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Scrapbook regarding Charles Lamb and his circle
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Held at: University of Pennsylvania: Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts [Contact Us]3420 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104-6206
This is a finding aid. It is a description of archival material held at the University of Pennsylvania: Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts. Unless otherwise noted, the materials described below are physically available in their reading room, and not digitally available through the web.
Overview and metadata sections
While this volume is not attributed to any specific person, it is possible that it was once owned and possibly donated by Mrs. James Gay Gordon, Jr. of Philadelphia, PA. Many of the clippings in the scrapbook contain reviews of and information on Charles Lamb (1775-1834), an English writer and essayist best known for his Essays of Elia and his children's book Tales from Shakespeare. He was also a poet and a part of the English literary circle of the time. His quirky and whimsical writing style is said to have earned him somewhat of a cult following in England, to which the creator of this scrapbook may have belonged.
This volume contains London-based newspaper clippings of literary reviews as well as a few music reviews and poems dating between 1825 and 1895. Among the publications from which articles were clipped are Eliza Cook's Journal, the English Review, the Illustrated Times, the Mirror, the Academia, the Illustrated London News, the Literary World, and several others.
Charles Lamb is clearly the focus of this scrapbook, with clippings regarding his writing, his family, his home, and his death. However, the creator of the scrapbook also collected information about the literary circle to which he belonged. Authors with significant focus in the volume include Samuel Taylor Coleridge, William Hazlitt, Leigh Hunt, and his sister Mary Lamb. There are also numerous clippings for William Blake, Thomas Carlyle, William Godwin, Samuel Rogers, and Percy Bysshe Shelley. In many cases, these clippings relate to Lamb, but there are also articles that are solely focused on members of this literary circle.
In addition to these clippings is an undated University of Pennsylvania Department of Archaeology Free Museum of Science and Art public lectures brochure. It is unclear how or if this University of Pennsylvania brochure is related to the creator of the volume.
- Publisher
- University of Pennsylvania: Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts
- Finding Aid Author
- Kelin Baldridge
- Finding Aid Date
- 2016 February 29
- Access Restrictions
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This collection is open for research use; however, the binding of this volume is very fragile. Researchers are asked to handle the volume with care.
- Use Restrictions
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Copyright restrictions may exist. For most library holdings, the Trustees of the University of Pennsylvania do not hold copyright. It is the responsibility of the requester to seek permission from the holder of the copyright to reproduce material from the Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts.