Eliza Giffard and Her Books, 1797–2015: The Legacies of a Regency Library

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ABSTRACT This article follows the effort to recreate virtually the private library of Eliza Giffard, a female book collector whose period of activity coincided with dynamic changes in the publishing, distribution, and accessibility of books. The study of reading is largely reliant on examining traces of interactions between audience and book; such traces can range from intimate reading journals to simple ownership marks. Reconstructing Giffard's collection through the evidence left in her books uncovers not only the individual reading history of a single woman at the turn of the nineteenth century, but also the continued circulation of books after their dispersal and their movement from private to institutional collections over time. The project provides further evidence of the idiosyncratic histories of readers, and gives insight into the afterlives of books, collectors and libraries.