My IASH Fellowship Ends …

Posted on by Dr Karen E McAulay
IASH - Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities

‘All good things must come to an end’, as the saying goes. And an IASH Postdoctoral Research Fellowship is a thoroughly good thing.  I handed back my keys with sadness today, but I have had a great year. (The Fellowship was technically six months, but I was graciously permitted to hang around, retaining the use of my office for the rest of the year, which was wonderful, and enabled me to continue data-gathering in the Library’s Heritage Collections.)

19th meets 20th century
Looking back …
Last glance from bus stop
St Patrick’s Square

If you are looking for a next step after your PhD, or if like me, you’re making a change of direction – or need a spell concentrating on a particular research question in the Humanities – do consider applying.

I devoted my time to examining the archives of the Edinburgh publishers, Thomas Nelson.  I initially entitled my project, ‘From National Songs to Nursery Rhymes, and Discussion Books to Dance Bands: investigating Thomas Nelson’s Musical Middle Ground’, but the nursery rhymes turned out to be poems, and weren’t what I had in mind! The rest? Yes, I researched them.

I found quite a bit of correspondence between Thomas Nelson’s editors, authors and compilers, which was gratifying. I was able to trace material in journals that I would not have had access to, had I not been in Edinburgh; there’s the excellent University Library collection of actual and digital resources, and the National Library of Scotland just down the road.

I have deferred commencing any significant written work until I had explored all the potentially relevant materials in the files. I believe I’ve now reached that point.  As a result of conducting this research, I have ideas for extending my research in new directions, and I’m contemplating writing another book, so I need not only to explore potential audiences, but also to start working on a book proposal

However, I have also applied for and recently won an Athenaeum Award from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland to enable me to conduct an oral history project. This work, to be conducted in 2026, will hopefully enable me to write a final chapter for my proposed monograph. (I’ll be blogging about this before too long, but there are things I need to do first, before I spill the beans!)

I have benefited from being part of a research community, hearing other scholars’ papers and discussing our research; and attending researcher development sessions. I  was able to focus on my new direction as a researcher – important, after so many years as an ‘alt-ac’ researcher working in professional services. In this regard, I have also been in a position to submit some other unrelated work for publication, and I spoke at a conference at the University of Sussex in June, all of which gives me a sense that my research is gathering momentum.

Today, my last day, I took a cake to the University Library’s Heritage Collections; went to IASH’s Christmas lunch; and mulled over aspects of my ethical approval submission for my next project. (Oh, and drank quite a bit of coffee!)

Thank you so very much for a great year, IASH!

IASH (Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities)

Archival Truths: the Reality of Archival Research

Posted on by Dr Karen E McAulay
White puzzle with black gap where the missing piece should be.

I can say this very succinctly!

That which you seek may not be there.

Indeed,

That which you seek may not exist.

You can look as hard as you like, for as long as you like, with as much concentration and determination as you can muster from every inch, every fibre of your body … but not everything you want to find, will have survived to the present day, whether in archives or attics, boxes or basements.

Thus, the Thomas Nelson archive may have a handlist, but even the handlist (a second or third version of a handlist made by unknown hands at some point in the past) may document items that no longer exist. I struck lucky with my searches for correspondence about the four Nelson Scots Song Books (1948-1954). Of course, I still don’t know if there was further correspondence between the song book editors (by which I mean the compilers), as well as that between the compilers and Nelson’s in-house editors. But I found enough to be interesting, and to document the general story of their coming to fruition. It is possibly significant that they were published post-war, by the educational department editors, who had all been in Edinburgh for years by now.

However, for the past few weeks, I’ve been looking for correspondence between the author of a 1935 (ie, pre-war) book aimed at the general reader, and Nelson’s in-house editors. There was correspondence as early as 1932 – I know that much, but I can’t find it. Not only have I completely failed to find it, but we’ve discovered at least half-a-dozen boxes are missing. I bet you anything the missing correspondence is (was) in one or more of those missing boxes! Now, Nelson had offices in Edinburgh and London. The editorial staff for educational materials seemed to have been based in Edinburgh before the Second World War, whilst some – but not all – of the other editorial staff joined them from London’s Pater Noster Row at the start of the war. Thus, my 1935 book – not a school textbook – may have been edited from the London office, not in Edinburgh. Hold onto that knowledge.

Missing in Enemy Action?

When the London offices were bombed, the remaining London editorial staff, including the juvenile literature department, were found temporary office accomodation with another publisher. If my missing correspondence was lost either during a move to Edinburgh, or during the London raids, or in the general upheaval that followed, then they will never be found.

Ironically, when I was researching in the British Museum for my Masters degree, there was a particular Augustinian plainsong manuscript that I desperately needed to see – I’d travelled from Exeter to see it. But I filled in the paper slip (this was 1980 – that’s how you did it) – and got the slip back, marked ‘Missing in Enemy Action’. I rather think I have come up against the same problem again!

And the handlist? The original copy could even have been made by Nelson’s own staff, maybe in Edinburgh, but incorporating letters that had come up from London.

There remain four ‘temporary boxes’ at the end of the sequence, which may contain my prey. And a handful of other boxes that I can’t look at until the next time I’m in Edinburgh. But I’m preparing myself to accept the almost inevitable. In this particular instance,

That for which I search may not exist at all.

Imperial War Museum image (copyright © The Family Estate (Art.IWM ART 16123) – I can only share the link).

Two Ladies and a Harp: the Maclean-Clephane Sisters of Torloisk on Mull (and Edinburgh)

Posted on by Dr Karen E McAulay

You know how you buy a new car, and suddenly everyone seems to be driving the same white Fiat 500? It’s the same with research topics.

“Enthusiastic collectors of Gaelic songs and Irish harp tunes”

I researched Gaelic song-collectors Anna and Margaret Maclean-Clephane as part of my PhD (2009).

  • I blogged about the sisters as far back as 2012 in my librarian days, when the Whittaker Library was using Blogspot:- How Far Can a Song Travel? (Author Karen McAulay, Whittaker Live blog, Wednesday, 23 May 2012);
  • and of course they later made it into my book (Our Ancient National Airs, 2013).
  • I followed up with an extended article about them (also in 2013). See this excerpt from the article:-

Naturally, the Maclean Clephane sisters are in my Pure institutional repository at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. I coined the above phrase, ‘enthusiastic collectors of Gaelic songs and Irish harp tunes’, using it both in my book (p.92) and my article (p.62), both in 2013.

‘While they were still in their teens’

The sisters had a book ‘printed but not published’ while they were still in their teens – you can read about it in my article, p.58. I have to say, the arrangements in their book were – well, okay, but not artistically stylish!

Margaret had a harp – there is actually a Raeburn portrait of Margaret with her harp – see below.   Alexander Campbell did say the sisters played, but there’s no portrait of Anna with a harp, so we can’t prove it either way. He didn’t meet them. (There was in fact a third sister, though her musical interest didn’t seem to carry through to adulthood. ) Indeed, Anna wasn’t that hot on the piano, as I recall.  They grew up on the Isle of Mull. I’ve driven past the house, Torloisk. It’s massive!

I just love researching and writing about people, particularly musicians! If they’re women musicians, then that’s all the more interesting – so it’s hardly surprising I was drawn to them, and went looking at materials in the National Library of Scotland and the School of Scottish Studies in Edinburgh, and even visiting a manuscript that’s now down in London. (Blog post Women’s History Month 2024. Musicians, this present blog.)

Details of my article

But ever since, these fascinating and talented ladies keep cropping up in my social media feeds. People who’ve read my writings also contact me from time to time. Thanks to the miracles of modern technology, I get notifications that people have consulted my stuff, too … and there’s also a CD whose notes cite me, too:-

Tullochgorum – Haydn – Scottish Songs, by The Poker Club Band and Masako Art (BIS-2471 | SACD

Tullochgorum – Haydn  – Scottish Songs

The harpist, Masako, asked if she could cite my work – I was very appreciative that she went to the trouble of asking me.

Correctly cited 😀
Margaret Clephane … and Masako Art

I spent so long with my early nineteenth-century heroines, but eventually my research took different directions. Not being a Gaelic scholar was just one of the problems I’d encountered! I attended classes in speaking it, at the Conservatoire. I signed up to local authority evening classes at the Gaelic School in Glasgow. But somehow, I never really had time to give it enough attention, despite having been considered good at languages at school and possessing school certificates in – well, several European languages. I understand when someone agrees with me in Gaelic, and can pronounce ‘Torloisk’, for sure, but Gaelic remains beyond me!

But look – now the music is going to be played. That’s exciting!

Exchange Talk Given, Book Launched

Posted on by Dr Karen E McAulay

A quick post to mark a successful and very enjoyable evening. I gave my research exchange talk tonight at RCS. It was about a book of Scottish songs almost certainly published for the Festival of Britain in 1951. I talked about history, book history, music history, Scottish tourism and that all important catch-phrase for the Festival of Britain – ‘A Tonic for the Nation’. And then there was my book launch afterwards.

RCS wasn’t on Renfrew Street in 1951. We were the Royal Scottish Academy of Music at that point, in the old Athenaeum building (Nelson Mandela Place), but we had established a drama department in 1950 – the Glasgow College of Dramatic Art. (More about our history – click here.)

It’s fair to say that the book I talked about tonight – The Glories of Scotland, published by local publisher Mozart Allan – would not have been required repertoire for the talented students passing through our doors in 1951. It wasn’t aimed at high-performing classical artistes. (I doubt the library even had a copy in 1951, but there’s no way of finding out now. Anyway, we have recently acquired it!)

Nonetheless, the songbook does have a place in Glasgow’s history, in its own unique way.

Books relaxing after a night out!

After the exchange talk, we launched my book about amateur music making, Scottish national identity and Scottish music publishing. Professor Stephen Broad introduced it, and said some very kind words about it. There were friends and colleagues there whom I hadn’t seen for a while, so it was very sociable as well as celebratory.

Book launch: my ‘few words’ in response

My thanks go to everyone who contributed to make the evening so successful – Research Exchange colleagues, Library former colleagues, and the box office events team. I’m ‘dead chuffed’, as they say.

Princess Charlotte Augusta (died 1817)

Posted on by Dr Karen E McAulay

I’ve referred to Charlotte before – as we know, her tragic death inspired people to write anthems, author poems, mass-produce commemorative porcelain ….

I’ve just found a Twitter link to a blogpost that Kyra C. Cramer wrote about her, so I thought I’d share it here:-