Enriqueta Rylands: A Study of Private Collecting and Public Philanthropy, 1889-1908

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My project will research and analyse Enriqueta Rylands' book collecting between 1889 and 1908 (when she died), including her collecting for the John Rylands Library. Through close scrutiny of both textual records and the material evidence of Rylands' collecting practice, this PhD will reveal what she acquired, how and for what purpose - i.e. private enjoyment, public benefit or sometimes both. Central to the project is an investigation of the relationship between the tastes, interests and practical resources of the individual collector and the ambition to found a major educational and cultural institution.The John Rylands Library was founded by Rylands in memory of her husband John. She began book collecting in 1889 and continued after the Library was opened to the public in 1900. Much of Rylands' private collection of books and art was transferred to the Library after her death in 1908. This project will research the relationship between Rylands' personal collecting practice and its public manifestation and effect. One of the critical contexts for the study is the similarity (or not) between Rylands and women art collectors of the period, especially in terms of the interplay between gender, collecting and philanthropy. The concept of collecting and philanthropy as sites for the construction of identity will underpin my reassessment of Rylands' private and public identities, particularly in relation to her ambiguous social status as both wealthy widow, white Cuban and former lady's companion. This project will assess Rylands' collecting practice thematically, focusing on different subjects represented in her collections, including theology, literature and the visual arts. I will evaluate the material evidence of the collections themselves alongside the archival record, which includescorrespondence, financial accounts and booklists. I will explore the significance of objects both within Rylands' collection and in wider book-historical and socio-historical contexts. Rylands' collection will be considered not only as a physical grouping, but also as a period in the life histories of the objects contained within it. In this manner, the project will develop critical insights into the praxis and politics of Rylands' collecting (Pearce, 1995).This research will also turn critical attention to the incomplete and competing narratives concerning Rylands' intentions for the future of her collection, in order to better understand the interplay between philanthropy and private acquisition. Although Rylands' voice is represented in the archive - in letters, reports of speeches and official documents - it is muted and fragmentary. I will construct a critical multilayered narrative of Rylands' intentions and their public effect from her own writings, writings of contemporaries, and the writings of biographers and historians.