The legendary correspondence between Elizabeth
Barrett and Robert Browning—broken seals, envelopes, crossed-out handwriting,
and all—will be released online on Valentine’s Day in the largest digitization
effort of love letters ever undertaken.
Wellesley, Mass.—On Valentine’s Day, some of the most famous love
letters ever written will be viewable in their original handwritten form, thanks
to the joint efforts of Wellesley College (Massachusetts) and Baylor University
(Texas). The 573 letters of the poets Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Robert
Browning, which are owned and housed by Wellesley’s Margaret Clapp Library,
have been digitized through a partnership with Baylor University and will be
made available online through Baylor’s Digital Collections beginning February
14, 2012. The collaborative project provides unprecedented free access to these
celebrated letters for scholars and romantics alike—and may inspire readers to
opt for pen and paper over text messages and emails this Valentine’s Day.
The love letters, written almost daily from January 1845 to September
1846, offer a thrilling tale of intellectual sympathy, mutual admiration, and a
daring elopement. The correspondence began with a letter addressed
to “dear Miss Barrett” and continued until a week after their marriage,
ending with Elizabeth’s note to Robert as they arranged to leave England and
travel to Italy. The letters are beloved by romantics because the story—of a
secret romance realized with a happy ending—is considered by many to be better
than fiction. Scholars value the letters because they offer a record of the
creative genius of both poets, who wrote some of their best work during the
time of their courtship.
Former Wellesley College President Caroline Hazard purchased the
letters in 1930 and gave them to the Wellesley Library, where they have
remained, along with their original boxes, ever since. Though transcriptions of
the correspondence have been published, high-resolution images of the original
letters and their envelopes have never before been available. Scholars wishing
to study the original letters would need to travel to Wellesley to view the
letters in person.
Thanks to the generous gift of Walter S. Klein in loving memory of
Mary Eddy Klein (Wellesley College class of 1942), who met as students and
spent much time during their courtship at the Wellesley College Library, the
project team hired 42-Line, a digital
imaging company based in Oakland, CA, to digitize the letters on-site in
Special Collections at Wellesley. The team worked for two weeks, meticulously
handling and photographing each of the letters and envelopes, which are more than
165 years old.
Ruth Rogers,
Wellesley’s Curator of Special Collections, believes the digitization of the
Browning love letters represents a great step forward both in access and
preservation. She said, “These letters have survived for 167 years, in spite of
creased paper, fading ink, and competition for ownership on two continents.
Wellesley College is indeed fortunate to have the originals, but we should not
‘possess’ them—their heritage is international.”
According to Barrett Browning scholar Sandra Donaldson (University of
North Dakota), editor of The Works of Elizabeth
Barrett Browning (Pickering), the Baylor-Wellesley collaboration
offers readers an accessible collection of the letters that will reveal how the
Browning correspondence was an intellectual courtship before there was any idea
of marriage. The project opens up conversations among scholars about what the
poets actually wrote—but also offers a rare glimpse at the development of the
Brownings’ relationship. “Having the love letters digitized is especially
wonderful – to see that very first letter that Robert wrote to her, never
having met Elizabeth but knowing of her through a mutual friend, and more
importantly through her poetry.” She continued, “We get the gestalt, the effect
of the page, our seeing how the page as a
physical thing struck her eyes—and
was used by him to pace himself as he was thinking through what to say and how
to say it.”
Digitization of the Letters
Just as Robert found Elizabeth, Wellesley also
discovered the perfect partner in Baylor. The Baylor Libraries already had the
significant infrastructure in place to create and maintain digital collections,
of which it currently has 30. The university in central Texas also is the home
of Armstrong Browning Library, which houses the world’s largest collection of
books, letters, works of art and other items related to the Brownings.
To bring the Browning courtship letters into
the digital age, Baylor’s Digitization Projects Group transformed 1,723 raw
digital images received from Wellesley into more than 4,200 edited page and
envelope images available on the Browning Letters website. Baylor added its own
Browning correspondence to the project, using its high-resolution planetary scanner
to digitize 842 of the more than 2,800 letters held by Armstrong Browning
Library written either by or to the Brownings.
“Most researchers want to see the letters in
their original state,” said Darryl Stuhr, Manager of Digitization Projects for
the Baylor Electronic Library. “These digitized letters are as authentic
online as if you pulled them out of a sleeve.”
Each page contains valuable metadata added by
Baylor, including full transcriptions that allow these letters to be full text
searchable.
The huge project, which continues to add more
letters, needed about 340 gigabytes to store the digital preservation files of
Wellesley and Baylor letters. Stuhr estimates they will need about 1.2
terrabytes of storage space once his group digitizes all of the Brownings’
correspondence.
Preservation,
Access, and Inspiration
Rogers also hopes
that access to the letters will inspire people well beyond the College campus,
noting the effect on visitors that come far and wide to view Wellesley’s
Browning collection, which includes the Barrett family door by which Elizabeth
would await Robert’s letters.
“When Russian and
Italian visitors stand in awe in front of the famous mahogany door of 50
Wimpole Street, which still has the brass letter slot through which Robert
Browning’s envelopes passed, I feel pride for Wellesley, and some amusement
too. Local legend has it that the slot
was mysteriously closed up over 40 years ago when students would occasionally
slip their own love letters through it. Why should we deny inspiration and hope
to romantics and future poets? Perhaps it will be opened…” Rogers said.
Beginning February 14, 2012, scholars and the public will be able to
see the complete collection of letters and envelopes online. The technology
allows readers to zoom in closely to see intricate details, for example, to
examine the individual words, scribbles, and marks from the poets’ hands.
Readers can rotate the letters and envelopes, and are invited to browse and
search the letters by date, author, and first line of text.
“Baylor and Wellesley
are committed as libraries to public access,” said Pattie Orr, Vice President
for Information Technology and Dean of Libraries at Baylor. “In the past, only
scholars or grad students would have the resources to travel to Baylor or
Wellesley to see these rare documents. By digitizing and mounting the letters
in the Baylor repository, junior high and high school students, undergraduates
and graduate students, scholars and anyone who loves poetry or romance across
the entire world can spend as much time as they wish with the letters.”
Orr continued, “Scholars
will always want to see the real thing, and the Baylor-Wellesley digitization
project will preserve the letters by reducing the amount they must be handled. We
want these letters to last as long as possible, but all physical objects
deteriorate. Through careful digitization and archival standards and
storage we hope these letters will last virtually forever.”
Ganesan Ravishanker,
Chief Information Officer at Wellesley College, added, “Technology enables us
to extend the lives of these precious letters—and at the same time brings the
magic of viewing them up close and examining the handwritten words on the page
to anyone with an internet connection. The experience is as close as you can
get to holding the actual letters in your hands—if not better.”
Baylor-Wellesley collaboration will create
unprecedented virtual collection of the Brownings’ work
The digitization of the love letters is the first phase of Wellesley’s
and Baylor’s goal to create the most important virtual Browning collection in
the United States.
With the first phase of the project now complete, the two institutions
will work to digitize a large amount of correspondence between the Brownings and
leading artists and authors, including Benjamin Haydon, John Kenyon, Anna
Jameson, and Harriet Martineau, which is also at Wellesley College.
“As The Browning Letters project
progresses, it is likely that poetical manuscripts will be digitized as well,”
said Rita S. Patteson, Director and Curator of Manuscripts at Armstrong
Browning Library. “The availability of all Browning materials will
preserve the items and make them easily accessible to scholars and Browning
enthusiasts.”
Baylor has developed The Browning Letters, an online resource of
Browning materials at http://www.baylor.edu/lib/browningletters. By using Baylor’s existing infrastructure, all digitized Browning materials
owned by Wellesley and Baylor will be made available to researchers throughout
the world at no cost.
The virtual collection of Browning love letters launches February 14,
2012 at http://www.wellesley.edu/browning.
About
Baylor University
Baylor University
is a private Christian university and a nationally ranked research institution,
characterized as having "high research activity" by the Carnegie
Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. The university provides a vibrant
campus community for approximately 15,000 students by blending interdisciplinary
research with an international reputation for educational excellence and a
faculty commitment to teaching and scholarship. Chartered in 1845 by the
Republic of Texas through the efforts of Baptist pioneers, Baylor is the oldest
continually operating university in Texas. Located in Waco, Baylor welcomes
students from all 50 states and more than 80 countries to study a broad range
of degrees among its 11 nationally recognized academic divisions.
About
Wellesley College
Since 1875,
Wellesley College has been a leader in providing an excellent liberal arts
education for women who will make a difference in the world. Its 500-acre
campus near Boston is home to 2,400 undergraduate students from all 50 states
and 75 countries.
Press Contacts
Sofiya Cabalquinto, 781-283-3321, scabalqu@wellesley.edu
Anne Yu, 781-283-3201, ayu@wellesley.edu
