Lewis Carroll’s original handwritten, illustrated manuscript for “Alice in Wonderland” will travel to the U.S. — making a stop in Philadelphia — to mark its 150th anniversary.
The British Library is loaning the book — presented by the author to Alice Liddell, who inspired it — to New York’s Morgan Library and Museum and the Rosenbach Museum of the Free Library of Philadelphia next year.
The work, which bears its original title of “Alice’s Adventures Under Ground,” was bought by an American dealer in 1928 and returned to Britain in 1948.
The Rosenbach Museum, who will house the manuscript in Philadelphia, is a place of active engagement that reinforces the relevance of historical collections to contemporary issues. It was founded in 1954 through a testamentary gift by Dr. A.S.W. Rosenbach and his brother, Philip. Renowned dealers in books, manuscripts, and fine art, the brothers played a central role in the development of private libraries that later became our nation’s most important public collections of rare books, such as the Folger and Huntington Libraries. The brothers’ own personal collection, now the core of the Rosenbach, features treasures the brothers were unable to part with, including the only surviving copy of Benjamin Franklin’s first Poor Richard Almanac and the manuscript of James Joyce’s Ulysses. The collection has since grown to include the papers of poet Marianne Moore, and Bram Stoker’s notes for Dracula, adding richness and relevance to the experience of visiting the Rosenbach.
Original story by the Associated Press.
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