Dead End? Tunnels under Nottingham in fact and fiction
June 28, 2024
Considering the number of manmade caves which lie beneath the streets of Nottingham, it is unsurprising that, over the years, a tangled web of stories has developed which imagines a secret network of tunnels beneath the city. The details vary, with passages variously linking the city centre, the castle, and Wollaton Hall or running instead …
The phoenix in early modern print woodcuts
June 4, 2024
This blog post was written by our Special Collections Librarian in the course of her work on an upcoming exhibition at the Old Rectory Museum, Loughborough, where facsimiles of books from the Loughborough Parish Library collection will be displayed. The early Christian writer St Isidore of Seville described the phoenix in his Etymologies: ‘The phoenix …
A grand day out from Rochdale to Nottingham via Aachen: to Know Power
June 27, 2023
This is a guest post by Helen Chicot, Reform and Prevention Lead at Rochdale Borough Council It honestly felt like an act of rebellion. In our little Whatsapp group, we half-joked about what the dress code might be (opting for “radical chic with arty vibes”) and took care to plan the snacks for the journey, …
Plants & Prayers
April 30, 2023
Healing is what makes us human – but concepts of health and methods of healing have changed much over time. Visitors to our latest exhibition Plants and Prayers: health and healing before 1700 will see how healthcare in the past was not just the domain of the physician: priests to apothecaries to housewives all provided …
My experience interning for Manuscripts and Special Collections
September 27, 2022
This is a guest post by Helena, who successfully applied for a Faculty of Arts funded summer work experience placement. I’m Helena, a second-year History student at the University of Nottingham and I had the amazing experience of getting a placement and working at King’s Meadow Campus for a couple of weeks. My role was …
Prose Responses to Editing DH Lawrence
May 20, 2022
On 5 May 2022, 14 writers from the Writer Highway group, led by Cathy Grindrod, were invited to respond to our exhibition Editing DH Lawrence. Here are the prose responses, check our other blog-post for poetic responses! D.H. Lawrence Exhibition, Lakeside by Bobbie Prime [including 4 poems by DH Lawrence] The exhibition revealed how hypocritical …
What is ‘censorship’?
March 24, 2022
This is a guest post by Gregory Walker, Midlands4Cities Doctoral Student. ‘I would emphasize, first of all, that there is in England no censorship of books’.[1] These were the words of Home Secretary Sir William Joynson-Hicks in the same year (1929) that he seized two typescripts of D. H. Lawrence’s poetry collection, Pansies, in the …
International Women’s Day: Dorothy Brett
March 9, 2022
This is a post by ‘Editing DH Lawrence# co-curator, Dr Rebecca Moore. Dorothy Eugénie Brett, born in London in 1883, was an artist of noble birth. Having had drawing lessons since the age of five, she joined the Slade School of Art in 1910, and studied there until 1916 where she became known simply as …
Florence Nightingale Returns
May 14, 2021
It’s been a long time coming, but we’re sure that Florence Nightingale of all people would understand why we had to delay opening the exhibition in her honour due to an outbreak of a deadly disease. ‘Florence Nightingale Comes Home’ was supposed to open last May to coincide with her 200th birthday, part of a …
Georgian Delights
January 6, 2020
When King George IV died in June 1830, The Times asked, ‘What eye has wept for him? What heart has heaved one throb of unmercenary sorrow?’. George was a controversial figure throughout his lifetime (1762-1830). As Prince of Wales, after 1783, George became notorious for his frequent love affairs and lavish self-indulgence, spending wildly on …
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