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NLA News - home May 2004 Volume XIV Number 8
Future Memory: National Library Recent Acquisitions

From rare books to the sheet music of a pop princess, Margaret Dent previews some of the Library’s recent acquisitions, now on display in Future Memory

Libraries, over the centuries, have been the most important way of keeping our collective wisdom. They were and still are a sort of universal brain where we can retrieve what we have forgotten and what we still do not know.

Umberto Eco, Vegetal and Mineral Memory: The Future of Books
1 November 2003

A colour map of 'Orbis terrarum typus de integro in plurimis emendatus auctus et icunculis illustratus' [Amsteldam: Gedruckt by Theunis Jacobsz ende Ian Fredericksz, 1648?]
Orbis terrarum typus de integro in plurimis emendatus auctus et icunculis illustratus [Amsterdam: Gedruckt by Theunis Jacobsz ende Ian Fredericksz, 1648?]
col. map; 2 hemispheres each 22.4 cm in diameter
Map Collection MAP RM 3451

The National Library of Australia is the designated keeper of Australia’s collective wisdom. Within its Collection, the Library stores the documentary heritage of Australia and its people, recording the things we have forgotten, the things perhaps most of us never knew, the slivers of information that help us to understand who we are, who we once were and who we would like to become.

Future Memory: National Library Recent Acquisitions provides a glimpse into the Library’s Collection, showing how the Library collects the present and the past for the future. In this exhibition, rare books from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries sit beside the contemporary photography of Wolfgang Sievers, the personal papers and watercolours of Eddie Mabo, political cartoons, material on Australian pearling and mining industries, the sheet music of pop princess Delta Goodrem, the Torch from the 2000 Sydney Olympics, an early nineteenth-century map of the Pacific and a satellite map of bushfires, paintings and portraits, oral history recordings, and manga comics from Japan. Drawn entirely from material added to the Collection since 1999, the exhibition illustrates the extraordinary variety of  the Library’s Collection and the many ways in which we acquire it.

The collections of the National Library of Australia, founded within the Parliamentary Library in 1901, have been growing and developing for over a century. Even in those early days, collection items were bought with an eye to the future needs of the Australian nation, beyond the needs of Parliament. In 1911, only 10 years after its establishment, the Library acquired the collection of Edward Augustus Petherick, a book dealer and collector. This and the collections of Sir John Ferguson, bibliographer and collector, and of Sir Rex Nan Kivell, art dealer and collector, make up the National Library’s three great foundation collections of Australiana. Many other items were acquired individually, and by the time the National Library of Australia was separated from the Parliamentary Library in 1960, it had already established a strong collection for its users. Described by the National Library Act 1960 as

a national collection of library material, including a comprehensive collection of library material relating to Australia and the Australian people

the Collection was to be used ‘in the national interest’ and the Library is required to maintain and develop it. Today the Collection consists of around 9 million items—although it is impossible to know exactly how many individual items it contains.

Title page of Machiavel’s Discourses upon the First Decade of T. Livius … To Which is Added His Prince ... by Niccolo Machiavelli (1469–1527) (London: William Hills and Daniel Pakeman, 1636)
Title page of Machiavel’s Discourses upon the First Decade of T. Livius ... To Which is Added His Prince... by Niccolo Machiavelli (1469–1527)
(London: William Hills and Daniel Pakeman, 1636)
RB MISC 3271

A library’s collection must grow if it is to stay up-to-date and meet the changing needs of its users. The Library’s Collection Development Policy provides the framework for what the National Library collects and why. The policy guides the selection and acquisition, whether by purchase, deposit, exchange, bequest or gift, of both Australian and overseas material.

The chief focus of the policy is on Australian material—broadly defined as material produced in Australia or its territories, or relating to Australia and its people, wherever it is produced. The Library’s aim is to develop and maintain a comprehensive collection that documents and aids understanding of Australia, its heritage and history, its people and its place in the world. The Collection includes material in many formats—books, magazines, newspapers and journals, maps, microfilm, pictures, photographs, oral history recordings, music scores, letters and diaries, company records, websites and electronic databases, objects, pamphlets, posters, handbills, theatre programs, menus, invitations. The range of material is seemingly endless.
Plate G reproduced from Ladies’ Guide in Health and Disease: Girlhood, Maidenhood, Wifehood, Motherhood by John Harvey Kellogg (1852–1943) (Warburton, Vic.: Sign of the Times, 1908)
Plate G reproduced from Ladies’ Guide in Health and Disease: Girlhood, Maidenhood, Wifehood, Motherhood by John Harvey Kellogg (1852–1943)
(Warburton, Vic.: Sign of the Times, 1908)
N 613.0424 K29

A significant proportion of this material is published in Australia and is received by the scheme that is known as ‘legal deposit’. Since 1912, Australian publishers have been required by law to give copies of all their publications to the National Library and a number of other Australian libraries. This ensures that the Library maintains a current collection of Australian publications. The legislation establishing the ‘legal deposit’ scheme, however, did not cover formats unforeseen at the time—such as electronic publications—and so amendments to the legislation and special arrangements such as voluntary deposit have been needed over the years. Agreements have also been established to cover government publications, as they too were not included in the original legislation. The Library buys other material, including microform, to supplement that received by legal and voluntary deposit. Historical material is also bought to fill gaps in the Collection.

Visitors to Future Memory will see many of these ‘gap fillers’, significant publications acquired in recent years. One of these is a title that lies somewhere between popular culture and science. The Ladies’ Home Guide in Health and Disease is an early self-help book, originally published in America but very popular in Australia. The Library holds not only the 1908 edition published in Victoria and displayed in the exhibition, but also two others published in Victoria—one in 1902 and one in the 1890s. Of interest for the Library’s Collection because of its publication in Australia, it holds further interest for readers because its author was John Harvey Kellogg, the inventor of the grain flakes marketed so successfully as breakfast cereal by his brother William K. Kellogg, founder of the Kellogg Company that today is a household name. The Ladies’ Home Guide contained a wealth of practical information for all stages of a woman’s life—girlhood, maidenhood, wifehood, and motherhood—and demonstrated its author’s concern for the health and comfort of his readers. The exhibition displays the volume open at a two-part illustration showing first a woman’s frame that has not been corseted, and then the deformity and displacement caused to bones and organs by tight corsets. Like Chinese foot-binding, ‘tight-lacing’ was a custom that caused serious damage to the body’s structure, and The Ladies’ Home Guide in Health and Disease reminds us that less than 100 years ago tight-lacing was still so common that women needed to be warned against it.
A black and white photograph of Peter Sculthorpe with a display of items from his collection
Peter Sculthorpe with a display of items from his collection
(This image is not on display in the exhibition.)

Published material—including books, pamphlets, maps, newspapers, printed music, and microform—is not all that is needed to document Australia: unpublished Australian materials such as manuscripts, pictures and even objects are acquired through purchase or donation, and additional photographs and oral history recordings are commissioned.

Significant manuscript collections have been acquired in recent years. They include the papers and musical manuscripts of Peter Sculthorpe, Elena Kats-Chernin and Larry Sitsky, political papers and those of authors. Manuscript collections allow us to see the development of significant artistic works, to be witnesses to the creative process. An author’s manuscript is the perfect place to see this at work, and to observe the changes that reflect the thoughts and second thoughts of the writer. The papers of author Murray Bail, recently purchased by the Library, include a series of drafts of his prize-winning and popularly acclaimed novel Eucalyptus. With the manuscripts came printed editions of the novel, including a number of translations, which would otherwise have been bought under the terms of the Collection Development Policy as the published work of an Australian author.

Murray Bail (b.1941) The plan for the novel Eucalyptus In the Papers of Murray Bail, 1978–2001. Manuscript Collection MS 6645

















Murray Bail (b.1941)
The plan for the novel Eucalyptus In the
Papers of Murray Bail, 1978–2001
Manuscript Collection
MS 6645

Paintings, photographs, prints and posters are all collected for their information content: the prime consideration in the acquisition of items is the information they contain, even if artworks can also be appreciated for their artistic merit. Format is not the issue, information content is: the Library looks for research value now or for the future.

Aspects of Australian life and culture, for example, can be seen in items such as Marion Mahony Griffin’s architectural drawing of the house designed by the Griffins in about 1921 for Cheok Hong Cheong. This house was part of the development of the Sydney suburb of Castlecrag, to which Walter Burley Griffin and Marion Mahony Griffin turned their energies after winning the competition for the design of Canberra. Walter Burley Griffin’s name is probably more widely known in Australia than that of his wife, but the style of architectural drawings she developed was very original and created huge interest when her drawings were exhibited in Melbourne in 1913. The lithographed poster on fragile silk sateen not only shows Marion Mahony Griffin’s original style, but also Walter Burley Griffin’s concept of blending houses into the landscape. Today, although most of the poster is faded, a strip at the foot is less so—revealing the letters ‘CRAG’. The poster seems likely to have been used as a promotion for the Castlecrag project, possibly being displayed in the window of their Sydney city office, which had CASTLECRAG painted on the window, perhaps protecting the base of the poster from fading. Such deductions from scraps of evidence can add immeasurably to our knowledge of the history and significance of an item.
A black ink lithograph, watercolour and gouache on silk sateen of 'Reverend Cheok Hong Cheong Dwelling, Castlecrag, Sydney, New South Wales c.1921' by Walter Burley Griffin and Marion Mahony Griffin
Walter Burley Griffin (1876–1937) and Marion Mahony Griffin (1871–1961)
Reverend Cheok Hong Cheong Dwelling, Castlecrag, Sydney, New South Wales c.1921
lithograph, black ink, watercolour and gouache on silk sateen; 107.5 x 52.9 cm
Pictures Collection nla.pic-an23594241

Other images, such as those of Wolfgang Sievers, are important for the way they document a place or an activity precisely as it was at the time, forming a permanent record of it. In the case of Sievers’ photograph House of Tomorrow, the image also records the hopes and aspirations of Australians in 1955 to own their own ‘dream home’. Sievers’ rendering of this particular subject is also a beautiful photograph, as are his photographs of ostensibly less photogenic subjects such as industrial processes and mining sites: a good example of information content in an artistic form. Sievers’ emphasis is on the beauty of the forms of industry and the dignity and humanity of those who work in it; he is considered to be Australia’s most important industrial photographer and in 2002 the Library contracted to buy his complete archive of negatives and prints—an enormously important record of Australia’s architecture and of the country’s factories, industries, mines and mining processes, and of working conditions for their staff.

Material relating to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people is also actively sought and is reflected in the exhibition. Included are photographs taken in the 1970s and 1980s, but only recently acquired, of the Indigenous land rights movement. Also on display are papers and artwork of Torres Strait Islander Eddie Mabo. The Library recognises that Indigenous Australians have a tradition of recording their stories and histories in non-print ways. So the Library’s Collection, and the exhibition, include oral history recordings, a silk batik scarf and a sarong by Emily Kame Kngwarreye and Gloria Petyarre, and one of a series of satellite images overlaid with the hand-painted ‘dreaming tracks’ of artist Tracey Andrews’ people.

Significant events such as the Sydney Olympics in 2000 are documented to give an all-round picture of Australian life, and the exhibition includes photographs taken at the Olympics, and even one of the torches that carried the flame around the country—a memorable item that evokes feelings of great pride in the achievements of the Sydney Olympics and in the involvement of so many ordinary Australians in their presentation.

The Library does not, and never could, hold every book or other item ever produced in Australia (though people often believe that it does, particularly when they find that it has exactly the item they need). It co-operates with other institutions such as the state libraries, the National Archives and ScreenSound Australia: National Screen and Sound Archive to ensure that material it does not collect is acquired and preserved elsewhere.

It would be even less practical to attempt to collect everything published overseas, though from its inception the Library selectively acquired overseas material to create a research base for its users. Significant amounts of overseas books and journals are still acquired, and in particular the Library recognises Australia as part of the Asia-Pacific geographic region, and the importance of that region. Since the 1950s it has actively collected material in Asian and Pacific languages and scripts, and it is now particularly strong in East Asian, Indonesian and Thai works. Here too its collecting is not limited to printed books. Future Memory, for example, showcases political ephemera—posters and badges—related to East Timor’s first democratic elections in 2001.
A watercolour of [Dauar and Waier Islands?] 1964 by Eddie Mabo
Eddie Mabo (1936–1992)
[Dauar and Waier Islands?] 1964
watercolour; 39.4 x 57.5 cm
Pictures Collection nla.pic-an24341106

The traditional methods of obtaining both Australian and overseas material are still essential: legal deposit, purchase (direct from publishers or through library suppliers or occasionally from individuals), bequests, donations and exchanges with other libraries or publishing organisations. A very important means of donating to libraries and other cultural agencies is the Cultural Gifts Program (CGP, formerly called the Taxation Incentives for the Arts Scheme), which celebrated its 25th anniversary in 2003. The collections of cartoonists George Molnar, Alan Moir and Geoff Pryor that are represented in the exhibition were donated under the CGP. The Friends of the National Library of Australia are generous donors too, and have recently funded the purchase of three items that are all displayed in the exhibition: a charcoal self-portrait by Australian artist Hugh Ramsay, a map of the Pacific Ocean published by the Spanish geographer Isidoro de Antillon y Marzo in 1802, and a very rare broadsheet about convict transportation to Western Australia called Affectionate Transports.

In fact, Future Memory and the acquisition stories it reveals tell us much about the generosity of individuals and organisations. A number of the items in the exhibition demonstrate the generosity of another institution, the National Library’s ‘parent’, the Parliamentary Library, which as a result of some collection-shaping of its own, passed to the National Library rare works connected with the history of various types of government. Among them is a 1518 edition of the Utopia of Sir Thomas More, English statesman and Catholic saint, who was beheaded in 1535 when he would not take the oath acknowledging Henry VIII as head of the Church of England, as it meant denying the supremacy of the Pope. Utopia was written and first published in Latin in 1516, and although very popular and translated into many other languages, did not appear in English until 1551. It described a mythical state governed by reason and needing few laws—an ideal form of government and society. The gift from the Parliamentary Library also included a 1636 edition of a volume by the Italian writer, statesman and diplomat Niccolo Machiavelli, containing his work The Prince.

A pen and ink drawing of 'The Waters Rise—a Lake!—·ey Rise–and Still Rise—Oh! the Temptation Is Too Great.’ 1960 by George Molnar
George Molnar (1910–1998)
The Waters Rise—a Lake!—They Rise–and Still Rise—Oh! the Temptation Is Too Great.’ 1960
pen and ink drawing; image 22.4 x 25.3 cm
Pictures Collection nla.pic-an25066217

Some works published in earlier times and no longer in print are hard to come by, but are needed to round out the collection’s picture of Australian life. One of these was the first Greek language book published in Australia, I zoi en Australia. As part of its 100th Birthday Booksearch in 2001 the Library appealed for books on a ‘wishlist’ and I zoi en Australia was received from a generous donor. A rare Ginger Meggs annual, published in 1952 and featuring the cheeky, rough-and-tumble larrikin much-loved by generations of Australians, was another most welcome donation as a result of the 100th Birthday Booksearch.

Nothing stands still in this world, however, and new ways of obtaining information are developing beside traditional methods of collecting. These new ways can include offering access to electronic indexes, databases, full-text e-journals, and the Internet. Now the Library is a world leader in archiving selected Australian web pages through PANDORA (Preserving and Accessing Networked Documentary Resources of Australia), and digitising materials from its collection to preserve the originals and to offer wide access through the Library website. The exhibition shows examples of some of the web pages archived by PANDORA—for instance, the Sydney Olympics site, which no longer exists outside PANDORA.

Choosing about 200 items from the many thousands received during the last four years meant making difficult decisions, but the final list we hope gives a broad view of the range of the Library’s collecting, and conveys the commitment of staff, the many scholars, readers and antiquarian dealers who suggest works to acquire, and the donors and others who provide material for the Collection. The marvellous thing about a library collection is the way individual items form different combinations according to different interests, rather like the complex and infinitely variable patterns made by a kaleidoscope.

MARGARET DENT is a curator of exhibitions, and former Rare Books Librarian, at the National Library of Australia

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