Professor Jessica Beckman and students examine illuminated manuscript leaves from a 14th-century French Book of Hours. (Photo by Rob Strong ’04)
A Dartmouth Course in Book History
Guided by Professor Jessica Beckman's sweeping historical framework and in collaboration with the Department of English and Creative Writing, Rauner Special Collections Library, and Dartmouth Libraries Book Arts Workshop, students participate in a unique learning experience. They don’t just study rare artifacts in Beckman's History of the Book course. They touch them. They make them. And they trace five thousand years of reading history, from clay to parchment to pixels.
“Our collections are here to be used,” says Jay Satterfield, Head of Rauner Special Collections Library. “Their worth lies in their use. Hands-on encounters with rare materials can change the way you think in a matter of seconds.”
“This project gives students a tactile experience,” says Book Arts Workshop Program Manager Sarah Marcella Parella. “They get a sense of how the materials feel and smell—especially the parchment made from animal skins. They also find an appreciation for how intentional one would need to be to produce a book in the past, compared to our quick and often casual approach to printed material today.”