Library of Drummond of Hawthornden - Hardcover

Library of Drummond of Hawthornden

Hardcover. Zustand: Very Good. 4to (28.5 cm), XII, 245 pp., 10 plates. Publisher's cloth and dust jacket (dust jacket slightly sunned and fraying at extremities). A reconstruction and scholarly study of the private library assembled in the first quarter of the seventeenth century by William Drummond of Hawthornden (1585-1649), the Scottish poet, essayist, and friend of Ben Jonson, whose collection -- one of the best documented of its period -- provides an important record of literary taste and intellectual life in the age of Shakespeare and Jonson. MacDonald's catalogue lists 1,405 titles, estimated to represent approximately 85 per cent of the original library, arranged by language -- Latin (subdivided into theology, philosophy, law, poetry, and prose), Greek, Hebrew, English, French, Italian, and Spanish -- and preceded by a substantial introduction examining Drummond's life and interests, education, career as a writer and critic, book prices, and the growth, arrangement, and subsequent history of the library, together with a thematic survey of its subject strengths. The foreword by Sir Geoffrey Keynes, revising his earlier scepticism about the value of reconstructing private libraries, characterises the study as offering a rare and illuminating slice of intellectual history in the decades after 1600. A valuable contribution to the history of reading, collecting, and early modern literary culture. Artikel-Nr. 009821

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