[Libri] FW: [SHARP-L] AAS Regional Academic Seminar, Nov. 18: Sean Moore on Book Borrowing in Early Newport

[James R. Kelly]

On Monday, November 18, the American Antiquarian Society will present a
regional academic seminar given by Sean Moore, Associate Professor of
English at the University of New Hampshire, titled “The Redwood Receipt
Books and Newport Slavers: A Bio-Bibliographical Inquiry into the Borrowing
Records of Early America's Premier Slave-Trading Port.” This seminar series
is co-sponsored by the history departments of Brown University, Clark
University, and the University of Connecticut.

 

Professor Moore has offered the following précis of his paper: Rarely do
scholars find evidence of the reception of works, but the Redwood Library’s
receipt books from eighteenth-century Newport, Rhode Island present the
opportunity to do a bio-bibliographical analysis of some of the Redwood’s
readers and perhaps move us towards an understanding of readers’ tastes. The
surviving receipt books are records of what books were borrowed from the
library during a five year period from 1756-1761, and were kept by Ezra
Stiles, the librarian of the Redwood and future president of Yale
University. These printed forms list three blanks per page, and are filled
in cursive handwriting with the title of the book, the cash deposit to
borrow it, the name of the borrower, and the librarian’s signature. Most of
the names have been torn out of them, the custom at the time being to tear
out the name of the borrower after the book was returned. Whether this was
done to protect the privacy of readers is an open question, but the
important thing for my research is that many of the names were not torn out,
or at least not completely. This evidence of who was reading what books is
not only of interest to book history, however, but also provides the chance
to do what D.F. McKenzie and Jerome McGann described as a “sociology” of the
text that considers the possible motives of the readers who were wealthy
enough to pay the deposit on a book within what some historians have called
early America’s premier slave shipping port. This paper, accordingly, will
explore the role of the philanthropy of slave traders and owners in
financing the library’s collection and argue that the receipt books give us
insight into the financial interests of readers and the possible reasons why
they might have been borrowing particular books.  

 

The seminar will take place at 5:00 PM on Monday, Nov. 18, at the Society’s
Goddard-Daniels House, located at 190 Salisbury Street, Worcester, MA,
01609. For directions, please visit the AAS website at
www.americanantiquarian.org.

 

Refreshments will be provided after the paper. If you plan to attend, please
notify Ann-Cathrine Rapp at AAS (at arapp at mwa.org) no later than Friday,
November 15. 

 

 

Paul J. Erickson

Director of Academic Programs

American Antiquarian Society

185 Salisbury St.

Worcester, MA  01609

508-471-2158

 

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