A Lewis Carroll Centenary Exhibition

A Lewis Carroll Centenary Exhibition

This is an online exhibition of items related to Lewis Carroll in the collection of the Harry Ransom Center. It is one of several "online exhibitions," including exhibitions of the Gutenberg Bible and the first photograph, that can be found on the HRC website.

Collection Principles: The items in the collection are from the Gernsheim Collection and the Warren Weaver Collection at the HRC. The selection of the items to include in the online exhibition seems to be guided by the desire to provide representative examples of Carroll's literary, artistic, and scholarly endeavors, and images from his life.

Object Characteristics: There are relatively few items digitized to include in the online exhibition; the focus is more on the explanatory text that accompanies each page of the exhibition. The objects are divided into contextual categories: "Early Life at Croft Rectory," "Carroll at Oxford," "Carroll the Photographer," "Phtographs of Children," "Logic, Mathematics, and Puzzles," "Alice," and "In Memoriam." Most of the digital images do not have any additional features; you cannot zoom in or view a larger image. The images included under the "Logic, Mathematics, and Puzzles" heading can be enlarged.

Metadata: The metadata associated with these images is concerned with the content of the images rather than their digital existence. The images have captions that describe what they are, and how they relate to relate to Carroll. The page devoted to each contextual category also has introductory text describing the importance of this class of items in relation to Carroll's life. The focus on this type of metadata seems appropriate for the way in which the exhibition is structured, and with relation to the likely audience.

Intended Audience: The intended audience for this exhibition is most likely the non-scholarly user. Though the text accompanying the items does on occasion point to additional resources, the focus of the exhibition seems to be to introduce Lewis Carroll to those who are not very familiar with his life and work.