The Department of English at the University of Toronto launched the MA Program in English in the Field of Creative Writing in 2004. Founded by Rosemary Sullivan, the program has spawned numerous published works by its graduates, almost fifty books. graduates have published almost fifty books. The program draws on the expertise of award-winning faculty at the University of Toronto and on the extraordinary vitality of Toronto’s writing community to support students through a multidisciplinary workshop in their first year and one-on-one mentorship for a book-length literary project in their second year. This display features the published work of both the graduates, the program's directors, and draws on Rosemary Sullivan's archival papers to show the program's genesis and creation. This exhibition was curated by John Shoesmith and installed by Linda Joy.
For generations, volumes of fairy tales and nursery rhymes have entertained, cautioned, and occasionally frightened children from around the world. This international display celebrates the art and design of these well-loved books.
Though drugs and alcohol are a hot topic these days, it is worthwhile to remember that the production and use of cannabis, opium and alcohol all have a long history. On display for the month of February are some the Fisher Library's early printed and illustrated works on medicinal cannabis, hemp, opium, as well as 16th-century instructional books on the art of distillation.
This display was curated by the Fisher's Susan Chater.
Glenn Goluska has been called Canada’s finest letterpress designer and printer. Born in Chicago, he studied at St. Michael’s College of the University of Toronto and moved to Canada permanently in the early 1970s when he began working with Stan Bevington at Coach House Press. Inspired by others in Toronto’s close-knit letterpress community – including Will Rueter of Aliquando Press and Robert MacDonald of Dreadnaught – Goluksa started his own imprint, imprimerie dromadaire. On display are examples of Goluska’s work, along with materials from his contemporaries.
As Christmas approaches, many of us will read, listen to, or watch adaptations of Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol. This story, which is so closely associated with the holiday season in the English-speaking world, marks its 175th anniversary this year. The first edition, released on 19 December 1843, sold out almost immediately, and was reprinted eight times within the first six months. The ghostly tale, with its emphasis on care for the poor, and keeping one’s priorities in order, remains timely in 2018. Numerous artists have tried their hands at depicting the key moments in the story, and it is their efforts which this exhibition particularly celebrates.
Take a walk with the ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Future!
November 11, 2018 marks exactly one hundred years since an armistice between the combatant nations went into effect and the First World War ended. After more than four years of horrific fighting, a conflict that encompassed the globe and included all of the major powers - Britain, France, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Russia, Italy, Japan and the United States – and resulted in the deaths of over sixteen million people, had finally drawn to a close. Canada as part of the British Empire, played a significant role, with more than 600,000 men enlisting in the Canadian Expeditionary Force, of whom close to 61,000 were killed on the battlefields of France and Belgium. Newfoundland, not yet a part of this country, also suffered grievous losses. This contribution is all the more remarkable when one considers that the population of Canada when the war began in 1914 was just over 8 million. Our soldiers earned a well-deserved reputation as superb fighting troops, a reputation forged in the battles at Ypres, the Somme, Vimy Ridge, Passchendaele and Amiens. Canadian men and women from all walks of life answered the call, including thousands from the Indigenous communities. For those who remained at home the war brought government-imposed restrictions, hardships, and personal tragedy, but it also offered opportunities to engage in war-related public service activities and to begin the process of breaking down sexual stereotypes. Canadian society was never the same. The unveiling last year of a monument in France dedicated to those Canadians who fought and died during the battle of Hill 70 in 1917, and the recent discovery and identification of the bodies of four Canadian soldiers killed in that fighting and who were subsequently buried with full military honours, illustrate the continuing presence of the First World War in our collective consciousness. We commemorate this important date in our nation’s history as an acknowledgement of the great sacrifices this generation of Canadians made, especially those who never returned and lie in foreign fields far from home. It is to them we pay special tribute.
In 2016, the University College Archival Collection was transferred to the University of Toronto Archives and Records Management Services (UTARMS).
Serving as the official repository for University records of permanent value and the private records of individuals and organizations associated with the University, UTARMS is fortunate to now house this important collection of material documenting the early history of University College (UC) – the founding member of UofT’s collegiate system.
The University College Archival Collection includes records documenting UC’s early administrative history, the personal records of prominent faculty and staff, a large collection of records on the University College fire of 1890, many publications from the College’s student body, and a number of records documenting student life. The Collection also contains a number of artifacts which relate directly to the recorded material and serve to liven this rich collection.
This display includes photographs, textual records, and artifacts which highlight the range of material represented in the Collection. From William Lyon Mackenzie King’s textbook and the personal records of Barker Fairley and John McCaul, to relics plucked from the rubble after the College fire, and ledgers documenting UC residence disciplinary actions, UTARMS invites researchers to come and make use of this significant historical resource.
The truly revolutionary aspect of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, when it was published in 1865, was its refusal to instruct. With its steadfast rejection of moralism and didacticism, Lewis Carroll’s fantasy made a radical break with the long tradition in children’s literature of stories with "lessons." This outlook is especially surprising given that Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, the historical person behind the Lewis Carroll pseudonym, was both a clergyman and an educator, spending his entire career as a lecturer in mathematics at Christ Church, Oxford.
In the Alice books, imagination is an end in itself. Nevertheless, individuals and institutions have been trying to put Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland to educational use ever since it appeared. To celebrate the beginning of the academic year, this month’s showcase explores Dodgson’s educational writings and the educational applications of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. The materials on display are from the Joseph Brabant-Lewis Carroll Collection, one of the world’s finest collections of Carrolliana, generously donated to the Fisher Library in 1997.
The University of Toronto is pleased to be welcoming the New Chaucer Society to the city for their biennial congress. In celebration of this event, the Fisher Library is pleased to display modern and early-modern editions of Geoffrey Chaucer’s works from our collections. Beginning with the stunning Kelmscott Chaucer, a jewel of the Arts and Crafts movement, and moving from the 16th century to the 20th, this exhibit shows the variety of ways that people have interacted with Chaucer in print.
Also on display include William Thynne’s second edition of The Canterbury Tales, including woodcuts originally found in Caxton; marginalia from a 1602 collection of Chaucer’s works connecting it with the London landscape; an illustrated Czech printing of The Canterbury Tales complete with modernist illustrations; a beautiful Victorian cloth binding based on illustrations from the famous Ellesmere manuscript; and Eric Gill’s remarkable illustrated wood cuts in the Golden Cockerel Press’s Canterbury Tales. Welcome to Toronto and the Fisher, and enjoy a pilgrimage through our collection!
To mark the recent acquisition of the oldest English-language book to be found in Canada, William Caxton’s 1481 printing of Cicero’s On Old Age and On Friendship, the Fisher Library offers these treasures for your viewing enjoyment. Issued from the presses of William Caxton, the first English printer, and his disciple Wynkyn de Worde, they remind us that what Gutenberg was to Western printing in general, Caxton was for the English-speaking world.
Also on display is a leaf from Caxton’s 1483 printing of John Gower’s Confessio amantis; the 1507 and 1527 printings by Wynkyn de Worde of Caxton’s translation of The Golden Legend, with Caxton’s woodcuts; and the lesser known Nova legenda Angliae of 1516 – all jewels of early English printing. Welcome to our celebrations!
