Colley Cibber
June 8, 2020
If ever there was a case of success and fame being the result of luck, rather than talent, then Colley Cibber is it. He was an awful poet who became Poet Laureate through his political connections; a middling actor who connived to became a pioneering actor-manager in Drury Lane; and an unscrupulous and divisive man …
Censorship and Banned Books
January 17, 2019
An auction house in Derbyshire is selling a rare 19th century edition of ‘Fanny Hill – Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure’ by John Cleland, which was banned not long after its publication in 1748. It’s the story of an orphaned girl who goes to London looking for domestic work and instead ends up working …
Picturing Shakespeare
April 22, 2016
Tomorrow, the 23rd April, is the quartercentenary of the death of William Shakespeare (1564-1616). We, and the Library more generally, have been celebrating Shakespeare throughout April. If you visited the Reading Room this month, you will have seen some of the wonderful books in our Cambridge Shakespeare Collection on display. It owes its existence to Henry Thomas Hall (1823-1894), a resident of Cambridge and …
Playing Around with Archives
January 16, 2015
Our first exhibition of the year opens today at the Weston Gallery, Lakeside Arts Centre. ‘Playing Around: Taking Theatre to Communities across the East Midlands‘ explores the history of two local theatre companies, New Perspectives Theatre and Nottingham Playhouse’s Theatre-in-Education company, Roundabout. Their extensive archives have recently been added to The University of Nottingham’s collections. This exhibition …
A Spotlight on Black History
October 13, 2014
If you ask people what archives are, the most common response (after a blank look) is generally something along the lines of boxes full of old parchment. That’s not exactly incorrect – Manuscripts & Special Collections does have an enormous number of rare books and historic documents – but it misses an important part of what we …
Maths, Myths and Mines: What’s New in Manuscripts & Special Collections
July 1, 2014
It’s a rare week that passes for Manuscripts & Special Collections without something new arriving. The new accessions range from a single book or manuscript, to a van-load of boxes. Some are gifts, others are deposited (i.e. loaned), and a small minority are books or manuscripts we have bought. There is inevitably a delay between …
Chekhoviana: Marketing a Foreign Classic to British Audiences
January 28, 2014
Our first exhibition of the year opened last week in the Weston Gallery, Lakeside Arts Centre. Visitors may notice a few changes, as the space has been decorated to reflect recurrent images of birch trees and seagulls found in the British marketing Chekhov; an appropriately visual setting reflecting the highly visual exhibition of Chekhovian theatrical ephemera …
All the World’s a Stage!
December 18, 2013
Panto season is upon us, and families across the country will be visiting theatres to enjoy this predominantly British form of entertainment. Those of you who follow us on Twitter @mssUniNott may have seen the programme for a performance of ‘Alice in Wonderland’ staged by University College Nottingham students one hundred years ago today. Lewis …
Find, follow, join us
