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Rare Book of the Month - April 2006

April is National Poetry Month - the largest literary celebration in the world. To join the observation of this event our featured book of the month is the first edition of John Milton’s Paradise Lost, 1667.

Bob Kieft, Librarian of the College admires Haverford’s copy of John Milton’s Paradise Lost, 1667

This epic poem is presented in ten books and details the story of the fall of mankind. Adam and Eve are caught between Satan and God as they battle for dominion of the Earth. After the pair have disobeyed God’s words by eating from the Tree of Knowledge Satan is celebrated in Hell. Distraught, Adam and Eve realize that although they must leave Eden they can take revenge on Satan by remaining obedient to God on the other side of Paradise.

Paradise Lost is part of the William Pyle Phillips Collection, a collection of original editions given by Philips to inform students and enrich the intellectual life of Haverford College. This extraordinary book is available for review in the reading room of Special Collections.

Posted by John Anderies at March 31, 2006 09:08 PM

Back to Africa Book Party, March 24

Join the authors of Back to Africa: Benjamin Coates and the Colonization Movement in America, 1848-1880, for a discussion and reception Friday, March 24, at 5:00 pm in the Philips Wing and Special Collections. Drawing heavily on the Benjamin Coates African Colonization Collection from Haverford Special Collections, Back to Africa has been called "essential reading for every student of black studies, abolitionism, Quaker history, and nineteenth-century reform in general."

Posted by John Anderies at March 21, 2006 07:44 PM

Rare Book of the Month - March 2006

Einstein, Albert, 1879-1955, Die Grundlage der allgemeinen Relativitätstheorie, Leipzig : J.A. Barth, 1916. 

This brief text of 64 pages transformed the whole of scientific outlook as it explained inconsistencies in Newtonian thought. Einstein’s two conclusions were that it is not possible to determine uniform motion and that energy and mass are the same. In recognition of this “theory of relativity” Einstein was awarded a fellowship of the Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institut in Berlin and it was part of the rationale for his winning the Nobel Prize in 1921.

Die Grundlage der allgemeinen Relativitätstheorie is part of the Rare Book Collection at Haverford College and is available for review in the reading room of Special Collections.

Posted by Ann Upton at March 1, 2006 09:18 AM