive collections relating to other figures of the 1890s period, including Lord Alfred Douglas, W.B. Yeats, Oscar Wilde (in the Sherard papers), and the publishers John Lane and Charles Elkin Mathews.

Plate: ‘The Battle of the Beaux and Belles’ – Belinda confronts the Baron.

Talking cake and victory cake: #MusCake Day

Posted on 19 June, 2013 by special-collections

The first in our ‘Favourite Finds’ series looks at cake – a staple in every workplace. Claire Wooldridge, UMASCS Graduate Trainee, elaborates.

It will be thought very odd, I doubt not by each little boy and girl, into whose hands this book shall fall, that a Banbury Cake should be able to write (as it were) its own life… but… many strange things happen every day – I shall therefore, without more words to the bargain, proceed in my story…

The History of a Banbury Cake (CHILDREN’S COLLECTION–828.7-HIS)

In anticipation of today’s #MusCake theme, it soon became clear to we of the special collections library team that delicious cake temptation runs through our collections like the jam in a Swiss roll. Featured below are just a few items from our MERL library and special collection rare books that will surely delight all cake lovers. Talking Banbury cakes are just the beginning!

The extraordinary Banbury cake (much like an Eccles cake) quoted above is the subject of The history of a Banbury cake: an entertaining book for children, published in 1835. This book is a real treasure of our children’s collection. The miniature 11x7cm text with its original blue paper binding (with pictorial covers) has been preserved inside a larger, modern casing.

The History of a Banbury Cake - text and illustration

The History of a Banbury Cake (CHILDREN’S COLLECTION–828.7-HIS)

The delightful tale of a talking and kindly Banbury cake documents its sale and subsequent journey from Oxford to Bristol. Before meeting its end by ‘falling prey to Billy’, the cake imparts moral and behavioural advice to its ‘little readers’, so that they will be ‘respected and beloved by all who know you’. A cake with a message indeed!

The Amateur Cook (RESERVE–641.5942-BUR)

Lamenting the ‘austere and solemn severity of demeanour’ of contemporary cook books, The Amateur Cook by K Burrill and Annie M Booth, published in 1905, is another title which features cakes, bakes and cookery in an unusual and intriguing manner. The writers hope to inject a more ‘frivolous spirit’ into printed works on cookery and baking, to address the production of dull and complicated cookery titles of which they saw ‘no end’. This is achieved through an unusual format; the text takes the form of a narrative intermingled with recipes, in which the protagonists, well-to-do early twentieth century ladies, are instructed in baking and cookery. In the chapter ‘Triumphant Teas’, the young ladies are instructed by their tutor, Delecta, on cakes and baking while trying to avoid falling asleep… ‘You told me, Lesbia, your cakes were often wrong. Now do try and look interested, like a good girl, while I read you some notes on cake making…’

The Amateur Cook – ‘ever ready to eat up my failures’! (RESERVE–641.5942-BUR)

The Amateur Cook is illustrated in a wonderful art nouveau style, on the cover and throughout the book. Many of the illustrations are intended to tie in with the comical nature of the book, such as the pictorial end papers which feature a woman feeding to a dog one of her culinary attempts with the caption ‘ever ready to eat up my failures’! As Delecta would say, ‘it is far easier to make than bake!’

Modern Cookery – chapter on cakes (RESERVE–641.5-ACT)

Eliza Acton was an early nineteenth century cook who wrote one of the first books on cookery featuring lists of ingredients, timings and instructions to produce a recipe book similar to today’s format. The well known Mrs Beeton’s Book of Household Management (first published in 1861) was largely based on Acton’s work. We hold the revised and enlarged edition of Acton’s Modern Cookery for Private Families published in 1875 (first published in 1845).

In Acton’s revised edition, her position on cakes and consumption of cake is laid bare (those who like to believe cake can do no wrong, avert your eyes!). She wishes that the space allotted to ‘sweet poisons’ in this edition had been ‘diminished still further’ due to the ‘illness’ the ‘habitual indulgence’ of rich buttery cakes can cause. Acton does concede, however, that occasional consumption of simple buns, biscuits and cakes is ‘not unwholesome’… some good news for cake lovers at least!

The British and Empire Confectioner, Baker, and Restaurateur

Our MERL Library periodical holdings feature several twentieth-century titles relating to cakes, confectionary and baking – ripe to be utilised by investigators of social, domestic and cultural history, alongside of the baking industry itself.

These titles often span the twentieth century, taking in resourceful baking methods to negate the impact of food rationing and how imperial and national achievements were celebrated through the medium of cake, such as victory fruit cakes in 1945 and a ‘polar cake’ to mark exploration in 1910.

Victory Fruit Cakes and a Polar Cake, both from The Baker and Confectioner (MERL LIBRARY PEROA–BRI/FOR)

Our Milling and Baking collection, alongside the titles of the open access MERL library, are ideal for those interested in researching baking in its industrial or scholarly context.

For those with a sweet tooth, there are many more cake and baking references to be found within our collections beyond these highlighted for museum cake day, 19 June.

Beckett, Books and Biscuits: University of Reading Special Collections

Category Archives: Favourite Finds