Special Collections Finding Aids

Pougin Pamphlet Collection - Books

Accession: SC1998.62

Location: M2A 3,2

Size: .25 feet

Biography: Arthur (1834-1921) Pougin was a French violinist and writer. He gave up performance early in his career in order to devote himself to writing. He is known as one of the founders of French musicology and wrote numerous articles and books on musical subjects, primarily music theater. He was music editor for Larousse's Dictionaire universel. His most important work was a biography of Verdi.

Provenance: The provenance of this collection is conjectural. A large number of the items deal with theater design, including one pamphlet written by Pougin. Another pamphlet bears an inscription to Pougin. These facts and the nearly exclusive publication of the pamphlets in France on the subject of music during the life of Pougin make it more than highly probable that they originate from the Pougin library, which Sibley Library purchased in the early 1920's. It is almost equally certain that a few of the items may not derive from the Pougin collection. It appears that someone in the past mixed in pamphlets from other sources. One item bore an inscription to H.E. Krehbiel and another the owner's mark of Henry B. Ellwanger. Items obviously of foreign origin have been removed.

Scope and Content: The collection contains a wide variety of late nineteenth-century pamphlets and emphemeral publications relating to musical subjects. The major subject represented is theater design. There are also a small number of documents relating to the construction of the organ at Notre Dame.

Associations: Sibley Library owns the Pougin library, which was originally dispersed through its collections, but most of which now resides in Rare Books. A card file of the library's holdings is available in special collections. A small collection of iconography from the Pougin library has been processed as a separate special collection.

Restrictions: none

Series: 1

Series Name: Books

Series Description: The series consists of pamphlets on the subject of music and is ordered alphabetically according to author or title and in some cases subject where the former two are lacking.