Tag: 2026

State of the Project, March 2026

A person wearing tan pants and black shoes on a bed, with their feet up, with school papers scattered all around/over them and a laptop to the side.
Photo by Ron Lach on Pexels.com

Greetings, dear readers! It’s the end of March and I am up to my eyeballs in grading, as is the way of things. I will be attending ASECS 2026 in Philly this year, which should be exciting. I’m making progress on being caught up on my feedback on student papers, which is something of a relief, but for now I’ll settle for reporting the small amount of progress the LBP saw this month and take comfort that even amidst the sea of grading that happens when you teach an overload, one can still paddle a bit towards the eventual destination.

This month brings us into the letter M. M has a lot going on, and so I doubt I’ll be done with it before May. I will continue to poke at it, however.

Things I’ve learned so far from the Letter M:

  • First, the number of institutions that just refer to the library as “Main Library.” It’s too many. Differentiate, people. You know who you are.
  • The University of Edinburgh has a number of good things I need to see, including a surprising number of editions of the Memoirs of the Duke of Sully for a non-US institution and a copy of The Life of Harriot Stuart, which isn’t easy to come by.

Number of libraries confirmed: 360
Number of libraries entered into the database: 118
Number of extant copies confirmed: 1257

State of the Project, February 2026

White capital L on a black field with white dots, surrounded by scrolling vines and flowers and a weird lamia-like figure giving strong Emperor's New Groove energy.

Greetings, dear reader! I suddenly find myself half-way through February, and thus I am scrambling to post my monthly check-in. This month’s status update is brought to you by the letter L, indicating that I finally finished L with its small cache of wonders. I’m starting on M next, obviously, and not particularly looking forward to the unfortunate number of libraries titled “Main.” This letter looks to have around 200 entries by volume, so it should be do-able in a month’s time.

Things I learned from L:

  • In addition to a number of various copies of Memoirs of the Duke of Sully in all its assorted names, the Langsam Library at the University of Cincinnati has a copy of that rare bird, Hermione, or the Orphan Sisters, published by Minerva Press in 1791. Now this gothic potboiler was published anonymously and its attribution to Lennox is, let’s say, tenuous at best. By 1791, however, Lennox was in pretty dire straits financially speaking. Euphemia, published in 1790, wasn’t successful, and most of her formerly influential publishing friends had died some years before. I know that Cadell, who took over for Millar’s bookshop, was good friends with Johnson, but I haven’t looked deeply into his relationship with Lennox and whether her falling out with Johnson affected their business together. Regardless, Lennox was not above doing what was needed to make money, Minerva Press was open for submissions, and thus it’s possible Hermione is hers (or at least it’s a really interesting question as to why it was attributed to her, if not).
  • The Library of Congress has at least a month’s worth of content for me to parse through. This probably isn’t surprising in the least, but that doesn’t make me any less excited.

Number of libraries confirmed: 351
Number of libraries entered into the database: 118
Number of extant copies confirmed: 1227