Teaching Bibliography

Subject. Rare book schools are very much about: “look at the object, and tell me what you see”; at the same time, courses on how you tell people to do this are not common. A course on “Teaching the History of the Book” has been offered at RBS Virginia on a number of occasions, with teachers such as Terry Belanger, most recently in 2007; here however the plan is something rather different, i.e. find out whether you know enough about bibliography and books to talk about them in a convincing fashion. So, it is as much about your ability to teach as your ability to do bibliography. Doing this course, therefore, means putting yourself to the test, constructively and positively, learning techniques and skills you can take back to your own lessons and students.

Materials and locations. The base for the course will be at Musée de l’Imprimerie in the very centre of Lyon. As well as printing presses and all sorts of other paraphernalia, the Musée has an impressive and very idiosyncratic collection of early printed books, many of them acquired because they exhibit some unusual typographical feature. A number of scholars following diverse lines of inquiry have written short pieces on items in the collection, which were brought together in the recent Guide déraisonné, a book that we shall be taking, well, as a guide.

One of our sessions at the Musée will explore some of the more unusual features of the collection, such as the ephemera, and also take the chance to look at the collection of woodblocks and clichés; likewise it is intended to hold a practical session in the workshop, in which students see typecasting, set type, and perhaps print a text. The Musée will also be hosting a McLeod collator for the duration of the course, with an aim to providing basic training on an unusual instrument. The other feature of the course will be that lessons will be hosted in other Lyon libraries, as well as at the Municipal Archives, with the collaboration of the curators, in order to view unusual and interesting items in their collections. In particular, we shall have one or more sessions at the Bibliothèque Municipale de Lyon, with particular use being made of the “fichier Parguez”. This is a card index that lists books with unusual or idiosyncratic features, something that is very useful when searching for things to talk about.

Potential users. Courses for academics, or intending academics, are quite rare and hardly ever form part of a university curriculum. At the most, they are expected to pick it up as they go along, or to learn it from their teachers. Actually, this view is not very helpful and some sort of training about basic teaching skills, which sometimes means survival, would be valuable. When I was beginning my Ph.D., my university did provide a one-day seminar about university teaching and I found it very useful and enlightening. Unfortunately, it was only that one day. Lyon is offering four!

Teaching bibliography also takes account of the fact that scholars rarely study bibliography as an academic subject; quite often, they start off doing something quite different, and “drift”. I’ve been there, I’ve done it, I know how it happens. So the course is offered with a mind to Ph.D. candidates and young scholars, who are looking to develop their university teaching skills, both for lectures and seminars, in a critical environment, and more mature scholars, who are interested in adding book studies to skills they already possess. A further potential category of users are librarians and conservators, who wish to improve their “show and tell” techniques, also perhaps through the medium of a library blog. Here again the examples of Stoddard’s inspirational Marks in books or of the Lyon Guide déraisonné might encourage other librarians and conservators to produce a publication of their own. And finally booksellers, who are looking for ways of adding value to what they propose through better and more elaborate forms of description.