Dust Jacket

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Ladybird book biographies: Part 6

This copy of the Autumn volume was acquired by an academic interested in the study of children’s literature. This also just happens to be an academic who has kindly contributed ideas and content towards the main banners in the exhibition itself. Dr Sue Walsh is a colleague of my co-curator Neil Cocks and works alongside him within CIRCL (Centre for International Research in Childhood: Literature, Culture and Media). With this institutional affiliation in mind it it easy to see why she might have been interested in acquiring a copy of this particular book.

Sue Walsh's copy of the 'Autumn' book

Sue Walsh’s copy of ‘What to Look For in Autumn’, complete with the standard dust jacket. It appears much the same as all the other first editions on display.

It appears at first glance to be much like the other first editions that we have borrowed for the exhibition. It has its dust jacket and is in near pristine condition. The price is, of course, the standard 2’6 for which Ladybird became known.

Price on the dust jacket of Sue Walsh's copy.

The standard price of 2’6, as printed on the dust jacket of Sue Walsh’s copy.

However, as with other individual copies, more careful visual inspection reveals subtle differences in the way this particular book has been treated by its previous owners. There are scribbles that evidence a perhaps less caring owner, most likely a child!

Scribbles on the title page of Sue Walsh's copy.

Scribbles on the title page of Sue Walsh’s copy of the ‘Autumn’ book, surrounding the iconic Ladybird logo.

Perhaps more interesting still is the later addition of an alternate price, no doubt by an enthusiastic second hand book seller. The price of £6.50 has been written inside, indicating a significant increase on its original price of 2/6. Whatever Sue herself paid for the book, this is evidence enough that the financial value of these volumes has increased markedly and that they are nolonger the economical literature of the people that they once were. Instead, they are the preserve of book collectors, enthusiasts, and specialists.

Price annotation on Sue Walsh's copy of the 'Autumn' book.

A later price annotation of £6.50 adorns the inside of Sue Walsh’s copy of the ‘Autumn’ book.

Sue herself acquired her copy with the possibility of using it for teaching or research purposes at some point in the future. I hope that involvement in this project has enthused her to make active use of this copy in the classroom context. Thanks to Sue for the generous loan of this volume and thanks also for providing ideas and content for the following exhibition banner.

Exhibition banner based on content and ideas provided by Sue Walsh.

This exhibition banner explores ideas connected with the notion of an animal and of absence and is based on content provided by Sue Walsh.

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Ladybird book biographies: Part 5

Echoing the themes of the last blog post on this topic, this example offers further evidence of the amazing and widespread enthusiasm that exists for Ladybird books. This time the impetus of the person acquiring this particular copy of a What to Look For book was not centred on a love of the work of Tunnicliffe but was based on a love of children’s literature. Indeed, this copy of the Spring volume has been kindly lent to the exhibition by children’s book enthusiast and collector Polly Harte.

Polly Harte's first edition copy of 'What to Look For in Spring'

Polly Harte’s first edition copy of ‘What to Look For in Spring’. Like Lionel Kelly’s ‘Autumn’ volume it lacks a dust jacket, revealing the Tunnicliffe image beneath.

Polly Harte works in the Department of Typography and Graphic Communication at the University of Reading. More specifically, she helps to run its commercial and printing section, the Design and Print Studio, and has therefore played a peripheral but nevertheless key part in administration running alongside the production of panels and printed content for use in this exhibition.

In response to the original call for loan copies of the Autumn book, Polly had hoped that she on her shelves a first edition of the volume we were keen to use. She was sad to discover that she only had a copy of the Spring volume to hand. However, her enthusiasm for the book biographies microproject and for the wider goals of the exhibition itself was so overwhelming that I felt it impossible to decline her offer to lend another season instead.

Nevertheless, in spite of it not being the Autumn volume, Polly’s copy offers yet another unique and fascinating glimpse into the mulitfaceted stories that such items can tell. It was acquired at a car boot sale or in an informal second hand context. Polly collects these kinds of books because she has a longstanding interest in them and harbours the desire to return to researching them in greater detail.

Many thanks to Polly for kindly lending this book and for sharing her story. I hope she does decide to return to studying children’s books and that the exhibition lives up to her initial enthusiasm!

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Ladybird book biographies: Part 4

The appeal of Ladybird books as collectible items is well known, with specialist websites and blogs such as The Wee Web and Vintage Ladybird Books offering a growing wealth of online and detailed information on the volumes available and on the history of this rich strand of children’s literature and publishing history. In terms of the biographies of individual copies of Ladybird books many of these will find themselves in the hands of collectors at some point in their lifetimes. The copies we have borrowed for the exhibition are no exception.

The Tunnicliffe collector's book shelves

This photo shows the book shelves of Tunnicliffe collector Lionel Kelly, whose personal holdings include earlye ditions of many works illustrated by the artist.

We have on display a copy of the first edition of the Autumn volume that has been kindly lent by Lionel Kelly, a former academic who worked for many years in the Department of English here at the University of Reading. Like numerous other scholars of literature, Lionel was an enthusiastic book collector for many years. When he retired he became especially keen on the work of Charles Tunnicliffe and began collecting early editions of books that had been illustrated by him. This, of course, included copies from the What to Look For series.

Lionel Kelly's copy of 'What to Look For in Autumn'

Lionel Kelly’s copy of ‘What to Look For in Autumn’ is a frist edition but is lacking the standard dust jacket that came with the original volume. This lack of dust jacket reveals the monochrome Tunnicliffe image that graces the cover beneath.

Lionel has also lent his first edition copy of What to Look For in Winter, which features one of the most entertaining (not to mention worrying!) errata slips I have ever seen, and one with which other Ladybird enthusiasts are already familiar. This is shown in the picture below.

Errata slip from Lionel Kelly's first edition copy of the 'Winter' volume.

Errata slip from Lionel Kelly’s first edition copy of ‘What to Look For in Winter’.

The slip reads as follows:

ERRATA page 16 // “The red and purple berries that look like tiny jam tarts are not poisonous.”// should read // “The red and purple berries that look like tiny jam tarts are ALSO poisonous.”

One young owner of this particular copy of the book has tken it iupon themselves to write ‘are poisonous’ alongside the wording of the errata slip. Someone – perhaps the same previous owner – has also made the correction on page 16, as shown in the following image.

Correction made in pen to page 16 of Lionel Kelly's copy of the 'Winter' book.

A correction has been made to the text on page 16 of Lionel Kelly’s copy of ‘What to Look For in Winter’.

We are enormously grateful to Lionel for lending these two books and for lending a handful of other gems from his wider Tunnicliffe collection. These include two books illustrated by Tunnicliffe and, like the What to Look For series, also authored by Elliot Lovegood Grant Watson. He has also lent us a copy of Tunnicliffe’s How to Draw Farm Animals, an original pencil sketch from which we have borrowed from Oriel Ynys Môn. Why not drop in to see the exhibition and take a look at this original pencil sketch on display.

Lionel Kelly's copy of 'How to Draw Farm Animals'

One of Lionel Kelly’s two different editions of ‘How to Draw Farm Animals’.

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Ladybird book biographies: Part 2

This is the second of these ‘book biography’ blog posts and it just happens to be a fairly brief one. Here is a copy of the What to Look for in Autumn book that is owned (and has been kindly lent to the exhibition) by Julia Waters. Julia works in Modern Lanugauges and European Studies so there is no obvious connection between her career/profession and ownership of this book. It seems that, as she herself has noted, that she simply ‘loved it as a child’.

A copy of What to Look for in Autumn belonging to Julia Waters

This copy has been laminated to protect it, a familiar treatment for many library books or those expected to see heavy use.

As with the copy I blogged about in the first post on this theme, Julia’s copy is an early edition that features the characteristic Ladybird patterned inside covers. Alongside this patterned interior, the corner of the flyleaf again reveals that early price of 2’6.

Price of 2'6 on the cover of Julia Water's copy of the 'Autumn' volume.

The standard price of Ladybird books in the early 1960s was 2/6 (two shillings and sixpence), as shown here on the dustjacket of Julia Water’s copy, where the dustjacket has been laminated onto the cover.

The tan-coloured stains of old sticky-backed tape marks in the photograph above and in the one below both reveal an earlier history of use. Was this copy once in an institutional collection, hence the laminated finish? What was the tape intended to adhere to these inside covers? We will almost certainly never know the answer to these questions but they certainly begin to highlight some of the subtle archaeologies of artefacts that careful visual examinations like this can highlight.

As Julia obtained her copy as a child and her copy has clearly had a ‘prehistory’, what this certainly indicates is that Julia obtained her copy second hand. In other words (and without seeking to reveal anyone’s age on an exhibition blog!) the book predates Julia herself. This also goes some way towards illustrating the enduring popularity of these books, which have been loved and will continue to be loved by subsequent generations of young readers.

Sellotape marks and pencil marks underlying laminate covering on this copy

Another history of use and perhaps a point of sale mark-up are shown in this image of Julia Water’s copy.

Whatever the earlier history of this particular copy might have been, as with Fiona Cummin’s example this volume is set to have a familial path of descent as it is also much loved by Julia’s 6-year-old daughter on whose shelf it normally lives when not on loan to MERL! Thanks to Julia and her daughter for letting us borrow it.

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Ladybird book biographies: Part 1

In the lead up to the What to look for? exhibition I have begun to consider how the original huntsman image was not just reproduced once in the What to Look For in Autumn book but was replicated in every single copy printed. Each of these versions has the capacity to tell a different story, with unique narratives bound inseparably to particular copies and editions of the book itself.

These myriad histories might connect to owners through whose hands the book might have passed over the years. Perhaps there were specific reasons why people had originally purchased this particular volume or that governed why it had been given as a gift. Maybe it had been cherished, or perhaps even ignored and discarded. Markings and physical changes to each different copy—or indeed a relative lack of wear or damage—might help reveal or illustrate a lifetime of use.

Fiona Cummins' copy of the Autumn book

This copy of ‘What to Look For in Autumn’ has been kindly lent by Fiona Cummins.

With this in mind (and rather expecting to receive one or perhaps two responses at best) I made a widespread call to my colleagues across the University of Reading:

“… We are keen to explore how this single image has been reproduced, not only in subsequent editions of the book, but also in multiple copies of the same edition. By using actual examples we hope to communicate the diverse ‘biographies’ that each individual copy has had. We are appealing for colleagues across the University to check their bookshelves for copies of What To Look For in Autumn.

“The books need not be in pristine condition (few old Ladybird books are!). Signs of wear and tear are indicative of a history of active use. A sense of the ‘well-loved’ object is one of the many things we hope to show. Scribbles, inscriptions, dedications, and other marginalia (however rough and ready) are also of great interest. The main thing is to offer a sense of the many copies of this book that have been sold, many of which lurk amongst the numerous volumes that no doubt line your shelves at home.”

I was surprised to receive far more replies than I had expected and pleased to hear that each told a story that was not only unique, albeit subtley so in many instances, but was personal and informative. The copy pictured above and below is no exception.

Although simple and familair in character, this copy represents the sharing of books between family members. As its owner Fiona Cummins (Library Assistant at the University of Reading’s Main Library) notes, it was first given to her as a child and she probably aquired it in the early 1960s, soon after it was published. She then purposefully kept it, thus enabling her own children, now in their twenties, to use the same copy when they were children. She intends to keep hold of it so that any grandchildren she might have in future will also be able to enjoy it.

The Ladybird patterned paper that adorns the inside covers of early editions of the Autumn book

This image shows the iconic patterned paper that adorns the inside covers of early editions of the ‘Autumn’ book. In this instance, a copy owned by Fiona Cummins.

The very process of retrieving thisbook from her shelves and giving thought to why and how she it came to be there has encouraged Fiona to reflect on the value she has placed on this book and on similar books:

“I would be delighted to put it to any good use as it is just gathering dust in a cupboard at the moment… It has a dust jacket and is unmarked… I have quite a lot of books like this. I also worked as a Nursery School Teacher but probably should have been a Childrens’ Librarian!”

Whether Fiona bought the book or it was a gift, I think we can agree that it was clearly 2’6 well spent!

The standard price of Ladybird books in the early 1960s was 2/6 (two shillings and sixpence)

The standard price of Ladybird books in the early 1960s was 2/6 (two shillings and sixpence), as shown here on the prinstine dust jacket of Fiona Cummin’s cherished copy of the ‘Autumn’ book.