Blog @ the Nelson-Atkins

If you have attended the new exhibition, Magnificent Gifts for the 75th, you may have seen the rare books on explorations of Egypt given to the library on display in the last room. The museum’s Spencer Art Reference Library has an extensive collection of approximately 4,900 rare books known as the library’s Special Collections.

The Special Collections includes books that were either published before 1900 or are qualified as rare. The collections include books, auction catalogs and many other types of items. Some of the other items include a collection of 53 reproduction Asian scrolls. The scrolls are reproductions of paintings from various centuries of Chinese and Japanese painting. One of the scrolls, (call number WEN ND 1049 .W4 K8 1900z) is a reproduction of a painting in the Museum’s collection, Old Cypress and Rocks by Wen Zhengming a Chinese artist who worked in the 15th and 16th centuries. The reproduction scroll in the library’s collection includes a reproduction of the painting, along with panels of text.

In Special Collections the Library also houses Museum founder William Rockhill Nelson’s personal book collection. Known as the Oak Hall Collection, it includes 89 titles on a variety of topics including gardening, natural history, the history of art and many volumes of literature, which shows us the diverse interests that Mr. Nelson must have had.

One set that I found interesting was a multi-volume set of Shakespeare’s plays. These volumes, bound in red leather, are facsimiles of the quarto publications of Shakespeare’s plays owned by libraries and private collections in Great Britain. The quarto editions of Shakespeare’s plays were the first publications of his plays, before the better-known folio editions. These facsimiles were published in the 1880’s. The first eleven volumes were published by William Griggs, and the rest were published by Charles Praetorius.

Looking at the volumes, the text of the plays themselves is the original 17th century text, with the names of the characters in italics, and the font is a beautiful, flowing font with serifs on the ends of the letters. The spellings are original too, so some of the words appear unfamiliar to the modern reader. It makes one wonder; are these volumes like the versions of the plays the original actors would have seen?

Viewing books from Special Collections can be like a treasure hunt. To begin your own hunt, try this sample search in the Leonardo catalog to find all the titles in William Rockhill Nelson’s library. Type “Oak Hall” as a general keyword search (with the quotation marks). What is your favorite title in his collection? Any of the items in Special Collections may be requested at the Reference Desk and viewed in the Library’s Reading Room on the second floor of the Bloch Building. Enjoy the hunt!