Library alumni news digi

May 2012

TrinityToday A PUBLICATION FOR ALUMNI AND FRIENDS

Library Alumni News

Trinty_Lib_Alu_News.indd 1

22/5/12 14:10:23

NEWS | Library Alumni

OLD LIBRARY TERCENTENARY

Welcome to a newsletter on developments, plans and events in the Library. I hope that you will find it an interesting insight into the great variety of activities that make up the Library’s work for College and for the wider world.

This issue is distributed in print but future editions will come to you in electronic format. If you wish to receive further copies, visit www.tcd.ie/alumni/ library to register your email.

Robin Adams Librarian and College Archivist

The focus for much of our work this year will be a whole series of events around the Tercentenary of the foundation of the Old Library building. The actual foundation date then was 12 May, but changes to the calendar make the accurate anniversary date 23 May 2012. In the succeeding 300 years the building has become recognised as an outstanding example of grace and beauty in Library design, an iconic symbol for the organisation of recorded thought and creativity.

The building was designed by Thomas Burgh, described as ‘the first indisputably and unmistakably Irish architect’. It was a very ambitious project, given the scale of Trinity College at that time and it took 20 years to finish. The introduction of the barrel ceiling to the Long Room in the 19th Century created one of the largest singlechamber libraries in the world and its image regularly appears as one of the world’s most beautiful libraries.

EXHIBITION IN THE LONG ROOM

‘A great many choice books’ 300 Years of the old library

April – October 2012, Long Room, Trinity College Library Dublin

The Librarian, Robin Adams introducing Ellen O’Flaherty Assistant Curator for the exhibition to the President of Ireland, Michael D. Higgins at the launch of the Tercentenary exhibition, with Dr. Patrick Prendergast, Provost

The Tercentenary Programme was launched on 27 April when the President Michael D. Higgins opened an exhibition in the Long Room, ‘A great many choice books: 300 years of the Old Library’. Felicity O’Mahony and her colleagues in the Research Collections division have put together a series of exhibits on the history of the building and the wealth and variety of the collections it contains. The programme also includes a monthly series of presentations on the work of the Conservation Department in the Long Room, continuing the work so generously supported in the ‘Save the Treasures of the Long Room’ campaign, to which close to 3,000 alumni have contributed. Details of the Tercentenary programme are available on the website at www.tcd.ie/Library/tercentenary.

300 years of the Old Library A One Day Conference Monday 25 June, 2012 The Thomas Davis Theatre, Trinity College Dublin, followed by a celebratory reception in the Long Room.

For details about the conference and how to register please go to:

www.tcd.ie/library/tercentenary

Building Collections The Library is hosting a major conference on ‘Building Collections’ in June, with a range of presentations on the history of the building and its extraordinary collections. An exhibition will be mounted in the Long Room featuring the College’s Nobel Laureate Ernest Walton and other Irish scientists as part Dublin’s ‘City of Science’ and the Euroscience Open Forum taking place in July.

2 | Trinity Today

Trinty_Lib_Alu_News.indd 2

22/5/12 14:10:34

Library Alumni | NEWS

Alumni Weekend and special events

New visitor centre The Old Library and Book of Kells exhibition centre is one of Ireland’s great tourist attractions and we take great pleasure in sharing the building with hundreds of thousands of visitors each year. The numbers continue to grow and we are planning to enhance and enlarge the visitor services facilities and also to take measures to ensure that the building and its collections can be best protected from the effects of large numbers of visitors and environmental damage. A grant of €2.7m from Fáilte Ireland will kick-start the overall development for the Old Library building,which will also enable us to create a new Reading Room for use of our manuscripts and early printed collections in a much enhanced space.

Student facilities The learning and reading habits of students are changing, as they work on group projects and in more informal spaces.

With a donation from the Fry family, we have introduced 10 group study rooms in the Berkeley Library, along with similar accommodation in the newly refurbished Hamilton Science Library and the Stearne Medical Library at St James’s. Some of the rooms are fitted with smart learning technology and in the past few months more informal seating has been introduced in the Ussher Library orientation space.

Students have responded enthusiastically to the contemporary layout.

The Library’s newest building, the Ussher Library, linked to the Berkeley and Lecky Libraries was completed in 2003 and was designed with flexibility in mind, as we were aware of likely changes to the use of learning facilities and materials. So far, we have extended the 24-hour opening space as more students wish to use the Library into the wee small hours, remodelled the assistive technology suite and increased the number of seats in the study areas. It also houses the Conservation and Preservation Department and the Map Library.

Trinty_Lib_Alu_News.indd 3

The annual Alumni Weekend in August will feature visits to Library departments and a reception in the Old Library www.tcd.ie/ alumni. Special events will be performed as part of the Library’s contribution to Culture Night in September and the ‘Open House’ day in October. Also in October, we will launch the publication of a lavishly illustrated book celebrating the Old Library and a further publication on the Book of Kells later in the year.

We would like to introduce the riches of the Library’s collections to children and families in the very special atmosphere of the Long Room, so a six-week programme of dramatic readings and performances will take place on Sunday mornings in October and November.

Further details of the Tercentenary programme are available at www.tcd.ie/Library/tercentenary.

Bookmarks Programme for local schools The Old Library is a well-established element of the Bookmarks project, part of the College’s Trinity Access Programmes (TAP), forging links with schools in order to widen access and participation of underrepresented groups at university. Children use the resources of the Pollard Collection of Children’s Literature as an inspiration for the creation of their own books, have workshops with writers and illustrators and an award ceremony is held in the Long Room each year. Their books are displayed alongside the scholarly tomes for a period after the event.

22/5/12 14:10:39

NEWS | Library Alumni Nan O’Connell, Professor John Horne, Robin Adams Librarian

PRE-ORDER NEW BOOK: The Old Library, Trinity College Dublin, 1712-2012.

ALUMNI DONATIONS Over its long history, the Library has been the recipient of gifts from friends and College alumni and we continue to benefit in many ways from the generosity of graduates. The ambitious ‘Save the Treasures of the Long Room’ programme is continuing to work on the essential task of conserving the wonderful arrays of early printed books in the Long Room. To date, over €750,000 has been donated by alumni and continued support will be greatly appreciated. The UK Trust for TCD is supporting the work of cataloguing the Pollard Collection of Children’s Books. This is an internationally significant collection of 10,000 books for children, published between 1690 and 1920, and is already proving a considerable resource for research and teaching, as well as the TAP Bookmarks project.

Other recent examples include the Fry family support for equipping a study room with learning technology in memory of Iris Fry BA (1938) and Nan O’Connell and the family of Fred O’Connell presented a volume of bound issues of the French satirical magazine Le Rire, and three volumes of the House of Commons Papers, relating to the expedition to the Scheldt, 23 January - 21 June 1810. The Library has also recently received donations of manuscripts from the novelist Jennifer Johnston BA (1965). We received a 19th Century diplomat’s diary from Brian Grimson MA (1968) and a commonplace book of Archbishop Richard Whately (1787-1863) from W.L.R. Watson BA, MA (1947). The family of the surgeon Denis Burkitt presented some further professional papers.

You are invited to subscribe for a copy of this lavishly illustrated volume, which is being published to celebrate the Tercentenary of the laying of the foundation stone of the world-famous Old Library in May 1712. The volume will contain 360 pages. It will be printed on acid-free paper and bound in cloth.

The names of subscribers will be printed in the volume, which will be available from October 2012. The price to subscribers will be €40 and to non-subscribers €50. Deadline for subscription is Friday 1 June 2012 Visit www.tcd.ie/Library/Shop/300 to subscribe.

LIBRARY ALUMNI GROUP BENEFITS The Library provides the following benefits to alumni:  10% discount on all items in the Library Shop  Free entry to the Old Library/Book of Kells exhibition  Library Reader’s Card  Newsletter on Library news, events and exhibitions Join the Library Alumni Group to maintain connections with Trinity Library and to avail of several benefits, including free access to our rich and varied collections and valuable reference resources. For more information, visit www.tcd.ie/alumni/library.

Library, Trinity College, Dublin 2 t. +353 1 896 1661 e. librarian@tcd.ie w. www.tcd.ie/library

Alumni Office, East Chapel, Trinity College, Dublin 2 t. +353 1 896 2088 e. alumni.relations@tcd.ie w. www.tcd.ie/alumni

To opt out of future Library communications, contact the Alumni Office.

4 | Trinity Today

Trinty_Lib_Alu_News.indd 4

22/5/12 14:10:43