Speaking volumes

This is a ‘before and after’ comparison of two of my three original (1858-60) volumes of the Illustrated News of the World.

You’ll see that, for the most damaged volume, it was necessary to have an entirely new spine made.

What this has demonstrated to me is the importance of traditional artisan skills. The fabulous bookbinder (details available on request) has carried out a wonderfully sympathetic restoration, retaining as much as possible of the original binding boards and spines. For two of the volumes, the repairs are all but invisible. Most importantly, they are now in a state where I can enjoy opening them up to view the contents. As you can see in the next picture, this was a newspaper that deserves such treatment – an ultimately doomed but splendidly audacious, very high quality competitor to Herbert Ingram’s Illustrated London News.

Despite the convenience of digitised versions of historical newspapers – and, let me speak plainly, my PhD would have been impossible without them, so I am very much in favour of them – there’s still something magical about handling the real thing, however fragile the physical artefacts might be. So, having been gifted these volumes of one of my favourite Victorian periodicals, I wanted to try to preserve them.

Finding a working bookbinder wasn’t easy, to my surprise. When I worked in universities (admittedly a few years ago now) every PhD thesis – and not a few Master’s dissertations – were required to be submitted as a hardbound book as the final stage in the process. Every university library has shelves full of them – many sadly forgotten but representative of thought, effort and application. I was looking forward to this sense of validation of my work over the last four years but…that’s so last century, apparently. All that’s required these days is a digital upload. Very convenient, much cheaper for the student and requires no physical library storage space. Am I, though, alone in thinking that something of the sense of achievement is lost? I also feel for the bookbinders who once had a steady business from postgraduate students and whose services are no longer needed. Once these skills are lost, it will endanger historical objects like these newspaper volumes and all we’ll be left with is the digital remediations – at least until that form also becomes obsolete, probably much sooner than have the print archives.

Well, it may not be be required for the university library, but I’m going to get a bound copy of my thesis anyway. It might be outdated but, speaking as a newly-minted historian (of the print media, no less!), it feels appropriate to have one for posterity.