The Caxton Club brings together archivists, authors, binders, book artists, booksellers, collectors, conservators, designers, editors, librarians, printers, publishers, scholars, and others. Members from these diverse backgrounds form a community that shares a love of printed, handwritten, and digital books and related textual objects, such as pamphlets, broadsides, maps, and ephemera. The club provides a forum to learn about the arts, history, and technologies of these materials, as well as a space to share the joys of appreciating and collecting them.

CAXTONIAN.ORG: A PUBLICLY AVAILABLE ONLINE ARCHIVE OF THE FIRST 22 YEARS OF THE CAXTONIAN.
BOOK LAUNCH. DR. RONALD BAILEY, CLAUDETTE HUNT, CAXTONIAN DR. IRVIN HUNT, JACKIE VOSSLER, AND DR. DESIRÉE MCMILLION
GRANTS: 2019–20 grant recipients: Meha Rey, Yann Trividic, Sara Jensen, Kathie DeLamater, and Annabel Pinkney.
PUBLICATIONS: The club has published 153 formal publications and other printed pieces in its 125+ years.
CHICAGO 101 AUTHORS: Each of the 101 titles is the focus of an essay by a leading scholar, writer, or bibliophile.
MELLON FELLOWS: Each year the club provides copies of Other People’s Books to Mellon Fellows at Rare Book School.

Caxton Members: Submit your item to our online exhibit, Caxtonians’ Collections.
Exhibit is open to all.



UPCOMING CAXTON EVENTS

Caxton Club programs will resume in September with a second Friday daytime program at Noon CT. All daytime Caxton Club events will be virtual. Third Wednesday evening programs begin at 6:30 PM CT and will either be virtual-only (Zoom) events or in-person events with virtual (Zoom) access. Live program activity times may differ, so please check times listed for each event.

Virtual programs will consist of quality Zoom presentations with real-time Q&A features immediately following. All programs — virtual or in-person — require advance registration on the club’s website. This allows Zoom instructions to be sent before programs, and for planning for in-person programs where space is limited. As usual, we will record all programs and make them available for viewing in the Past Programs section of our website’s Members Only section.

Only registrants who miss a program or wish to view it again will be given the opportunity to request a link to a recording of the program.


    • 04/14/2023
    • 12:00 PM
    • 4/14/2023 12:00 PM CT Zoom presentation is free and open to all. Preregistration required via website. ULCC live attendance – Zoom presentation and optional lunch ($35) immediately following. Reservations required by 12:00 PM CT 4/14/23
    Register

    April Midday Program



    Quick. What are the two flattest U.S. states? Here’s a hint, neither correct response starts with “Kansas.” First place honors belong to Florida and second … to Illinois, where many folks like to say that, “On a clear day, you can see the back of your head.”

    That’s one reason that people first encountering the American West as they ventured from the Midwest were awestruck. Some of those encounters were captured on film – in stunning black and white – and our speaker, Megan Friedel, will be sharing examples of that photographic history with us. She’ll be drawing on the Rare and Distinctive Collections (which includes books and maps) at the University of Colorado Library.

    An Amherst graduate, Megan received an MLIS as well as a MA in history from Simmons College. She has served as president of the Society of Rocky Mountain Archivists and is on the editorial board of the Journal of Western Archives.

    Western photographs from the eighteenth century often appear as small images clustered on a page in history books or as part of extraordinarily expensive set of collectible volumes. Here’s your chance to see them richly portrayed and in the company of an expert.

    Please forward this notice to anyone who may find it of interest.

    Please register if you’d like to see this program, even if you can’t attend. After the program, all registrants will receive an email offering an opportunity to request a link to a recording of the complete program.

    • 04/19/2023
    • 5:30 PM
    • 4/19/2023 5:30PM Live attendance at the Newberry 60 W. Walton, Chicago with buffet supper to follow ($72 inclusive). Prepayment and registration required via website by 5:30 PM 4/17/23.
    Register

    April Evening Program



    Join us in welcoming Caxtonian Bruce Kennett as he discusses W.A. Dwiggins and his Athalinthia project in person at the Newberry.

    Produced entirely in New England, Athalinthia is filled with delights. It comes straight from the imagination and heart of W.A. Dwiggins (WAD), one of the great visual artists of the twentieth century. Wise and witty stories written by Dwiggins, are accompanied by more than a hundred of his fanciful illustrations – many of these never before seen in print.

    From 1910 to 1926, Dwiggins created a series of stories about an imaginary place he named Athalinthia, and the people who lived there. A place perhaps akin to Persia a thousand years ago, or Uzbekistan in the nineteenth century … he never said. This is WAD at his most fanciful, his most personal.

    In 1928, after nearly twenty years of writing and picture-making, Dwiggins tried valiantly to get his stories published in one volume. He designed the book, made a dummy, and shopped it around to publishing houses. He had no luck. Discouraged, WAD put his Athalinthia project aside. Thankfully, after a delay of nearly a hundred years, Dwiggins biographer Bruce Kennett picked it up and saw it through to the end. This is a remarkable achievement and a pure delight. In these troubling times, stories such as these are a comfort for all of us to have on our bookshelves.

    Doors open 5:30 PM, Presentation 6:15 PM, Buffet dinner (vegetarian options available) with wine, beer, or non-alcoholic beverage to follow.

    Cost $72.00 inclusive. No program-only option. You must purchase dinner to attend.

    Prepayment and registration required via website by 5:30 PM 4/17/23.

    Registering for the program will allow you the opportunity to purchase copies of Athalinthia for $62, including tax.

    Please forward this notice to anyone who may find it of interest.

GRANTS

Midday Programs

Evening Programs

  • 04/19/2023 5:30 PM
    4/19/2023 5:30PM Live attendance at the Newberry 60 W. Walton, Chicago with buffet supper to follow ($72 inclusive). Prepayment and registration required via website by 5:30 PM 4/17/23.

Other Events

Thornwillow Press Centennial Reading of James Joyce’s ULYSSES

LATEST NEWS

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211 South Clark Street,
PO Box 2329,
Chicago IL 60604-9997


Tel: +1 (312) 970-1294
info@caxtonclub.org