Realization of the Day:

I really like my job.

I had my first 'sit down with the boss and talk about one's progress' talks. I couldn't really tell what she thought of my progress since, quite frankly, I've basically taken the tasks that people suggested during one of my first days and run with them. There's hasn't been a lot of guidance from anyone, but I haven't really wanted any. I like creating my own work patterns to fit my moods.

First off, let me tell you what it is that I do. Yes, the WBL is a library, but not in the sense that you go and check out books, but instead that it's a museum for books, papers, sounds recordings, manuscripts, and much more. It's only recently that WBL separated from World's Biggest Museum and became its own entity. So basically, it's a museum for books that has special departments for conserving books, putting on museum exhibitions with books, and cataloguing books.

Most of my job involves cataloguing, but my boss is letting me help pick some manuscripts that will go on display for the general public, as well as to write the description about the manuscript that everyone will read. But back to the main part of my job...

My job this summer is to catalogue books for a giant online database of illuminated manuscripts from the medieval and renaissance periods. This involves looking at each manuscript, figuring out basic information about it (e.g. what's inside, when it was made, where it was made), describing it (e.g. binding, illuminations, illustrations), and researching its provenance.

a. When a cataloguer researches the basic information about a manuscript, she basically creates a table of contents that other people can consult. Since each of these manuscripts was written by hand, they could have mistakes, unique changes, and since so much time has passed, pages can be missing. It's the cataloguer's job to record this.

b. Describing a manuscript is my favorite part, especially figuring out the place (usually France, Italy, Germany, England, Spain, or the Netherlands) and the century (usually anywhere between the 9th century to the 16th century). Since some of the texts written in these manuscripts exist in only a single copy, or perhaps two or three, figuring out where/when a manuscript is produced can be really important. This is also the time when a cataloguer examines the manuscript to see if a scribe or artist was associated with the book.

c. Provenance research is particularly interesting. Basically, a cataloguer tries to figure out every person who has owned the book since it was 'born.' One does this through finding signatures in the books and figuring out information about them and trying to figure out if others have talked about the manuscript before. Old owners cross out information, erase, and change things, so sometimes one has to look under a UV lamp to see if anything has been erased. This is where cataloguing becomes like an episode of Alias for me. Basically, one is trying to solve a giant puzzle!!