Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library
Encyclopedia
Yale University
Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...
's Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library (BRBL) was a 1963 gift of the Beinecke family. The building was designed by architect Gordon Bunshaft
Gordon Bunshaft
Gordon Bunshaft was an architect educated at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In 1988, Gordon Bunshaft nominated himself for the Pritzker Prize and eventually won it.-Career:...
of the firm of Skidmore, Owings, and Merrill, and is the largest building in the world reserved exclusively for the preservation of rare books and manuscripts. It is located at 121 Wall Street in the center of Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, USA, in Hewitt Quadrangle
Hewitt Quadrangle
Hewitt University Quadrangle is a plaza at the center of the Yale University campus in New Haven, Connecticut, which is the home of the university's administration, main auditorium and dining facilities...
, which is more commonly referred to as "Beinecke Plaza".
A six-story above-ground tower of book stacks is surrounded by a windowless rectangular building with walls made of a translucent Danby marble, which transmit subdued lighting and provide protection from direct light. The public exhibition hall surrounding the glass stack tower displays contains, among other things, one of the 48 extant copies of the Gutenberg Bible
Gutenberg Bible
The Gutenberg Bible was the first major book printed with a movable type printing press, and marked the start of the "Gutenberg Revolution" and the age of the printed book. Widely praised for its high aesthetic and artistic qualities, the book has an iconic status...
. Two floors extend under Hewitt Quadrangle. The first level down, the "Court" level, centers on a sunken courtyard featuring sculptures by Isamu Noguchi
Isamu Noguchi
was a prominent Japanese American artist and landscape architect whose artistic career spanned six decades, from the 1920s onward. Known for his sculpture and public works, Noguchi also designed stage sets for various Martha Graham productions, and several mass-produced lamps and furniture pieces,...
that are said to represent time (the pyramid), sun (the circle), and chance (the cube). This level also features a reading room for researchers, offices and book storage areas. The lower level of the building, two floors below ground, has compact shelving for books and archives.
History
In the late 19th century the rarer and more valuable books of the Library of Yale College were placed on special shelving at the Old Library (now Dwight Hall). These were moved to the Rare Book Room collection of Sterling Memorial LibrarySterling Memorial Library
Sterling Memorial Library is the largest library at Yale University, containing over 4 million volumes. It is an example of Gothic revival architecture, designed by James Gamble Rogers, adorned with thousands of panes of stained glass created by G. Owen Bonawit.The Library has 15 levels, each with...
when it opened in 1930. When the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library opened its doors on October 14, 1963, it had become the home of the volumes from the Sterling Memorial Library Rare Book Room, and three special collections—the Collection of American Literature, the Collection of Western Americana, and the Collection of German Literature. Shortly afterward, they were joined by the James Marshall and Marie-Louise Osborn Collection.
Beinecke Library became the repository for books in the Yale collection printed anywhere before 1601, books printed in Latin America before 1751, books printed in North America before 1821, newspapers and broadsides printed in the United States before 1851, European tracts and pamphlets printed before 1801, and Slavic, East European, Near and Middle Eastern books through the eighteenth century, as well as special books outside these categories.
Now, the collection spans through to the present day including such modern works as limited-edition poetry and artists' books. The library also contains thousands of linear feet of archival material, ranging from ancient papyri and medieval manuscripts to the papers of modern writers.
Special collections
The holdings of the Beinecke Library include:- American Children's Literature
- John James AudubonJohn James AudubonJohn James Audubon was a French-American ornithologist, naturalist, and painter. He was notable for his expansive studies to document all types of American birds and for his detailed illustrations that depicted the birds in their natural habitats...
- James M. BarrieJ. M. BarrieSir James Matthew Barrie, 1st Baronet, OM was a Scottish author and dramatist, best remembered today as the creator of Peter Pan. The child of a family of small-town weavers, he was educated in Scotland. He moved to London, where he developed a career as a novelist and playwright...
- John BaskervilleJohn BaskervilleJohn Baskerville was an English businessman, in areas including japanning and papier-mâché, but he is best remembered as a printer and typographer.-Life:...
- William Thomas BeckfordWilliam Thomas BeckfordWilliam Thomas Beckford , usually known as William Beckford, was an English novelist, a profligate and consummately knowledgeable art collector and patron of works of decorative art, a critic, travel writer and sometime politician, reputed to be the richest commoner in England...
- Sir John BetjemanJohn BetjemanSir John Betjeman, CBE was an English poet, writer and broadcaster who described himself in Who's Who as a "poet and hack".He was a founding member of the Victorian Society and a passionate defender of Victorian architecture...
- John Boswell
- BryherBryherBryher was the pen name of the novelist, poet, memoirist, and magazine editor Annie Winifred Ellerman. She was born in September 1894 in Margate. Her father was the shipowner and financier John Ellerman, who at the time of his death in 1933, was the richest Englishman who had ever lived...
- Mary ButtsMary ButtsMary Frances Butts was a British modernist writer. Her work found recognition in important literary magazines such as The Bookman and The Little Review, as well as from some of her fellow modernists, T. S. Eliot, H.D. and Bryher...
- CartographyCartographyCartography is the study and practice of making maps. Combining science, aesthetics, and technique, cartography builds on the premise that reality can be modeled in ways that communicate spatial information effectively.The fundamental problems of traditional cartography are to:*Set the map's...
, including the "Vinland MapVinland mapThe Vinland map is claimed to be a 15th century mappa mundi with unique information about Norse exploration of America. It is very well known because of the publicity campaign which accompanied its revelation to the public as a "genuine" pre-Columbian map in 1965...
" - Cary Collection of Playing CardsCary Collection of Playing CardsThe Cary Collection of Playing Cards, held at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library of Yale University in the USA, is one of the most significant assemblages of materials relating to playing cards and related ephemera in North America.- Overview :...
- Ernst CassirerErnst CassirerErnst Cassirer was a German philosopher. He was one of the major figures in the development of philosophical idealism in the first half of the 20th century...
- CongregationalismCongregational churchCongregational churches are Protestant Christian churches practicing Congregationalist church governance, in which each congregation independently and autonomously runs its own affairs....
- Joseph ConradJoseph ConradJoseph Conrad was a Polish-born English novelist.Conrad is regarded as one of the great novelists in English, although he did not speak the language fluently until he was in his twenties...
- Walter CraneWalter CraneWalter Crane was an English artist and book illustrator. He is considered to be the most prolific and influential children’s book creator of his generation and, along with Randolph Caldecott and Kate Greenaway, one of the strongest contributors to the child's nursery motif that the genre of...
- DadaDadaDada or Dadaism is a cultural movement that began in Zurich, Switzerland, during World War I and peaked from 1916 to 1922. The movement primarily involved visual arts, literature—poetry, art manifestoes, art theory—theatre, and graphic design, and concentrated its anti-war politics through a...
- Daniel DefoeDaniel DefoeDaniel Defoe , born Daniel Foe, was an English trader, writer, journalist, and pamphleteer, who gained fame for his novel Robinson Crusoe. Defoe is notable for being one of the earliest proponents of the novel, as he helped to popularise the form in Britain and along with others such as Richardson,...
- Charles DickensCharles DickensCharles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...
- Norman DouglasNorman DouglasGeorge Norman Douglas was a British writer, now best known for his 1917 novel South Wind.-Life:Norman Douglas was born in Thüringen, Austria . His mother was Vanda von Poellnitz...
- Jonathan Edwards
- George EliotGeorge EliotMary Anne Evans , better known by her pen name George Eliot, was an English novelist, journalist and translator, and one of the leading writers of the Victorian era...
- The Elizabethan ClubElizabethan ClubThe Elizabethan Club is a social club at Yale University named for Queen Elizabeth I and her era. Its profile and members tend toward a literary disposition, and conversation is one of the Club's chief purposes....
collection - Erasmus and his contemporaries
- FaustFaustFaust is the protagonist of a classic German legend; a highly successful scholar, but also dissatisfied with his life, and so makes a deal with the devil, exchanging his soul for unlimited knowledge and worldly pleasures. Faust's tale is the basis for many literary, artistic, cinematic, and musical...
- Henry FieldingHenry FieldingHenry Fielding was an English novelist and dramatist known for his rich earthy humour and satirical prowess, and as the author of the novel Tom Jones....
- Benjamin FranklinBenjamin FranklinDr. Benjamin Franklin was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. A noted polymath, Franklin was a leading author, printer, political theorist, politician, postmaster, scientist, musician, inventor, satirist, civic activist, statesman, and diplomat...
- GoetheJohann Wolfgang von GoetheJohann Wolfgang von Goethe was a German writer, pictorial artist, biologist, theoretical physicist, and polymath. He is considered the supreme genius of modern German literature. His works span the fields of poetry, drama, prose, philosophy, and science. His Faust has been called the greatest long...
- Greek and Latin Literature
- Thomas HardyThomas HardyThomas Hardy, OM was an English novelist and poet. While his works typically belong to the Naturalism movement, several poems display elements of the previous Romantic and Enlightenment periods of literature, such as his fascination with the supernatural.While he regarded himself primarily as a...
- W. Head & Sister, photographers
- Langston HughesLangston HughesJames Mercer Langston Hughes was an American poet, social activist, novelist, playwright, and columnist. He was one of the earliest innovators of the then-new literary art form jazz poetry. Hughes is best known for his work during the Harlem Renaissance...
- HumanismHumanismHumanism is an approach in study, philosophy, world view or practice that focuses on human values and concerns. In philosophy and social science, humanism is a perspective which affirms some notion of human nature, and is contrasted with anti-humanism....
- IncunabulaIncunabulumIncunable, or sometimes incunabulum is a book, pamphlet, or broadside, that was printed — not handwritten — before the year 1501 in Europe...
(over 3100 volumes including the MelkMelkMelk is a city of Austria, in the federal state of Lower Austria, next to the Wachau valley along the Danube. Melk has a population of 5,222 ....
copy of the Gutenberg BibleGutenberg BibleThe Gutenberg Bible was the first major book printed with a movable type printing press, and marked the start of the "Gutenberg Revolution" and the age of the printed book. Widely praised for its high aesthetic and artistic qualities, the book has an iconic status...
) - The James Weldon JohnsonJames Weldon JohnsonJames Weldon Johnson was an American author, politician, diplomat, critic, journalist, poet, anthologist, educator, lawyer, songwriter, and early civil rights activist. Johnson is remembered best for his leadership within the NAACP, as well as for his writing, which includes novels, poems, and...
Collection - James JoyceJames JoyceJames Augustine Aloysius Joyce was an Irish novelist and poet, considered to be one of the most influential writers in the modernist avant-garde of the early 20th century...
- Judaica
- Rudyard KiplingRudyard KiplingJoseph Rudyard Kipling was an English poet, short-story writer, and novelist chiefly remembered for his celebration of British imperialism, tales and poems of British soldiers in India, and his tales for children. Kipling received the 1907 Nobel Prize for Literature...
- D. H. LawrenceD. H. LawrenceDavid Herbert Richards Lawrence was an English novelist, poet, playwright, essayist, literary critic and painter who published as D. H. Lawrence. His collected works represent an extended reflection upon the dehumanising effects of modernity and industrialisation...
- Doris LessingDoris LessingDoris May Lessing CH is a British writer. Her novels include The Grass is Singing, The Golden Notebook, and five novels collectively known as Canopus in Argos....
- Sinclair LewisSinclair LewisHarry Sinclair Lewis was an American novelist, short-story writer, and playwright. In 1930, he became the first writer from the United States to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, "for his vigorous and graphic art of description and his ability to create, with wit and humor, new types of...
- Pre-1600 manuscripts
- Thomas MannThomas MannThomas Mann was a German novelist, short story writer, social critic, philanthropist, essayist, and 1929 Nobel Prize laureate, known for his series of highly symbolic and ironic epic novels and novellas, noted for their insight into the psychology of the artist and the intellectual...
- F.T. Marinetti
- John MasefieldJohn MasefieldJohn Edward Masefield, OM, was an English poet and writer, and Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom from 1930 until his death in 1967...
- F. O. MatthiessenF. O. MatthiessenFrancis Otto Matthiessen was an educator, scholar and literary critic influential in the fields of American literature and American studies.-Scholarly work:...
- The Mellon Collection of Alchemy and the Occult
- George MeredithGeorge MeredithGeorge Meredith, OM was an English novelist and poet of the Victorian era.- Life :Meredith was born in Portsmouth, England, a son and grandson of naval outfitters. His mother died when he was five. At the age of 14 he was sent to a Moravian School in Neuwied, Germany, where he remained for two...
- Eugene O'Neill, Jr.Eugene O'Neill, Jr.Eugene Gladstone O'Neill, Jr. was an American professor of Greek literature.O'Neill was son of Nobel Prize-winning playwright Eugene O'Neill and the elder O'Neill's first wife, Kathleen Jenkins. The couple divorced in 1912. O'Neill once said he did not even meet his father until age 12...
- OrnithologyOrnithologyOrnithology is a branch of zoology that concerns the study of birds. Several aspects of ornithology differ from related disciplines, due partly to the high visibility and the aesthetic appeal of birds...
- the Papyrus Collection
- Polish LiteraturePolish literaturePolish literature is the literary tradition of Poland. Most Polish literature has been written in the Polish language, though other languages, used in Poland over the centuries, have also contributed to Polish literary traditions, including Yiddish, Lithuanian, Ukrainian, Belarusian, German and...
- Dorothy RichardsonDorothy RichardsonDorothy Miller Richardson was a British author and journalist.-Biography:Richardson was born in Abingdon in 1873. Her family moved to Worthing, West Sussex in 1880 and then Putney, London in 1883...
- RilkeRainer Maria RilkeRené Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria Rilke , better known as Rainer Maria Rilke, was a Bohemian–Austrian poet. He is considered one of the most significant poets in the German language...
- Rochambeau Family
- Bruce Rogers
- the RomanovRomanovThe House of Romanov was the second and last imperial dynasty to rule over Russia, reigning from 1613 until the February Revolution abolished the crown in 1917...
Family photo albums - Olga RudgeOlga RudgeOlga Rudge was an American-born concert violinist, now mainly remembered as the long-time mistress of the poet Ezra Pound, by whom she had a daughter, Mary....
Papers - John RuskinJohn RuskinJohn Ruskin was the leading English art critic of the Victorian era, also an art patron, draughtsman, watercolourist, a prominent social thinker and philanthropist. He wrote on subjects ranging from geology to architecture, myth to ornithology, literature to education, and botany to political...
- Russian LiteratureRussian literatureRussian literature refers to the literature of Russia or its émigrés, and to the Russian-language literature of several independent nations once a part of what was historically Russia or the Soviet Union...
- SchillerFriedrich SchillerJohann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller was a German poet, philosopher, historian, and playwright. During the last seventeen years of his life , Schiller struck up a productive, if complicated, friendship with already famous and influential Johann Wolfgang von Goethe...
- Sixteenth-Century Printed Books
- Sporting Books
- The Gertrude SteinGertrude SteinGertrude Stein was an American writer, poet and art collector who spent most of her life in France.-Early life:...
and Alice B. ToklasAlice B. ToklasAlice B. Toklas was an American-born member of the Parisian avant-garde of the early 20th century.-Early life, relationship with Gertrude Stein:...
Collection - Robert Louis StevensonRobert Louis StevensonRobert Louis Balfour Stevenson was a Scottish novelist, poet, essayist and travel writer. His best-known books include Treasure Island, Kidnapped, and Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde....
- James J. Strang
- Alexis de TocquevilleAlexis de TocquevilleAlexis-Charles-Henri Clérel de Tocqueville was a French political thinker and historian best known for his Democracy in America and The Old Regime and the Revolution . In both of these works, he explored the effects of the rising equality of social conditions on the individual and the state in...
- Vanderbilt Collection
- Carl Van VechtenCarl van VechtenCarl Van Vechten was an American writer and photographer who was a patron of the Harlem Renaissance and the literary executor of Gertrude Stein.-Biography:...
- Rebecca WestRebecca WestCicely Isabel Fairfield , known by her pen name Rebecca West, or Dame Rebecca West, DBE was an English author, journalist, literary critic and travel writer. A prolific, protean author who wrote in many genres, West was committed to feminist and liberal principles and was one of the foremost public...
- Edith WhartonEdith WhartonEdith Wharton , was a Pulitzer Prize-winning American novelist, short story writer, and designer.- Early life and marriage:...
- The Thornton WilderThornton WilderThornton Niven Wilder was an American playwright and novelist. He received three Pulitzer Prizes, one for his novel The Bridge of San Luis Rey and two for his plays Our Town and The Skin of Our Teeth, and a National Book Award for his novel The Eighth Day.-Early years:Wilder was born in Madison,...
papers - Kurt WolffKurt WolffKurt Wolff was a German publisher, editor, writer and journalist.Wolff was born in Bonn, Rhenish Prussia. Together with Ernst Rowohlt he began to work in publishing in Leipzig in 1908. He was the first to promote and publish the authors Franz Kafka and Franz Werfel...
In popular culture
The glass-walled structure that holds the original core collection of the British LibraryBritish Library
The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom, and is the world's largest library in terms of total number of items. The library is a major research library, holding over 150 million items from every country in the world, in virtually all known languages and in many formats,...
(the books gifted by King George III and referred to as the King's Library
King's Library
The King's Library was one of the most important collections of books and pamphlets of the Age of Enlightenment. Assembled by George III, this scholarly library of over 65,000 volumes was subsequently given to the British nation by George IV. It was housed in a specially built gallery in the...
within the British Library building in Euston
Euston
Euston may refer to:Communities*Euston, Suffolk, UK*Euston, New South Wales, AustraliaStations*Euston railway station, London, UK*Euston tube station, London, UK*Euston Square tube station, London, UKOther...
, London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
), was inspired by the elegance of the Beinecke.
During the 1960s, Claes Oldenburg's
Claes Oldenburg
Claes Oldenburg is a Swedish sculptor, best known for his public art installations typically featuring very large replicas of everyday objects...
sculpture "Lipstick on a Caterpillar Track" was displayed in Hewitt Quadrangle. The sculpture has since been moved to the courtyard of Morse College
Morse College
Morse College is one of the twelve residential colleges at Yale University, built in 1961 and designed by Eero Saarinen. It is adjacent to Ezra Stiles College. The current Master is Frank Keil, Professor of Psychology and Professor of Linguistics. The Associate Master is Kristi Lockhart...
, one of the university's residential dormitories.
- In Uncommon Carriers, John McPheeJohn McPheeJohn Angus McPhee is an American Pulitzer Prize-winning writer, widely considered one of the pioneers of creative nonfiction....
admires a restaurant's display of "a glass tower of recumbent wines that may have been an architectural reference to the glass column of visible books in the Beinecke Library at Yale." - In The Once and Future Spy by Robert LittellRobert LittellRobert Littell may refer to:* Robert Littell , New Jersey politician* Robert Littell , American writer...
, an assassination attempt is made on a CIA analyst at the Beinecke Library.
External links
- Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library Homepage
- Online Tour of the Beinecke Library Building
- African American Studies at Beinecke Library Blog
- Beinecke Poetry Blog
- Room 26: Cabinet of Curiosities Blog - Blog of visual materials from the Beinecke's collections by Beinecke curatorial staff
- Beinecke Library Construction Photographs, 1961-1963