Fun with Manuscripts (and Folios)!

Yesterday I got to spend the afternoon with the wonderful, fabulous, amazing Carter Hailey at the equally outstanding Folger Shakespeare Library! With Carter's generous help and a letter of recommendation from my adviser, Prof. Whittenburg, I now have a reader card and reader privileges at the Folger through the beginning of July. I AM SO EXCITED!!! I metro-ed into D.C. yesterday for my first Folger reading day, and can I just say that I love the eighteenth-century even more now? Was that even possible???

First, I got there, filled out a little form, got my reader card, got a short orientation from the librarian, then Carter showed me where the computers were to use Hamnet to look up materials. Mostly I needed manuscripts, and for those there are special cards you fill out, and then the librarian sends someone to the vaults to get the items you requested. I knew they had lots of Garrick playbills, but I actually haven't even looked at those yet-- I had no idea how many Garrick manuscripts they had! His promptbook of Hamlet is restricted, so I may have to content myself with the microfilm of that, but they had an entire volume called David Garrick: Verses, Epilogues, and Prologues. When the librarian handed it to me I was certain it was a print book and was a little confused, but when I opened it, it turned out to be a scrapbook. Tons of handwritten pages were pasted in-- and they were funny and touching and amazing! It just gives one such a sense of closeness to touch a page that Garrick himself touched. To see his signature, to almost know what he was thinking as he scratches through a phrase and changes his wording. There was Garrick's handwritten prologue to Harlequin Invasion and some songs, one about a fish, randomly enough, and poems to him and by him. Some of it was difficult to decipher, as anyone who's ever studied eighteenth-century handwriting knows, (really, I need a paleography class), but still so much fun. I even got to read an entirely handwritten copy of The Jubilee!!!

Perhaps some of my favorite bits were the two poems to Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire. I do love her so. And apparently, Garrick was fond of her, also. Which makes him go up in my esteem :). Oh, there were some written gems! My favorite new insult is "You Jack-Bite Hussey!" ::Eighteenth century love::

I was reading next to Carter, who was working with a first folio of Shakespeare's works. 'Tis a very, very old book. He let me turn a few pages, just so I could say I touched a first folio! His work focuses more on the paper of the book than on the content, and honestly it looks very complicated but very interesting. He is a patient man, flipping through every piece. He taught me how to look at the way the book was bound, and showed me some of the watermarks in the paper.

After the Folger closed, we went to the Hawk and Dove for a drink, and got to catch up a bit. We talked about our projects, and our future plans, and generally had a great time. Then, once I got home, Kay and Brian came over with cheesecake and tiramisu and we watched another episode of The Tudors!

Overall, the best day of Spring Break so far. And perhaps, the most exciting day of thesising!