Library of Congress Digitized Rare Materials

[mjh215]

I searched MR and didn't see any links, so figured I'd post this.
http://www.loc.gov/rr/rarebook/digitalcoll.html
http://www.loc.gov/library/libarch-digital.html (Their main digital collection site)
It's also worth noting that many other large libraries, including universities, have a growing collection of scanned works available for free download.

-MJ

[Indigo Ink]

Originally Posted by mjh215

I searched MR and didn't see any links, so figured I'd post this.
http://www.loc.gov/rr/rarebook/digitalcoll.html
http://www.loc.gov/library/libarch-digital.html (Their main digital collection site)
It's also worth noting that many other large libraries, including universities, have a growing collection of scanned works available for free download.

-MJ

Thanks for those links.

How I wish all "National Archives" of the world digitize their rare and original documents and put them on the net. Most of them don't charge their visitors (most being poor students!) anything to allow them to look up their documents but imagine how much time, energy, money and fuel we would save if researchers from all over the world could access rare, and not so rare, manuscripts on the net rather than go to these archives. International studetns often have a hard time to get appropriate funding to go and visit these archives.
In fact it is likely to be a win-win. As goverments would be able to cut on the cost of maintenance of the archives if the archives just become depositories and the public face of the archives in only on the internet.

[vivaldirules]

A very nice find. Many interesting texts most of which are available as PDFs. I believe I'll start with an illustrated copy of William Blake's The marriage of Heaven and Hell. Thank you!

[DixieGal]

Originally Posted by vivaldirules

A very nice find. Many interesting texts most of which are available as PDFs. I believe I'll start with an illustrated copy of William Blake's The marriage of Heaven and Hell. Thank you!

I wonder if there is a copy of Blake's Jerusalem? I wish there were more hours in the day to read!!!!!

[vivaldirules]

Yes:

http://lcweb2.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage...ge.db&recNum=2

http://memory.loc.gov/service/rbc/rb...3rosen1811.pdf

[DixieGal]

Thanks! I saved a copy. It's still not the glorious multi-color version I saw somewhere (maybe a museum?). Sooner or later I'll find that one.

In grad school, I had to do a presentation on The Canterbury Tales, and I found an article comparing Blake's painting of the pilgrims with another artist's work from the same period. Turns out that they were hated rivals, so one painted the pilgrims going east and the othe painted them going west. I managed to do the whole presentation about the two paintings. Blake's was alive and somehow he even managed to make the Miller seem like a sympathetic character.

[pilotbob]

Originally Posted by DixieGal

I wish there were more hours in the day to read!!!!!

You could convert your Mobileread time to book read time.

[pshrynk]

Originally Posted by pilotbob

You could convert your Mobileread time to book read time.

That would just be wrong!

[mjh215]

See if we can't add some libraries to this post;

• http://www.nypl.org/digital/ (New York Public Library)
• http://www.ulib.org/ (Carnegie Mellon University, et al)
• http://www.nla.gov.au/digicoll/ (Looks to be accessible only online, but some interesting archives from the Aussieland National Library)
• http://amicus.collectionscanada.ca/e...oll=11&l=0&v=1 and http://amicus.collectionscanada.ca/c...oll=11&l=1&v=1 (Canuckistani Online archive of Monographs and Periodicals, 1st link Eng. 2nd Fr.)
  http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/e...s/index-e.html (Still from the above the border crowd, this one being 500+ image scans of rare / important Canuckistani works. )
• http://dli.iiit.ac.in/ (Digital Library of India, unsure of the downloadability of their format)
• http://www.manuscriptorium.com/Site/..._documents.asp (A couple works available online for free from the Czech Republic)

http://oedb.org/library/features/250...archives#etext (Variety of links to libraries supplying eBooks)


I had checked across the pond, and couldn't find a similar online version at the British Library (some nice online media, but no eBook archive, silly Brits) and the French Bibliothèque (No English translation, so perhaps if one of our froggy regulars could check and post back a link if there is an online archive)

-MJ (I haven't ignored any countries, I actually started searching at the beginning (each country) but it'll take some time and obviously theres a language barrier. So check back if this interests you, or add your own!)

[DaleDe]

We have a lot of Library's listed in the wiki although not the ones that only supply books for their own local people. you might want to test these and add them to the list if they have support in wide areas. I suspect that we have the best list available in our own wiki.

Dale

[mjh215]

Dale, I always forget to check the Wiki, but by the look of the responses, I'm not the only one. -MJ

P.S. All the ones mentioned are publically accessible online, whether they are available for download/offline viewing or what sort of format they are in is another story.

[Patricia]

Originally Posted by mjh215

and the French Bibliothèque

Gallica is the site of the French Bibliothèque Nationale, and has lots of French classics:
http://gallica.bnf.fr/