Tag: Andrew Stauffer

Book Traces with Dr. Andrew Stauffer

The presentation both in class and in the library by Dr. Stauffer was pretty incredible. The amount of history that can be extracted from notes within the marginalia of Victorian-era books is very deep and thanks to modern technologies like google, able to be explored. He estimated that 12.5% of Victorian-era books contain significant historical marginalia. Dr. Stauffer’s process of looking up who people were and their relationships based on their marginalia so many years later almost seems like science-fiction.

The frequency of physical artifacts found within the books was also something really unusual that caught my attention. Sewing needles, locks of hair, and dolls as well as botanical insertions are all common within these older books. The botanical insertion portion was especially interesting as we were able to follow how a habit or action by people (inserting a flower into a book) became practice by publisher’s incorporating printed flowers and other botanical designs into the margins and illustrations where people normally would press one in. This practice evolved into layers of images being incorporated into the works of writer’s like Wordsworth. Images in works like that were connected to other images that sprawled over pages in a psychedelic style. I guess they could be considered meta-illustrations.

The social-historical aspect of the event was immense as well. The social function and form of annotation as a type of communication similar to a modern day email was very cool. Notes to lovers and friends were scrawled on pages or passages that reminded people of each other. Following the Victorian-era books also came pre-annotated in a sense as a result of the practice. Life stages (specifically those of women) were included in books with parts left blank for a mother to fill out for a daughter as she grew up.

The major role of books within peoples lives during the Victorian-era was put into perspective as a result of Stauffer’s work. Books were not just educational, religious or recreational, they were major social tools as well.  Book traces open-source accessibility is a wonderful layout for a really intriguing project.

Book Traces – Stauffer

The book traces event held by Dr. Stauffer was enjoyable and piped my interests as an archivist. The event was well described by Dr. Stauffer as he outlined his goals to us in the class. The goals were to use texts dating from the 1800’s up to 1929, the age of copyright, to find annotations written by their original owners and to interpret the meaning of these annotations and what the book represented in the 19th century. He explained how books back then were shared possessions and that they often switched hands. People used to communicate using books and was a common form of messaging, such as how we have electronic texting and emails today. His books were host to a variety of materials, love letters, lecture notes, analytical satire, physical  we can better understand 19th century culture and values. The class event went really well, with each of us receiving a copy of one of his historical books from his library in Virginia. He was incredibly excited to share his findings and for us to interpret them.

He gave me a book that was heavily transcribed by the original owner. It seems as if he was making fun of the book by adding lines of his own and adding his own form of humor between the pages. It seemed like this copy was meant to be passed to a friend because of the way it is written. Its a lot of language devices to make the text humorous and more enjoyable for the next reader. The book is a book of poems and are very sappy and romantic in nature. Its possible to believe that this person hated that form of writing and wanted to make light of it and belittle the lesser known author.

The lecture after class was a little less comprehensive due to time constraints and topics he was focusing on. the presentation regarding flowers in books was somewhat shaky towards the end and I felt that he got really nervous presenting to the large group that appeared. Every teacher from the history department was there and there felt like a pressure from the back of the room. He wasn’t a 100% confident on the flora in the books which also lead to a rough patch in his lecture since it was focusing on that exact flora he couldn’t name. The flora is often symbolic as he describes in his speech and is used to mark a passage often in memory to the life of a loved one or to add depth to a poem or piece of scripture. It seems like an easy fix with some identification help and I could be misinterpreting the situation at the end of the lecture. In comparison to his class lecture, I felt that he was much more enthusiastic and dealt with the smaller group on a personal level and a fluidity that you couldn’t find in his group lecture. I left the class feeling inspirited to help with archival work and better prepared to keep an eye out for annotations in books. They provide insight to that era’s thoughts, feelings, and culture. To me these things are irreplaceable and once we lose them, they’re gone forever to history. understanding the feelings of an era allows us to better understand our future. Another reason history and culture need to be respected and observed.

-Review by Cory Price

Book Traces event with Andrew Stauffer

The Book Traces event was enlightening. Andrew Stauffer brought a handful of books to our class from the time period of 1800-1923. These books, which he gave to each of us, were special because they contained authentic marginalia from that time period. In my book–a book of poetry from the 1800s–someone had underlined various lines of sad content. There was only one written marginalia in the book–a date, which Professor Stauffer explained was most likely the date things went wrong with the writer’s relationship.

Professor Stauffer explained the marginalia in the other books as well. For example, Ryan’s book had marginalia which effectively tried to alter the story printed in the book. So funny and extensive were the alterations that the class joked the writer must’ve been an SNL writer before SNL existed. Another book, called Reveries of a Bachelor, had written in it notes from the reader who clearly found the book relatable.

Next, Professor Stauffer pulled up a slideshow of images of books with marginalia. He read the marginalia to us and subsequently told us the stories of the writers based on his and his students’ research. We learned that a lot of the books that had been donated to UVA were sent from homes of Confederate families. The most touching marginalia recounted how the writer, drunk and feeling sentimental, purchased a book which reminded him of the past with his friend. This marginalia was in letter form and was gifted to the recipient with the book.

At the actual Book Traces speech, Professor Stauffer covered much of the same content, since more students and staff were present. However he also included new information. For example, he talked about why books older than 1800 weren’t included in his research (because they were stored away in vaults due to their fragility and rarity). He also talked about flowers as marginalia–often left in books to commemorate loved ones or to illustrate excerpts dealing with flora.

This all deals a lot with the content of our course because we have been learning about how ancient, or simply old, practices are carried over in today’s publishing/technology. Professor Stauffer made a profound statement about how the marginalia between two lovers in the same book was much like how we may text each other today.