Graduate Students View Rare Books at Huntington Library

November 19, 2012. English Professor Dewey Hall and 13 graduate students were treated to a private presentation of rare books by Alan Jutzi, chief curator at the Huntington Library in San Marino. Jutzi’s presentation, specifically designed for Hall’s Victorian studies course (ENG 552), featured priceless, hand-colored prints by William Blake (1789); a first edition of “Lyrical Ballads” by William Wordsworth (1798); a first edition of Emily Bronte’s “Wuthering Heights” (1847); and a leaf from “In Memoriam” in Tennyson’s own handwriting (1833-50). “The students had been studying the prose and verse by these writers in my graduate courses English 551 (Romanticism) and English 552 (Victorian Studies),” Hall says. Students are also writing papers about texts by the authors, including Tennyson’s “In Memoriam” and Bronte’s “Wuthering Heights.” “The aim was to inspire my students,” Hall says. “The gleeful expressions from eager-eyed students were as delightful as the rare books shown.”