All fiction titles from the English Catalogue, Volume 4 have now been added! That means 1862–1889 are complete. Next up: the 1890s... • 27,471 title entries • 6,770 author entries (most with bios) Big thank you to my students from last semester who assisted me to this milestone.

The Curran Index, named after my old friend Eileen Curran, is the world's only ongoing research project devoted to identifying the authors of anonymous articles, stories, and poems in the 19th-c. press. Please check it out and let us know what you think. Your help will be invaluable. #victorian

Martin Hewitt@vicmanch.bsky.social · 3d ago

Still plugging the short survey on the future of the Curran Index. Interestingly, have had almost as many retweets of my original post as there have been actual completions of the survey. Closes on the 10th, so if your work touches at all on nineteenth century periodicals please have your say!

Indeed you all are. And, gentle Bluesky readers, check out the news projected behind this team: a British Newspaper Archive discount for RSVP members that saves serious money on that subscription. Negotiated by the inexhaustible Mary. Even more reason for all C19 scholars to join @rs4vp.org!

Clare Clarke@clareclarke.bsky.social · last wk.

With the wonderful Mary and Priti ahead of the RSVP AGM. What a team! #RSVP2026

@rs4vp.org

Marie Léger-St-Jean@marielsj.bsky.social · last wk.

Lois Burke —formerly at Tilburg University, now at the University of Stirling— is making her pitch for the usefulness of manuscript magazines. There is for instance "The Sunbeam Magazine" (1866), edited by Robert Louis Stevenson (1850–1894)... collections.library.yale.edu/catalog/1067... #BAVS2026

Thrilled to see Alex Bubb's work on book collecting! I remember him getting into it and me telling him to start a bibliographic database. His website has a great acronym: *Archive of Victorian Translations from Asia and their Readerships (AVaTAR): Asian Literature in the Victorian World* #BAVS2026

Who can forget this scene from The Hound of the Baskervilles? I can, and did. With thanks to the amazing @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social for another pulp take on a Victorian classic!

Oh my, not only is this a marvelous cover, it is an equally marvelous title. #victorian #bookhistory

Richard Fallon@richardfallon.bsky.social · last wk.

High(ly) Victorian book cover: Margaret Plues's Rambles in Search of Ferns (1861).

We're running a short online survey to inform development of the Curran Index. If you're interested in Victorian periodicals, whether or not you've used the Curran recently, please complete the survey! Survey closes 10th August. Please retweet. docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

Curran Index User Survey

Thanks for being willing to complete this short survey. Whether or not you have used the Curran Index recently (or at all) we are looking for opinions on how the Curran can best be improved and develo...

docs.google.com

So happy to be in Dublin for this year’s @rs4vp.org meeting. Here posing with Sir Isaac amid the empty shelving of the soon to be renovated Old Library…and searching in vain for someone to explain to me why the letter J is missing from all the shelves. #RSVP2026

VPR 58.4 is hot off the press! It's great reading-whether you're gearing up for #RSVP26 in Dublin this week or just following the conference on our socials. muse.jhu.edu/issue/57248 @rs4vp.org

I’m more or less particular about my particulates, and these have been particularly unwelcome.

Another thoughtful essay from book historian Bill Bell: crusoesbooks.wordpress.com/2026/07/15/s... #bookhistory

Sleepers

I HAVE BEEN REREADING a novel that I first encountered some twenty years ago. John Williams’ Stoner is the story of a young man from humble origins who leaves his farming community to become …

crusoesbooks.wordpress.com

Please join the network and our friends on the Punch's Pocket Book Archive team for our upcoming symposium "Global circulations – annuals and pocket books on the move", 26–27 November 2026, U of Caen Normandy. Deadline for proposals = 31 August 2026 caesar-project.unicaen.fr/event/call-f...

Call for papers for the CaeSAR ‘Punch’s Pocket Book’ project: ‘Global circulations - annuals and pocket books on the move’, 26–27 November 2026, University of Caen Normandy - CaeSAR

Caen, Strategy for Accelerating Research

caesar-project.unicaen.fr

A complete digital version of The Naturalist’s Library (1833-43), William Jardine’s 40-volume book series on natural history, including restored versions of each of the 1300+ illustrations in the library. Wow. [kottke.org]

The Naturalist’s Library (1833-43)

Nicholas Rougeux, whose work I have featured here before, has published a complete digital edition of William Jardine’s 40-volume book series on natural history published in the early-to-mid 19th-century. As part of the

kottke.org

I find this so deeply moving— not only that we can now read writings that haven’t been read in two millennia, but that this miraculous accomplishment is owing to an unshakable commitment to public, cooperative scholarship.

Ada Palmer@adapalmer.bsky.social · 3w ago

In 79 AD, Mt. Vesuvius buried the Roman town of Herculaneum under ash. In a villa, a library of papyrus scrolls was buried. For 2,000 years they’ve been unreadable. Researchers with the Vesuvius Challenge have read an entire scroll without opening it. buff.ly/WSjPmXf #ShareGoodNewsToo

We're running a short online survey to inform development of the Curran Index. If you're interested in Victorian periodicals, whether or not you've used the Curran recently, please complete the survey! docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

Curran Index User Survey

Thanks for being willing to complete this short survey. Whether or not you have used the Curran Index recently (or at all) we are looking for opinions on how the Curran can best be improved and develo...

docs.google.com

British Library's EThOS platform for its online database of 650,000 doctoral theses back online. Hooray!

EThOS records restored

We are pleased to share that EThOS (E-Theses Online Service) is now available again following restoration work after the cyber-attack.

bl.uk

There’s a permanent modern British history post going at Manchester 🎉Come and join a great department and please share with anyone who might be interested. (Don’t let the short deadline put you off). #skystorians 🗃️

Lecturer in Modern British History (post-1800) at The University of Manchester

Apply now for the Lecturer in Modern British History (post-1800) role on jobs.ac.uk - the leading job board for higher education jobs. View details.

jobs.ac.uk

Pope goes full anti-Mordor.

Peter Lucier@peterlucier.bsky.social · 2mo ago

Big day to be Catholic and an LOTR nerd

These photos took me back to my own debate days, when all was legal pads and index cards and every year's debate topic was ultimately about race, poverty, or Vietnam: www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...

The Very American, Very Intense World of High-School Debate

What do kids learn when ethical and political questions become a high-speed game?

newyorker.com

How @camunicampop.bsky.social researchers are turning static snapshots of Victorian Britain into dynamic life histories. The team are linking over 200 million census records, revealing how people moved, worked and lived in ways never before possible. 🔎 Read on 👉 www.hist.cam.ac.uk/news/tracing...

The latest installment of our three-part interview with Linda Hughes is now live! Continuing on from their previous conversation about "the past" foundations of periodical poetry research, Linda and Gillian Walters discuss the "present" state of the field. Read on here: rs4vp.org/periodical-p...

Periodical Poetry Research Today – RSVP

Our second interview with Linda K. Hughes kicks off. Linda shares insights from her career on how to get started with periodical poetry.

rs4vp.org

A 2 year restoration project has been completed on a 6.5 metre stained glass window at Salisbury Cathedral, Wiltshire designed by Pre-Raphaelite artists, William Morris & Edward Burne-Jones. 👇 BBC News - Salisbury Cathedral's stained glass window restored - BBC News www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Salisbury Cathedral's stained glass window restored

The £120k two-year project has seen the window restored and returned to Salisbury Cathedral.

bbc.co.uk

Some slightly discomfiting thoughts about a book much loved by myself and many others: Helene Hanff's 84, Charing Cross Road, whose anniversary will be celebrated at Foyle's in London next month. Thanks to @akennedysmith.bsky.social and her wonderful blog. akennedysmith.substack.com/p/april-lett...

This is another routine reminder that our journal @advancesjournal.bsky.social is actively seeking proposals for themed issues. Do get in touch with me directly if you are interested in submitting a proposal. Journal details 👇 www.tandfonline.com/journals/ran...

Advances in Nineteenth-Century Research

Explore the latest peer-reviewed articles and learn how to publish your work in Advances in Nineteenth-Century Research.

tandfonline.com

Great stuff here from a splendid historian of the 19th-c press. Bonus: during the discussion period he talks about what an utterly miserable experience it is to work in the archives of the London Times! But worth it. #victorian #bookhistory

Research Society for Victorian Periodicals@rs4vp.org · 4mo ago

For those who may have had to miss it Friday, the recording of our wonderful talk by Graham Law on "Commissioned Letters to The Times" is now live on our YouTube channel! youtu.be/4KKgILJqiE0

Mudie's Select Circulating Library lay at the heart of the Victorian publishing system. Karen Wade's site, now at a new URL, makes it possible to explore the library's catalogues as never before, with an index of 22,000 novels by 6000 authors. curatr.ucd.ie/mudies/ #victorian #bookhistory

For more on the status of open access online collections of Victorian letters see www.victorianresearch.org/other.html#l...

Many thanks to Paul Lewis for making available the unannotated texts of all of the letters included in the magisterial Pilgrim edition of Dickens's correspondence. As that edition is paywalled, this will be very handy for scholars everywhere: victorianresearch.org/Dickens%20le... #Victorian

Congratulations! And thanks to Wiley for making this free to access (for now). Some fascinating material here. #victorian #19th-c

Victorian Commons@victoriancommons.bsky.social · 4mo ago

Great excitement in the #HistParl office as our research fellow Dr Naomi Lloyd-Jones gets her hands on a print copy of her special issue of Parliamentary History. It's currently free to access online here: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/toc/17500206...