Books Like Sapphires: From the Library of Congress Judaica Collection

Brener, Ann

ISBN 10: 1684581982 / ISBN 13: 9781684581986

Published by Brandeis University Press, 2024

About this Item

Seller Inventory # 001035

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Books Like Sapphires: From the Library of Congress Judaica Collection
• Publisher: Brandeis University Press
• Publication Date: 2024
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1684581982
• ISBN 13: 9781684581986
• Binding: Hardcover
• Condition: New

About this title

Synopsis

Illustrated highlights from the Judaica Collection of the Library of Congress.
 
Books Like Sapphires showcases a wide range of Hebraic treasures from the storied collection at the Library of Congress, many of them for the first time. Tracing the history of Judaica collecting in the twentieth-century United States, the book illuminates varied works, telling their stories alongside vibrant color images. These include a unique manuscript about a betrothal scandal in Renaissance Crete, an illustrated Esther Scroll, a poem from 1477 celebrating the new technology of printing, amusing rhymed couplets in sixteenth-century Padua, and the Washington Haggadah. This book also tells the story of the patrons and collectors, first among them Jacob Schiff, as well as archivists and curators, who made the storied Judaica archive at the Library of Congress the precious resource that it is today.

About the Author

Ann Brener served as the Hebraic Specialist at the Library of Congress from 2009–2022. Prior to that she taught Medieval Hebrew Poetry at Ben-Gurion University in Israel and published two books on the subject, Judah Halevi and His Circle of Hebrew Poets in Granada and Isaac ibn Khalfun: A Wandering Hebrew Poet of the Eleventh Century. She lives in Columbia, South Carolina.