Happy 250th birthday, Jane Austen! Why not celebrate by reading my hot-off-the-press lil piece which sheds new light on the composition process for JA's greatest novel (no questions, sit yo ass down) PERSUASION. It involved archival sleuthing, so was cracking fun to write. jasna.org/publications...

/… www.leightonlibrary.org.uk/friends ☕️ You can support us at our Christmas Coffee Morning on Saturday 6 December 10am-12 noon in Dunblane Cathedral Hall 🚶Dunblane's historic Leighton Library is now closed for the winter, except for opening by special arrangement for groups

The Society currently invites applications for its David Berry Fellowship in the History of Scotland and the Scottish People. The Fellowship, for up to £2500, supports research by historians of Scotland at any career stage: bit.ly/4ns6LJj Closing date: Friday 6 March 2026 #Skystorians

Excited to be speaking in Dunblane on 15 Nov for the Leighton Library. I'll be sharing findings from my PhD and the @books-borrowing.bsky.social project. Do come along to hear more about Enlightenment and conspiracy in the reading habits of Leighton members!

This forthcoming novel by @shonamaclean.bsky.social looks great! 'Had us at 'circulating library' & '1831'! 😍https://www.hive.co.uk/Product/Shona-MacLean/The-Cromarty-Library-Circle/32495124 #CromartyLibraryCircle

We are advertising for an Assistant Director to join us in Marsh's Library. Full details about this exciting post here: marshlibrary.ie/vacancy-for-...

We're looking forward to our Summer Fayre next Friday and Saturday! Local craftspeople, refreshments and lots of secondhand #books

The Wolfson Foundation has awarded a grant of £50,000 towards the cost of redeveloping the Leighton Library Undercroft to create a new exhibition space. The Leighton Library Trustees and all other volunteers thank the Wolfson Foundation for this very generous award.../👇

The laying of the foundation stone of the Royal High School, Edinburgh, on 28th July 1825. A great blog by Steven Robb for the OEC. #royalhighschool #caltonhill #thomashamiltonarchitect #lordprovost #lordglenorchy #oldedinburghhistory #scottishenlightenment #greekrevivalbuildings

BARS Digital Symposium: ‘Global Romanticism’ Programme – 23 July 2025 (UK Time; BST) www.bars.ac.uk/blog/?p=6052 Links to follow on Monday 21 July - keep an eye on emails!

Also taking place next week: BARS Digital Symposium: Expanding Queer Romanticisms, 25th July 2025, 3pm-6.15 BST. Links to follow in an email to BARS Members. www.bars.ac.uk/blog/?p=6045

Call for Applications: BARS Communications Fellow 2025-26 BARS would like to invite applications for a Communications Fellow to assist with the BARS Blog and social media for a period of one year tenable from August 2025. Details: www.bars.ac.uk/blog/?p=6062

Institutions of Literature, 1700-1900 is now available as a relatively affordable paperback from CUP. Jon and I are really happy with the fourteen excellent intersecting essays our contributors prepared - do consider picking the book up if you work in the area: www.cambridge.org/core/books/i....

For those interested in writers' lives (and particularly their tribulations), the Royal Literary Fund has now made available an index covering over 3,600 case files for authors who first applied between 1790 and 1939, based on my catalogue for the British Library: www.rlfarchive.org.uk.

Heading to the #GlobalAusten250 Conference at Southampton bright and early to meet these brilliant people and many more! (If you are too and want to be added to the starter pack let me know!)

Very excited to share a stage with some amazing women @edbookfest.bsky.social Rosemary Goring, Kate Anderson and I will be discussing Mary, Queen of Scots and James VI under the expert care of Anna Groundwater on 20 Aug #EdinburghInternationalBookFestival

BARS Digital Symposium: ‘Global Romanticism’ – 23 July 2025 (UK Time; BST) Current research on Romanticism will be explored by bringing together speakers across the world, addressing different areas of Romantic writing, its production and intercultural connections. www.bars.ac.uk/blog/?p=6052

Just published! 'Library Catalogues as Data' with a chapter by Team B&B - '"(S)hut not thy Heart, nor thy Library": Realising the Potential of Historical Library Borrowing Data': www.facetpublishing.co.uk/page/detail/...

Normalise writing a nice quick note to scholars literally every time you read and like their work. Our world is small and getting smaller. We need encouragement.

'A Year of Books and Borrowing'- read Katie Halsey's round-up here: borrowing.stir.ac.uk/a-year-of-bo... 😃📖📚

✨️Job Alert: MHRA Research Fellow on The Letters of Percy Bysshe Shelley✨️ Fixed-term at QMUL, closing date 12 June. Please share with ECRs @bars-ecrs-pgrs.bsky.social www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DNC513/m...

Jean Guild Grant Awardee Dr Kit Baston's research on 'Book Borrowing Surgeons' has got off to a great start! Using records from the University of Edinburgh Library for ‘external’ users, this project will reveal the books borrowed by the surgeons. Read all about it on our website. buff.ly/XBRmKma

Book Borrowing Surgeons! With thanks to @oldedinburghclub.bsky.social for funding an exciting new @books-borrowing.bsky.social venture: borrowing.stir.ac.uk/book-borrowi... 📚📖⚕️

And search the catalogue from here: innerpeffraylibrary.co.uk/books/

Congratulations on your fabulous online catalogue, @innerpeffray.bsky.social! (And thanks for mentioning us at the launch! 😊) Catalogue: innerpeffray.soutron.net/Portal/Defau...

Registration for the 2025 BARS PGR & ECR Conference, Romantic (Un)Consciousness’, is now open! All registration details can be found on our conference website, under the ‘Registration’ section, where a provisional programme is also available. barsconference2025.wixsite.com/home

Glad to see that the CFP for the BARS symposium, “Global Romanticism,” that I will organize is out! @bars.bsky.social Time: 23rd July Format: Online CFP deadline: 16 May Please join!! For more info: bars.ac.uk/blog/?p=5963

Uncovering Scotland’s Bookish Histories 9 April @uofglasgow.bsky.social – free Prof @mjrsangster.bsky.social will discuss the “Books & Borrowing, 1750–1830” @books-borrowing.bsky.social project – using unexplored library records to reveal hidden histories of book use www.gla.ac.uk/events/listi...

A reminder that our bursaries are open until the end of the month. Find all the information below: scottishhistoricalreview.org/bursaries

Reminder that our exhibition Curious Minds: Thomas Pennant and Gilbert White is launching soon! Do come and join us! @bsecs.bsky.social @bshsnews.bsky.social @sochistnathist.bsky.social @gilbertwhite.bsky.social @brycchancarey.bsky.social

#FeelGoodFriday The winner of the #BSECS2025 Digital Prize is the Books and Borrowing, 1750-1830 database! The database contains borrowing records from 18 Scottish Libraries, 43,000 register pages, 162,000 borrowing acts #skystorians #18thC 🗃️ @books-borrowing.bsky.social borrowing.stir.ac.uk

Conference Information & Online Access: Romanticism across Borders (24-25 March). The programme can be accessed on the conference website as well as below: www.bars.ac.uk/blog/?p=5890 The Conference is hybrid and you can sign up for online access at the link ⤵️

That's us! Thank you, @bsecs.bsky.social ! 🎉🎉

Tickets for the Radcliffe Project's second Ann Radcliffe, Then and Now lecture are now live! Join Dr. Deborah Russell (University of York) on 16th May 6pm-8pm for 'Ann Radcliffe and Women's Gothic Writing'. www.eventbrite.com/e/ann-radcli...

Don’t forget - our next research seminar is tomorrow! Come and learn all about how London was presented to, and experienced by, tourists in the eighteenth century! More information below 👇🏼 #eighteenthcentury #london

A reminder that the deadline for bursary applications for #BARS2025 is midnight tonight (GMT) - we look forward to hearing from you! @bars.bsky.social @bars-ecrs-pgrs.bsky.social

Very honoured to be a part of this forthcoming publication, Feminist Librarianship, ed. Kirsten MacQuarrie and Leah Higgins @cilipscotland.bsky.social. My contribution reflects on female borrowers @books-borrowing.bsky.social in early c19 Scotland. More info here: www.cilips.org.uk/feminist-lib... !

We’re thrilled to announce our research event on Scottish and Irish Gothic on 11 April, with a keynote by Claire Connolly and a fabulous lineup of speakers. We look forward to welcoming you. Full details and registration below: www.swinc.englit.ed.ac.uk/scottish-and...

A new Five Questions interview up on the @bars.bsky.social blog: Susan Valladares on Stock Pieces: British Repertory Theatre, 1760–1830, recently published by Liverpool University Press: www.bars.ac.uk/blog/?p=5836.

Delighted to receive the latest issue of the Book of the Old Edinburgh Club from @oldedinburghclub.bsky.social today! It includes my article 'Borrowing Books in a City of Literature, 1750-1830' based on my work with @books-borrowing.bsky.social and the talk on the Edinburgh libraries included in...

Scott, Hogg & Espionage – Prof Penny Fielding 18 Feb, hybrid research seminar – Research Institute of Irish & Scottish Studies @uniofaberdeen.bsky.social For further details or the link to the talk, please contact Prof Michael Brown [email protected] www.abdn.ac.uk/riiss/news-e...

/…Explore what other books were borrowed on this day in Dunblane's historic Leighton Library in "Books & Borrowing: An Analysis of Scottish Borrowers’ Registers, 1750-1830" from Leighton Library website www.leightonlibrary.org.uk/books-and-bo... …/

Help please! I'm seeking academic papers on readers' responses to Wollstonecraft's A Vindication of the Rights of Woman. I've found loads on critical responses, but haven't located anything on her readers contemporary readers... Please share - all pointers gratefully received! #18c #c18

@kandicedarcia.bsky.social has a brilliant essay on Wollstonecraft’s books in libraries, and what library records show about her reception in the years after her death www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Up next in Stirling’s C18 seminar series: Gema Silva Ferrandez will present a paper titled ‘Re-Imagining Byron: from Lady Caroline Lamb’s Glenarvon to 21st Century Fiction.’ Wednesday 5 February; 1-2pm; Teams link on request. All very welcome!

REMINDER: ⭐️DEADLINE EXTENSION⭐️ We've extended the deadline for submissions to our upcoming 'Contemporary Responses to Robert Fergusson' collection for another MONTH to Friday 28th February! Follow the link below to find out more about how to submit 👇 robert-fergusson.glasgow.ac.uk/legacy/submi...

ANOTHER ONE! Call for Papers: Eloquent Voices: Orality in the Age of Print, 1750-1850 See the full call/all info here: www.bars.ac.uk/blog/?p=5791 And please repost/share widely!

Now on the BARS Blog: Romance, Revolution and Reform Issue 8: Call for Submissions! See the full call and all the info you need to submit at the link here: www.bars.ac.uk/blog/?p=5784 And please don't forget to repost/share widely!

The Gentle Shepherd 29 March, Edinburgh Allan Ramsay’s pastoral comedy was first published 300 years ago, in 1725. Through the inclusion of traditional songs & music, Ramsay adapted his work into a ballad opera, earning it the title of “the first Scottish opera” www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-gentle...

CFP: Scots & the Environment Eighteenth-Century Scottish Studies Society Conference 17–20 June, University of Stirling Proposals invited on any aspect of the conference theme: literary, philosophical, theological, historical, scientific or medical, social or political ecsss.org/upcoming-con...