Posts from the Berg Collection of English and American Literature

In this episode, NYPL's Carolyn Vegan and Hilary Havens of the University of Tennessee explored the manuscripts of 18th-century English novelist Frances Burney.

The books that English artist Charles Ricketts and his partner Charles Shannon designed for Oscar Wilde offer insight about a network of support between gay men in the publishing industry in the United Kingdom.

The first woman artist to be regularly employed by Houghton Mifflin—and one of the most prolific designers of her day—was Sarah de St. Prix Wyman Whitman. She frequently collaborated with author Sarah Orne Jewett.

In the 1920s, Moore worked as a part-time clerk at the Hudson Park Branch of The New York Public Library, which some critics have linked to the exacting and cataloguing character of her writing.

Although controversial for its socialist overtones, 'Germinal' was a popular success that was quickly adapted to the stage, and has since spurred countless reprints, translations, and adaptations.

Her advice to potential researchers: "Do not be scared off by the magnificence of this institution...a library is only as important as its potential readers."

She is a PhD candidate in English studies at Université Bordeaux-Montaigne and Universiteit Antwerpen. Her research addresses collaborative translation processes, with a specific focus on the French translations of James Joyce’s Ulysses.

In the 145 years since its initial publication, Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland has provided continuous inspiration for artists and illustrators. But the most iconic Alice images remain John Tenniel’s illustrations for the first edition published in 1865. This February marked the bicentennial anniversary of Tenniel’s birth, and in celebration of that milestone, The New York Public Library has digitized a set of Alice books interleaved with proofs of Tenniel’s illustrations.

Revolution was in the air on October 8, 2020, when the Doc Chat community traveled back in time to New York City in the 1960s to learn about the vibrant radical literary culture of the Lower East Side.

During her research on Frances Burney she found an artifact that she considers "a testament to the ongoing importance and irreplaceable value of our archives and libraries".

Pichaya Damrongpiwat's time in the Berg Collection changed the direction of her research.

She describes her three years of work in the Berg Collection using the Jack Kerouac archive.

As part of our series on researchers who use NYPL collections for their work, we interview an NYU student about his favorite Library spaces, places to work, and even lunch choices.

Happy 235th Birthday to English poet, journalist, and literary critic Leigh Hunt, born this day in 1784. Though not often remembered for his own writings, Hunt had a major influence on British literature of the 19th century.

To celebrate Herman Melville's 200th birthday, the Library is displaying notable Melville items from our collections, including family correspondence and literary manuscripts.

A Library Fellow discovers the staggering volume of research undertaken by Proulx for her novels: notes, comments, observations, and newspaper clippings on small communities, and the all-too-frequent violence within.

The term Black Humor was coined in the 1960s by critics who regarded him as a founder, and although Friedman admits that he was never fond of the term, it is true that he helped pioneer this darker comic tone that was grimmer than conventional satire.

James Joyce's Ulysses is a novel unique in the history of English literature, perhaps all literature, in that it has a day dedicated to its celebration all over the world. The day is named for Leopold Bloom, one of the novel's three chief characters.

The premise of Sarton’s picaresque novel pivots on her recollections of her encounters with past lovers — "Muses" — who inspire her to write one of her books. For Stevens, each of these meetings is a "collision" of sorts: frequently resulting in a loss of equilibrium, and sometimes serious damage to herself and others. And yet, she is adamant that feeling — even feelings of anger and despair — yield good art. As she tells her interviewers, "eventually her [the Muse's] visitations must be paid for in human terms. And one