The
latest exhibition at the de Beer Gallery, Special Collections, University of Otago begins on Friday
9 December. It is called ‘Keeping it in the Family. British and Irish
Literary Generations 1770-1930’.
Co-curators of this exhibition, Drs
Tom McLean and Ruth Knezevich write:
“Not every great writer is a
solitary genius. As a child, Charlotte Brontë created the imaginary world of Angria with her brother Branwell.
William Wordsworth borrowed from his sister Dorothy’s diary to create one of
the most famous poems in English. Long before Charles Darwin studied the
fertilisation of orchids, his grandfather Erasmus wrote poetry about the loves
of plants. Dante Rossetti created lavish illustrations to accompany his sister
Christina’s volumes of poetry.
These are some of the relationships
explored in Keeping
it in the Family: British and Irish Literary Generations 1770-1930*, an exhibition
highlighting the role of family in creative production in
nineteenth-century Britain and Ireland.
Items
on display will include early editions from S.T. Coleridge, William Makepeace
Thackeray, and Virginia Woolf; a letter from Charles Darwin; an 1899 edition of
Rudyard Kipling’s The Second Jungle Book with illustrations by his
father; and Lady Jane Wilde’s 1864 Poems, written under the pen name
‘Speranza’ and dedicated to her sons, Willie and Oscar.
New
Zealand (and Dunedin) is not forgotten. Famous
British families with New Zealand connections on show include descendants of
Scottish writers Robert Burns and James Hogg (who settled in Dunedin); Matthew
Arnold’s brother Tom published an account of his 1847 visit to Otago; and
George Kingsley (father of the famous African explorer Mary Kingsley) wrote of
his anticipation at seeing a kiwi for the first time.
Please
do come along and visit the de Beer Gallery, Special Collections, University of
Otago Library, 1st Floor
Time:
8.30 to 5.00 Monday to Friday
The
exhibition will run to 17 March 2017
*Keeping
it in the Family: British and Irish Literary Generations 1770-1930 is made possible by the
generous support of the Royal New Zealand Marsden Fund. It includes works from
Dunedin Public Library, the Hocken Library, and the University of Otago Special
Collections.
And because there is no official opening, there is a treat, especially if you are looking for literary inspiration. Tom McLean and Ruth Knezevich will give a FREE tour of the new Special Collections exhibition "Keeping it in the Family" on Friday at 3pm. The exhibition, which examines kinship and creativity, includes works from Wordsworth, Darwin, Rossetti, Wilde, and Woolf, among others. The tour will start on the first floor just outside Special Collections, and everyone is welcome.
For further information, please contact Special
Collections Librarian Dr Donald Kerr (donald.kerr@otago.ac.nz) or co-curators Dr Thomas McLean (thomas.mclean@otago.ac.nz) and Dr Ruth Knezevich, (ruth.knezevich@otago.ac.nz).
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