Author: Chris Browne

Unfortunately “Treasures from the John Emmerson Collection”, had to be cancelled due to the unavailability of the presenter due to illness. We are confident that this very important collection of English 17th century books, donated to the SLV by the late Dr. Emmerson, will be the subject of future MRBW events in years to come.

A panel discussion presented by the MCC Library In the middle of the day, the Melbourne Cricket Club library presented its traditional panel discussion on sporting books to an enthusiastic audience of 60 people. The panel members were the MCC’s head librarian David Studham, deputy librarian Trevor Ruddell and the official historian of the Melbourne

Presented for the RMIT Design Archive by Marius Foley Wednesday 26th July was the busiest day in the program for MRBW 2023, with five events. The day started with “Into the Archive: Creating Designer Books”, where Marius Foley presented an enlightening session on the history of Backyard Press and Champion Books, founded in the 1970s

All stories are shaped by the documents that survive to tell them. Presented by the PMI Collections Librarian, Ellen Coates At the Prahran Mechanic’s Institute (PMI), the Collections Librarian, Ellen Coates, presented a talk called All stories are shaped by the documents that survive to tell them. She used items from the library archive and rare

Presented by Dr. Jennifer Kloester at East Melbourne library On Tuesday evening, around 75 people attended “More Than Romance: The Witty World of Georgette Heyer” which was presented by Dr. Jennifer Kloester at East Melbourne library. Jennifer spoke about how Heyer’s family background and early life shaped her as a writer, and how she had

Presented by Dr. David McInnis for Rare Books Melbourne and hosted at The Melbourne Athenaeum Library On Tuesday 25th July, more than 70 people attended a fascinating talk that was held at The Melbourne Athenaeum Library to celebrate the 400th anniversary of the publication in 1623 of the First Folio of William Shakespeare’s plays. The

Presented by Alissa Duke for Rare Books Melbourne On Monday evening, 35 people gathered at East Melbourne Library to hear a talk by Alissa Duke, the official sketch artist for MRBW, called “You Can’t Draw in Books”. Alyssa related her personal history of drawing in books, and how she, as a professional librarian, had to

Presented by Jillian Hiscock Following the traditional tea, coffee and cake provided by the Royal Historical Society of Victoria (RHSV), the second talk was presented by Jillian Hiscock, the Collections Manager of the RHSV, who spoke about “Rare Books from the RHSV collection”. Jillian recounted how she had noticed some interesting-looking books that were kept

Presented by Andrew McConville for State Library Victoria Monday 24th July began with an event run by Andrew McConville, the Digital Access Librarian at State Library Victoria, entitled “First Glimpses of the Antarctic”. Andrew showed an attentive audience of 30 how the history of the exploration of the Antarctic has been documented and preserved through

Speaker: Edwin Jewell Later on Monday morning, two events were held at the headquarters of the Royal Historical Society of Victoria (RHSV) in A’Beckett Street, Melbourne. Firstly, The Ephemera Society of Victoria featured Ed Jewell, who spoke on “Collecting Australian Internment Ephemera”. Ed shared with the audience of nearly 60 people some of the highlights