Have you ever placed something in a book? Perhaps you placed an item there for a specific
reason, to mark your page, to temporarily keep an item safe, or perhaps because there was a connection between the item and the book which you were reading. You may have
remembered placing the item there or perhaps you did not, only to rediscover it later. When
books borrowed from the library’s general collection are returned, they often arrive back with items placed within them. Examples include pens, post-it notes, receipts and page markers.
Inside cover of Dennis O’Driscoll’s Hidden Extras from the Maurice Harmon Collection (108.G.101)
The library’s Special Collections are not immune to having additional items placed within its
books although the items, and how they got there, can differ. These items include letters,
cards, bookmarks, drawings or reviews. They may reveal something about a book; its author or its former owner.
While working in UCD’s Special Collections I recently opened a book from our Maurice
Harmon Collection with the purpose of adding it to our catalogue. Upon opening the book, I
noticed that the book’s inside cover contained a brown stain. This mark on the inside cover is evidence that something extra (although no longer there) had been placed in a book by
Dennis O’Driscoll, Hidden Extras (108.G.101).
While it was not located where the evidence suggested it once was, a look further into this
book revealed that there was a newspaper clipping placed within it. The brown stain on the
inside cover most likely appeared when acid found within a newspaper clipping transferred
from the clipping into the book’s cover.
As a preventive measure to prevent the migration of acid from one item into another library
staff may create a barrier between the items by placing newspaper clippings or other items in mylar (a transparent film used to protect documents).
Enclosure in Hidden Extras (108.G.101)
Whether or not an additional item placed within a book is documented may depend on a
library’s cataloguing policy, the cataloguer’s attention to detail or the item’s research value.
The terminology used by the cataloguer may also vary. For a researcher wishing to search for additional items placed within our collections, they may use the words enclosure, enclosures, enclosed, insert or inserted as search terms.
The newspaper clipping placed within Hidden Extras (108.G.101) is a clipping taken from
The Irish Times. It is dated the 26/7/92 and features a Dennis O’Driscoll poem, Pathology.
Reviews can occasionally be found enclosed within works of poetry in Special Collections.
Examples include a review in Outer Space: Selected Poems by Cathal McCabe
(51.RRR.111) and Colleseum: poems by Katie Ford (107.D.51). Reference to enclosed items
where present may be found in the catalogue’s notes field.
Postcard from the Michael Tierney Insertions Collection (68.P.2)
While some items will remain with the books they were placed in, there are also occasions
when items are removed from books. This may be to aid preservation of both the book in
which the item was placed and the item that was placed within the book. Where this happens the relationship between both items should be documented. One example of where this has happened can be found in the Michael Tierney Insertions Collection (68.P.2). Here items, which were placed in books owned by UCD’s former president, have been placed together to form a collection. While the items have been removed from the books, a list accompanies the collection documenting the names of the books from which items were removed. Items which can be found in this collection include postcards, compliment slips, newspaper clippings and manuscript notes.
An enclosure in Handbook of Irish Folklore by Seán Ó Súilleabháin (41.O.32)
Enclosures may be placed within a book accidentally or deliberately. While some items may
have arrived with a book on its entry into Special Collections, there are also instances where a note may be enclosed later. An example can be found in the Handbook of Irish folklore by Seán Ó Súilleabháin (41.O.32). Here instruction has been left to handle the book with care.
Enclosure, “Author of the Irish Fairy Legend” in Handbook of Irish Folklore by Seán Ó Súilleabháin (41.O.32)
This volume also includes a print of the “Author of the Irish Fairy Legend” This enclosure,
at the time of writing, is an example of an enclosure which does not appear in our catalogue, yet it caught my eye recently when a researcher requested to view the book. Some consideration was then given to whether or not the print had been part of the book. An examination of another copy in the National Folklore Collection suggested it was not.
Bookmark in Déirdre: the first of the “three sorrows, or pities, of story-telling” by Douglas Hyde (41.O.30/1)
Bookmarks are found inserted in some books within our collections. The nature of these
bookmarks vary. Some examples within Special Collections include a bookmark promoting
Mercer Street Used Books and Records in New York placed in A poet’s prose : selected
writings of Louise Bogan : with the uncollected poems (107.O.23), a bookmark promoting a
bindery in Déirdre: the first of the “three sorrows, or pities, of story-telling” by Douglas Hyde
(41.O.30/1), and a birthday book mark in The Wrack of the Storm by Maurice Maeterlink
(100.D.19). In The Wrack of the Storm, the presence of the book mark is recorded on the
book’s end pages.
The Wrack of the Storm by Maurice Maeterlink (100.D.19).
This post was written by Patricia Bedlow, Library Assistant, UCD Special Collections / Information and Learning Services