Last Friday evening, a group of about two dozen bibliophiles and dedicated museum patrons gathered at the Morgan Library and Museum in Midtown Manhattan to see Protecting the Word: Bookbindings of the Morgan. The exhibition, which features approximately 55 of the museum’s many thousands of books and manuscripts, spans 1600 years of literary history from across the globe.
H. George Fletcher, the former Brooke Russell Astor Director for Special Collections at the New York Public Library and the curator of the exhibition, led the group through the Morgan’s most valued specimens. Pierpont Morgan began the collection around the turn of the 20th century—he was inspired by the Lindau Gospels, his first extremely valuable acquisition. Bound in 1592, the lower cover of the Lindau Gospels is one of only three contemporary pieces of Carolingian goldsmithing from the Court School of Emperor Charles the Bald, grandson of Charlemagne. While not the oldest piece in the Morgan’s collection, the Lindau Gospels is one of the most visually striking, for it is studded in jewels with a gold repoussé figure of Christ on the front cover.
The honor of oldest binding is held by a Coptic cover of the Gospel, found at the Monastery of St. Michael in Egypt and bound sometime in the seventh or eighth century. Works like these bring one to appreciate the sheer enduring quality of these texts. Almost all of the collection’s Coptic works were found in their original bindings after approximately 1300 years of use and display.
Most books in the Morgan’s collection are valued for their bindings rather than their content—the Holy Bible is by no means a rare publication. Among the thousands of other specimens stored in the Morgan’s vault, however, there are works valued more for their content. Unique books and manuscripts include original authorial annotations not seen in the exhibition.
Moving on to more modern works, Fletcher, who also teaches a seminar on medieval and renaissance studies at New York University, paused at a European manuscript from 1390 with two printed works inside. Similar to German songbooks of the mid-twentieth century, this manuscript featured small bosses on the bottom cover to prevent spilled beer from damaging the book itself – truly a marriage of function and art.
Although only a fraction of the museum’s collection is on display, Fletcher, who set out to give the public an idea of the museum’s different holdings, has done a remarkable job of showcasing the experience we understand as “reading” through the ages.
The exhibition chronicles how the rise in literacy rates around the turn of the 16th century led to portable editions of books being released without additional commentary. As one walks through the gallery, the opulent beauty of bindings embossed with precious metals gradually gives way to the accessibility of the mass-produced works from the 20th century. Given the advent of internet libraries and other internet publishing sources, what does the future hold for publishing and book bindings?
“The death of the book is widely exaggerated,” said Fletcher, who became a collector at the age of fifteen. While the future dominance of the physical book is debatable, Protecting the Word has artfully charted its course to the present day.
Protecting the Word will be on display until March 29 at the Morgan Library and Museum, which is located at 225 Madison Ave. at 36th Street. Admission is $12.
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