For two centuries (1540-1740) the Sidney family of Penshurt Place, Kent, produced poets, courtiers, collectors, and at least one revolutionary. Increasingly aware of the cultural ideal of the learned nobleman and of libraries as representations of that ideal, the Sidneys amassed one of the largest gentry libraries in England of their period. This edition of their library catalogue provides a vivid portrait of the birth, growth, and eventual demise of the distinguished family’s library collection.

Comprised of nearly 5000 entries, the catalogue is presented with a full introduction describing the Sidneys’ intellectual world and life, their reading and collecting, the women collectors of the family, and the dispersal of the library in 1743. The editors employ all the resources of contemporary bibliography, print and digital, to identify the titles in the catalogue, and where possible to locate the Sidneys’ own copies still extant, as well as architectural analysis to identify and describe the library room at Penshurst, now lost to nineteenth-century renovations.

Germaine Warkentin is a professor emerita of the Department of English at Victoria College, University of Toronto.

Germaine Warkentin's profile page

Joseph L. Black is professor and director of Graduate Studies in the Department of English at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.

Joseph Black's profile page

William R. Bowen is Chair of the Department of Arts, Culture and Media at the University of Toronto Scarborough.

William Bowen's profile page

‘The Library of Sidneys of Penshurst Place is a monumental achievement that will contribute to scholarship on the history of reading, libraries, and the Sidney family… It is a book worthy not only of any decent research library, but of a private collection – a joy to read, skim, and to display on the bookshelf.’

Sidney Journal vol 34:02:2016

‘It is an informative work, admirably organized and structured. The research is exhaustive and scholarly and it is a fascinating book to read.

The Library vol 15:04:2014

‘Warkentin, Black, and Bowen have produced an extremely careful publication, attractively and logically presented … The Library of the Sidneys is an important publication that offers insights into the mysteries of manners, arms, and arts’ that the Sidneys commanded – and collected – for so many years.’

Library & Information History vol 31:01:2014

“The Library of The Sydneys is the product of more than forty years labour and it is saturated with the incremental accumulation of expertise. Some books take time, and are better for it, and this is one of those.“

Times Literary Supplement, June 12, 2015.

‘This masterful edition, the product of decades of collaborative research, represents a remarkable contribution both to Sidney studies and to early modern book history.’

Renaissance and Reformation vol 37:01:2014

“This is a meticulous and scholarly study of a family archive and its innumerable literary ramifications.”

The Book Collector 64.4 (Winter 2015)

‘Warkentin’s successful efforts provide a fascinating analysis of book-collecting and reading of the Sidney Earls of Leicester… This volume will be prized by Sidney scholars.’

SHARP News vol 23:04:2014