Papers Panel 10. Joker’s Wild

Abstract

“Manuscripts from Print: The Pennsylvania Schwenkfelders and their Dangerous Books”: As one of the Catholic Church’s first measures of the Counter-Reformation, the Council of Trent prohibited writings by four men in particular: Luther, Calvin, Balthasar Hubmaier, and Caspar Schwenckfeld von Ossig. Schwenckfeld’s writings in his own time often circulated in manuscript for years before printing, and printers were frequently afraid to reveal their names in Schwenckfeld’s published works, especially as he became better-known and considered heretical by both Catholics and Lutherans. The Silesian Schwenkfelders, people of the book, were forced to eventually immigrate to Pennsylvania from Silesia, and they did so in six migrations—the largest in 1734. Their sea chests were filled with books: print and manuscript copies of Schwenckfeld’s writings and the writings of men in his circle. This paper will investigate the Schwenkfelders’ unusual manuscript traditions: copies of printed books; learning by copying; hymnals; postila—both the traditions in Silesia from the Reformation period and those that followed after the migration to Pennsylvania. The manuscripts discussed are in the collections of the Free Library of Philadelphia’s Rare Book Department and the Schwenkfelder Library & Heritage Center in Pennsburg, Pennsylvania.; “Retrofitting Underused Special Collections: Visual Literacy and the Yale Bookplate Collection”: Developments over the past three-plus years with the Yale Bookplate Collection make for a useful case study of “retrofitting” a historical archive to a modern-day instruction program in special collections. This paper describes how a visual literacy exercise designed for bookplate materials has become an indispensable tool for orientation and instruction sessions in the Special Collections department of the Robert B. Haas Family Arts Library. Encouraged to approach bookplates as traditional research materials as well as sources for creative inspiration, students engaged in this exercise confront the improvisational aspects of analysis and arrive at a more reflective understanding of not only the artifact but also the agents involved in its production and use. This exercise provides a space for multiple approaches to research and education in the book arts.; “Playing the Hand You’re Dealt: What can we learn from Historic Playing Cards?”: Playing cards are ubiquitous in the broad history of book arts and printing, but they are rarely covered in discussions of book history and bibliography. This may be because there are very few guidelines for cataloging playing cards. The Cary Collection at the Beinecke Library is one of the richest resources for playing card history. It was one of the first significant collections that came to Beinecke in the 1960s – over 2600 packs of cards, 460 sheets and 150 wood printing blocks – and a custom cataloging scheme was created to describe the collection – focusing on a number of aspects unique to playing cards. I propose to discuss this cataloging process and to show examples of the roles that playing cards play in illuminating social, political, bibliographic, and ludic history.