the milton booklet

7/30/2019 The Milton Booklet

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Introducing the

Robert J. Wickenheiser

Collection o John Milton

September 21, 2006Thomas Cooper Library

University o South Carolina


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Dr. Robert Wickenheiser is the uncontested premier collector o Milton and

Miltoniana in the world. . . . There is, to the best o my knowledge, no other privately

held collection in the world that even remotely begins to approach the Wickenheiser

Milton Collection in scope, range, or importance. . . . The purchase o this collection

would immediately catapult the purchaser into world-class status.

G.W.StuartJr.

. . . one o the major collections o materials related to John Milton, editions and

studies and artworks, in the world . . . indicating the breadth and nature o Miltons

position in the literary, political, religious, and sociological world over the nearly

three and a hal centuries since his death.

JohnT.Shawcross

. . . a magnifcent collection, in mint condition, preserved under ideal

circumstances, broad in scope, and unique in some o its items . . . what has to be

one o the best private collections o Milton and Miltoniana in existence.

JohnMulryan

Dr. Wickenheisers collection is . . . a paradise or a scholar o seventeenth-century

English literature.

RoyFlannagan

. . . breathtaking in its reachMilton is here but also Miltoniana, the latter

in abundance. This is a collection that, unlike any other I have seen, represents

Milton on an international scene and as an important token o his culture.

JosephWittreich

Cover illustration:

Adam and Eve leaving Eden, rom

John Martin, illus., Paradise Lost, 2 vols.(London, 1827), with proos o themezzotint illustrations


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Introducing the Robert J. Wickenheiser Collection

The Robert J. Wickenheiser Collection o John Milton is a very signicant as wellas a very welcome acquisition or the University o South Carolina and its library. To

support the teaching and research o a major university, its library must provide both

current resources and distinguished research collections. The Wickenheiser collection

brings the library its rst major seventeenth-century research collection, to join our

earlier acquisition o great collections in succeeding centuries. It brings a collection

with the depth, scope, and size to support and stimulate a wide range o teaching

and research, rom the undergraduate level upward. It brings to the University a

collection that is already widely recognized among scholars in the eld. We believe

it is a collection that will draw aculty and scholars to South Carolina, to the

continuing benet o the academic community here.

The Wickenheiser collection has come to the University through the generosity and

support o three people. Dr. and Mrs. Wickenheiser, who had built the collection over

a period o nearly orty years, held to their wish that it could be maintained and made

available to uture scholars as a single collection, in one library, and to accomplish

that aim accepted a very conservative valuation or purchase. Their cordiality and

helpulness throughout the acquisition process have been much valued.

The leading support or the acquisition has been generously provided by Mr. William

L. Richter and the William L. Richter Family Foundation. Mr. Richters willingness

to visit the University, to recognize what the collection might accomplish here or the

University, and to commit the lead unding to bring the collection here were pivotal

to the acquisition.

From the librarys rst contact with Dr. Wickenheiser, in 2004, we recognized that the

prospect o additional space in the projected Special Collections library wing would

be crucial i the collection is to have the greatest long-term benets to teaching and

research. The Board o Trustees has approved naming a dedicated room in the new

wing The William L. Richter Room, recognizing Mr. Richters generosity and ensuring

that the Wickenheiser collection will be known and used. President Andrew A. Sorensen

and Provost Mark Becker have both been extremely supportive o the acquisition o

the Wickenheiser collection.

Paul Willis

Dean o Libraries

Jonathan Richardson (16651745),

sepia drawing o Milton rom clay

bust (ca. 1730)


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Dr. Robert J. Wickenheiser started collecting Milton and other seventeenth-century

poets as a graduate student at the University o Minnesota in the late 1960s. As a

young proessor at Princeton in the early seventies, he began ocusing on the historyo Milton illustration, and with his wie, Pat, and the late Robert H. Taylor, past

president o the Grolier Club, he visited and established riendships with many o

the best-known antiquarian book dealers on both sides o the Atlantic. The Milton

collection o more than 6,000 volumes that he and Pat built over the next 35 years

became a place o pilgrimage or Milton scholars. Since retiring, Dr. Wickenheiser

has completed a ull-scale illustrated catalogue o the collection that is scheduled

or publication or the John Milton quatercentenary in 2008.

The Robert J. Wickenheiser Collection o John Milton has been purchased or the

University with the leading support oMr. William L. Richter and the William L.

Richter Family Foundation. In recognition and appreciation o this generous git, the

Universitys Board o Trustees has approved naming a room in the librarys new Special

Collections wing or Mr. Richter, dedicated to housing and selectively displaying the

Wickenheiser collection.

Books are not absolutely dead things, but do contain a potency o lie. . . . They

do preserve as in a vial the purest efcacy and extraction o that living intellect

that bred them. . . . A good book is the precious lie-blood o a master-spirit.

JohnMilton,Areopagitica(1644)

The slightest Pamphlet is nowadayes more vendible than the Works o learnedest

men; but it is the love I have to our own Language that hath made me diligent to

collect, and set orth such peeces both in Prose and Verse, as may renew the wonted

honour and esteem o our English tongue . . . presenting . . . these ever-green, and

not to be blasted Laurels.

HumphreyMoseley,Miltonspublisher,in Poems(1645)

A portion o the Robert J. Wickenheiser

Collection, in the library o the

Wickenheisers home in Olean, N.Y.

Many o the photographs in this

publication were taken in this room by

Carl V. Margeson, o Allegany, N.Y., or

Dr. Wickenheisers orthcoming book

about the collection and are used here

courtesy o Dr. Wickenheiser.

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Richard Westall (17651836), Milton

ComposingParadise Lost, hand-coloredaquatint (ca. 1810)


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An Overview o the Robert J. WickenheiserCollection o John Milton

John Milton (16081674) is the most important English-language poet o the

seventeenth century, and central to the wider culture o his time. He was active in

politics (as author o the rst major text on the reedom o the press and as Latin

secretary to Britains revolutionary government in the late 1640s and 1650s), deeply

involved in the same religious debates as the Pilgrim athers, and a pioneer also in

his writings on education and on marriage law. He was a learned, even bookish, poet

whose works lead outward to other writers and thinkers. For centuries ater it was

written, his poetry drew responses rom poets, learned scholars, ordinary readers,

musicians and composers, and (as the Wickenheiser collection particularly shows)

artists and illustrators.

The Robert J. Wickenheiser Collection o John Milton, with more than 6,000 volumes,

has both depth and range. Its holdings o rst and other seventeenth-century editions

o Miltons own writings places this library among the top ten Milton collections in

North America. The holdings o seventeenth-century Miltonianabooks reerring to

Milton or otherwise relating to himare likewise distinguished. The long ranges o

shelves in the collection with eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth century Milton

editions present a comprehensive record o Miltons continuing impact, while similarly

comprehensive holdings o Milton biography, scholarship, and criticism document the

development o knowledge about his writings, thought, and infuence.

Dr. Wickenheiser has been especially successul in building what is perhaps the most

comprehensive collection anywhere o Milton illustration, rom the rst illustrated

edition in 1688 through all the major illustrators that ollow, with original drawings

by several o the artists, and with especial depth or the work o John Martin (1789

1854) and Gustave Dor (18321883).

The Wickenheiser collection broadens the historical range represented in the

Universitys research collections. It is the rst major acquisition ocused on any

author or topic beore the mid-eighteenth century. Moreover, the breadth o Miltons

own interests and the international and chronological range o those who have

responded to him make this a collection that will stimulate an equally broad range

o research projects, across a variety o disciplines, both by established researchers

and by students at the graduate and undergraduate levels. This is the kind o special

collection, on a major author o central cultural signicance, with the strength to

support both teaching and research, that any University library should covet. We

salute with gratitude the collector and the donor who have brought it here to Thomas

Cooper Library.

Patrick Scott

Director o Special Collections

Frontispiece portrait rom Paradise Lost(1688), engraved by Robert White ater

William Faithorne


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Milton in theSeventeenth Century

The Robert J. Wickenheiser Collection

includes more than sixty dierent

rst and other early editions o Milton

published in Miltons own century.

These cover all phases o Miltons

career and all the varied aspects

o his published writing.

Milton as PoetLea with Miltons frst published poem,

rom the Shakespeare Second Folio (1632)

The oundation o Miltons signicance remains his poetry, and the

Wickenheiser collection includes Miltons rst published poem,

his tribute to William Shakespeare, published while he was still a

student at Cambridge.

Miltons Early RecognitionMiltons Poems English and Latin (1645)

From his rst published collection in 1645, whicincluded tributes rom Italian scholars, Miltons

stature as a poet was recognized not only by

English readers, but also internationally.

The Wickenheiser collection has a ne copy

o the 1645 collection, with the Marshall portrai

Miltons Historical ImportanceMiltons Eikonoklastes (1649)

Milton was deeply engaged in the English political revolution o

the mid-seventeenth century, both as pamphleteer and as Latin

Secretary to the Commonwealth ater the execution o King

Charles I. The Wickenheiser collection includes rst editions

o many o his political writings.

Five variant issuesoParadise Lost (166769)Paradise Lost

At the heart o the Wickenheiser collection

are ve ne copies o the rst edition o

Miltons masterwork, the epic Paradise Lost

(1667). The collection includes ve o the six

variant issues traditionally identied rom the

rst edition, which was arranged in ten epic

books rather than the twelve o the second

and later editions.

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Illustrated Editions oParadise LostThe frst illustrated edition (1688)

The initial ocus o Dr. Wickenheisers Milton collectingwas Milton illustration, and the collection has all three variant

issues or the rst illustrated edition, the ourth olio (1688),

with twelve engravings chiefy by J.B. Medina. Shown here is

the expulsion rom Eden.

Books that Infuenced MiltonDuBartas, His Divine Weekes and Workes (1605)

In addition to Miltons own works, the Wickenheisercollection has more than ty related seventeenth-century

items. O writers that infuenced Milton, the collection has

rst editions o Giovanni Andreini (1617), Phineas Fletcher

(1633), Thomas Heywood (1635), and George Sandys (1636),

as well as several editions o Sallust DuBartas.

Contemporary Reaction to MiltonJudgment and Decree of the University of Oxford (1683)

Miltons political views made him a controversial gure to

his contemporaries. In addition to books mentioning and

commenting on Miltons poetry by George Sikes, Joshua Poole,

John Phillips, Patrick Hume, and others, the Wickenheiser

collection has items like this, the Universitys condemnation o

pernicious books and damnable doctrines, including Miltons.

Milton as Political ThinkerThe frst edition oAreopagitica (1644)

Miltons ideas on controversial issueschurch-state

relations, marriage law, education, and the rights o those

governed to remove the governmentwere o lasting

infuence. His 1644 letter to Parliament,Areopagitica, was

a milestone in establishing the reedom o the press.

By labour and intent study . . .

I might perhaps leave something

so written to ater-times, as they

should not willingly let it die.

JohnMilton(1641)


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Milton in theEighteenth and

Nineteenth Centuries

The Wickenheiser collection contains

holdings in depth charting Miltons

readership and infuence in the

eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

These holdings in particular hold

the potential or a wide variety o

research projects, not only on Milton,

but on his publishers, illustrators,

biographers, and commentatorsand on the developing history

o book production.

The Growth o Miltons InfuenceJoseph Addisons copy oParadise Lost (1711)

Among items documenting Miltons infuence isthis unassuming edition, once owned by the poet

and critic Joseph Addison (16721719), given to

Dr. Wickenheiser in 1980 by the late John Fleming,

to whom it came rom the legendary Dr. A.S.W.

Rosenbach. The rst separate edition o Addisons

infuential essays on Milton is also in the

Wickenheiser collection.

Miltons International ReputationParadise Lost (Paris, 1792), with color illustrations

The Wickenheiser collection documents Miltons extraordinaryinternational infuence, with early translations that include Latin

German, French, Dutch, and Italian. The French edition shown

here (in a sumptuous binding) pioneered a new technique or

direct color printing, rather than hand-colored engravings.

Milton and His EditorsParadise Lost (1727), interleave

with manuscript annotationsThe Wickenheiser collection also

documents how editors wrestled

over the texts and interpretation

o Miltons poetry. This specially

interleaved copy preserves the

copious and detailed annotations

o its mid-eighteenth-century own

Milton and AmericaThe frst American edition oParadise Lost (1777)

Milton was as infuential in America as in Europe

and not only among the Puritans. The Revolution

reed Americans rom British copyright, and the

Wickenheiser collection includes not only the

rst American editions o Miltons poetry but also

rare printings o political pamphlets, infuential in

debates on the Constitution and Bill o Rights.

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Francis Hayman (17081776)Hayman, Satan, Sin & Death

The Wickenheiser collection has twooriginal Hayman watercolors. The subject

o this one is also treated by several other

artists, including Hogarth and (in political

caricatures) Rowlandson and Gilray.

Henry Richter (ca. 1770ca. 1820)Richter, original drawing (ca. 1794)

Henry Richters illustrations or Paradise Lost were published in

1794. In addition to the published versions, the Wickenheiser

collection has a portolio with twelve o Richters original

drawings or the series.

John MartinOriginal mezzotint proo or Paradise Lost (1825)

The Romantic or apocalyptic landscapes by

John Martin (17911855) are among the greatest o

Milton illustrations. The Wickenheiser collectionhas an extraordinary range o the published editions

o Martins work, including this proo or his rst

mezzotint edition. Another Martin proo is used

on the cover o this publication.

Gustave DorDors Milton in original parts (1866)

Among the most widely popular mid-nineteenth-century Milton

illustrations were those by the French illustrator Gustave Dor

(18321883). Dors work was marketed using all the resourceso Victorian mass publishing, including part issues (as here) and

multiple variant bindings. The Wickenheiser collection includes

all these, along with Dors other illustrated works.

Milton andHis Illustrators

The Wickenheiser collections

comprehensive holdings o illustrated

editions o Milton include many

rare variant issues and editions and

a number o original drawings and

separately issued engravings by such

artists as Francis Hayman, Thomas

Rowlandson, James Gilray, Henry

Richter, Henry Fuseli, Richard Westall,

Henry Howard, John Martin, John Belland Gustave Dor.


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Milton and theHistory o the Book

A collection o this depth not only

illustrates its own special eld but

also provides research opportunities

in many adjacent disciplines. The

Wickenheiser collection is especially

valuable in the research materials it

provides or the growing research

interest in book production and

the history o the book.

Milton and Fine PrintingParadise Lost (Golden Cockerel, 1937)

The Wickenheiser collection includes editions o Milton byinfuential printers and book designers rom John Baskerville

in the eighteenth century through to the modern ne printing

movement, with examples rom the Daniel Press, Eragny Press,

Vale Press, Doves Press, Chiswick Press, Cresset Press, Nonesuch,

Golden Cockerel, Rampant Lion Press, and Whittington Press.

Fine BindingsParadise Lost (1688), in contemporary black morocco

Many o the volumes in the Wickenheiser collection have beenspecially bound, and in addition to such earlier ne bindings as

the one illustrated, the collection contains examples by many

o the major binders o the late nineteenth and early twentieth

centuries: the Doves Bindery, Rivire, Sangorski and Sutclie,

Bayntun, and others.

The Development o Book Production Techniques

Victorian decorated cloth bindings

The scale o the collection means that it also includes, generally in ne condition, a very ull

range o examples o book production history, rom seventeenth-century olios (and pamphlets),

through the paper-covered boards o the late eighteenth century, through the evolution o

publishers decorated cloth bindings in the nineteenth century.

Milton Scholarship and Reerence

The primary materials in the Robert J. Wickenheiser Collection are supported by a ull range o

the scholarship on Milton, including modern biographies, critical monographs, editions, specialist

journals, auction and booksellers catalogues, and reerence works relating to Milton illustrators

and the history o illustration techniques. Many o these books are inscribed to Dr. Wickenheiser

by their authors.

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Rare Books and Special Collections at Thomas Cooper Library

The University o South Carolina (then South Carolina College) started building its library

collections in 1803. By 1850, with 25,000 volumes, it had the largest library collection south

o Washington, D.C., housed in the rst purpose-built ree-standing college library building.

Many o the valuable books acquired during that time period are still in the librarys care and

orm the core o the current Special Collections. Since the mid-twentieth century, the libraries

as a whole have grown exponentially until, with more than 3.3 million volumes, USCs libraries

constitute a major research and teaching resource or the University, the community, the state,

and the nation. USC has the only nationally ranked research library in the state and the only

S.C. membership in the Association o Research Libraries.

The Department o Rare Books and Special Collections at Thomas Cooper Library has also

grown dramatically in recent years. Its special mission is to acquire, preserve, and make

available distinctive (oten rare or valuable, sometimes unique) materials and collections,

such as books, manuscripts, and other materials, in support o teaching and research. Over

the past twenty years the departments holdings have grown sixold, attracting international

scholarly attention and adding signicant new collections, largely through generous response

to an expanded git program, in the areas o philosophy (Hume, Russell); history (Garibaldi),

exploration (Renaissance maps), military history (Civil War, World War I), and military

aviation (World War II); natural history (eighteenth century watercolors, Abbot) and the

history o science (Darwin, Babbage); English literature (Milton), Scottish literature (Ramsay,

Burns, Carlyle, Stevenson, MacDiarmid), and American literature (Emerson, Fuller, Whitman,

Johnson, Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Heller, Dickey); childrens literature (Rawlings, Arican-

American); and the history o the book.

Over the same period, the department has also added new initiatives in the areas o teaching,

exhibits, digitization, and scholarly and public programs. Its community organization, the

Thomas Cooper Society, ounded in 1990, now has more than 600 members. An extensive

series o Web exhibits and Web projects based on the collections has been attracting more

than 25 million hits a year.

When it opens in 2008, the departments new home, part o a multistage plan to modernize

and upgrade physical acilities or all USC libraries, will provide attractive space or all these

activitiesexhibits, teaching, public programs, and digital projects as well as expanded and

up-to-date study space or researchers, enhanced environmental conditions and security or

both people and books, and much increased and upgraded stack space to ensure the long-term

availability o these extraordinary collections.

The Thomas Cooper Librarys new

west wing will provide space or the

collections and services oered by

the Department o Rare Books and

Special Collections.

The University o South Carolina is an equal opportunity institution. 06497 University Publications 9/06


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Books are not absolutely dead things, but do contain a potency o lie. . . .

A good book is the precious lie-blood o a master-spirit.

JohnMilton,Areopagitica (1644)

Rare Books & Special Collections

Thomas Cooper Library

the milton booklet

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