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Library Newsletter – Winter 2015
Inside this issue
UCL Library users will be interested in our opening times over Christmas and how we’re making changes in our front-line services. On top of that, our Research Data Support Officer writes about how we can help you manage the results of your research.
Library Services continually engages with our community and members of the public and so we have a number of articles for all tastes. As the weather finally begins to turn colder, we have some comfort food courtesy of Jeremy Bentham. Panto season is upon us so we fittingly have a piece on Peter Pan from a colleague in our Institute of Child Health Library. One time member of the Viking Society and design icon, William Morris features in an exhibition at our Queen Square Library, and we have a guest article on an art project in our Institute of Archaeology Library. You can also read about one Librarian’s experience of publishing her first book as an Open Access publication, and see more on this topic in our round up from UCL Press. Last but not least, there is a round up of activities from our Special Collections.
We hope you enjoy, and don’t forget to check out the competition below!
Win a Kindle Fire!!
That’s got your attention hasn’t it? Read on to find out how.
If you’ve recently joined UCL, this will be your first newsletter from UCL Library Services, and you can look forward to others in the Spring and Summer Terms.
However, those of you who have been around a while will notice that we’ve changed the format, and we’d really like your help in naming the newsletter. In exchange for your suggestions we’re offering the chance to win a Kindle Fire.
To enter
Send your entries to library@ucl.ac.uk, by the end of January 2016, and if we choose your suggestion that Kindle Fire will be coming your way. Over to you…
Christmas opening hours
If you’re planning on studying or conducting research over the festive period, some of our libraries will be open so see our opening hours page for full details.
Season’s greetings to all.
Service with a smile
“I’m sorry to bother you” is not a phrase we in the Main and Science Help Team particularly relish hearing from students. Believe it, or not, the stereotypical image of the Librarian ensconced in an ivory tower, thumbing through The Collected Works of Proust, shushing anyone who dares to disrupt their solitary quest for enlightenment, still endures.
Read more about how we’ve contributed to an improvement of the student experience…
Doing more with your data
UCL Library Services is working towards a number of goals to improve our Systems & Processes, as part of our Library Strategy (2015-18). One of these goals is to improve our research support by extending support for research data management.
A new website dedicated to Research Data Management is now accessible. It has been created to help UCL researchers and research students plan ahead for data management and comply with research funders’ expectations on data management and sharing.
Want to know what are Research Data and why should I care? Read on…
Jeremy Bentham’s recipe for Turnip Pudding
Recipes written by Jeremy Bentham are just some of the delights to be found in our Bentham Collection, and earlier this year students in the UCL Centre for Publishing worked with the Transcribe Bentham initiative to produce a cookbook
Many of the recipes in the manuscripts contain some rather grisly ingredients, but we’ve found a nice seasonal one that’s suitable for vegetarians.
Learn how to make Bentham’s Turnip Pudding…
The most generous gift: Peter Pan, J. M. Barrie, and Great Ormond Street Hospital
Early in 1929, Sir James Barrie was asked to join an Appeals Committee to try and buy some of the estate of the Foundling Hospital for Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH). He replied that on principle he never lent his name to appeals, but he would see whether he could do something for the hospital. A few months afterwards he gave the copyright of Peter Pan – both the book and the play – which proved to be one of the most generous donations ever to the hospital.
Read more on the relationship between Great Ormond Street Hospital and Peter Pan..
Embroidered Minds: William Gowers & the Morris Family
William Morris, the designer and social reformer, lived and worked in Queen Square from 1865-81.
Embroidered Minds, a collaboration between artists, writers, doctors and academics, is investigating connections between the Morris family and William Gowers, a 19th century neurologist at the National Hospital, Queen Square.
Read more about the exhibition…
Lazy Susan stars in museum film
‘Lazy Susan: Portable Toolkit’ is a stone sculpture which functions as an object handling desk. Artist Kate Morrell is currently touring the sculpture to various archives and museums, to film a series of short (1-2 mins) object presentations by museum professionals.
The sculpture was made in 2014 for the commissioned exhibition ‘Pots before words’ at Gallery II, University of Bradford. The exhibition was a collaboration with Special Collections at the University.
Read more about the sculpture and a recent visit to UCL Institute of Archaeology…
An adventure in Open Access
In early September this year I had the pleasure of opening a parcel containing a slim volume: a newly published book I had written under the title “Supporting research in area studies: a guide for academic libraries”. It was an attempt to capture some of what I had learned over many years at UCL SSEES Library, and before that at Chatham House Library. I hoped it would both fill a gap in the professional literature of librarianship in relation to area studies, and encourage librarians to think more internationally about collections, systems and services. I did a little publicity, there was a flurry of interest and congratulation, and then all went quiet. Slowly it started to appear in academic library collections, and in due course I hoped there would be a few kind reviews in professional journals, but I knew I had to be patient and put it out of my mind.
Read the conclusion of this tale of the unexpected pleasures of open access…
Special Collections out & about
The Italian poet Dante Alighieri was born 750 years ago, and UCL Special Collections has been playing a leading part in the international celebrations. Events elsewhere have been taking place throughout 2015, and include the issue of a commemorative 2-Euro coin – an interesting choice for a poet who condemned financial corruption – and a recitation of Dante’s poetry from space by Italy’s first female astronaut, transmitted to earth for broadcast in an Italian cinema. Here at UCL Special Collections, events have been more modest but, we hope, commensurate with the remarkable international significance of UCL’s history with Dante.
Full details of UCL’s Dante Collection and upcoming exhibitions by UCL Special Collections…
Hot off the press & straight on the web
The six months since the launch of UCL Press have been extremely busy. During this time, UCL Press has managed to launch eight open access books, two journals and managed an extremely successful Open Access conference with over 120 delegates (with assistance from UCL Open Access and UCL Discovery). The UCL Press team have also spoken at a number of events- Society for Young Publishers conference, Academic Book of the Future projects showcase evening at the British Library and the Futurebook conference, to name but a few- and contributed articles about the press to UKSG enews and Insights.
We were also deeply saddened to hear of the death of Lisa Jardine, Professor of Renaissance Studies, Director of the Centre for Editing Lives and Letters, and author of UCL Press’ inaugural title, Temptation in the Archives. Professor Jardine was a distinguished scholar, and we are honoured to have published her final work.
Read more about our published titles and our work in UCL’s Open Access conference…
