C. P. CAVAFY LIBRARY

C. P. Cavafy’s library comprises the rescued books that the poet and his family had in their possession. These books served as basic tools in the hands of the poet, and through them, one can draw Cavafy’s profile as a reader and grasp the variety of influences that shaped him as a literary writer. With these books, one can discern his preferences as a reader, his interactions with other scholarly and literary contemporaries, as well as the wider social networks he was a part of. An instrumental part of the archive, the poet’s library is in a discourse with many of the items in his archive collection, fitting together the pieces of the puzzle of his personality. From all the readings Cavafy had in his possession, 966 titles are saved today, several of which with reading traces and inserted handwritten notes; many of the books also contain information about former holders, either from ex libris, bookplates or donors’ dedications to the poet. The group’s approach focused on highlighting Cavafy’s reading identity and investigating his social and cultural environment, aiming to digitally disseminate this information and facilitate users as much as possible.

The objective of the literary documentation working group of C. P. Cavafy library was to annotate the 966 titles of the library, in order to digitize it. 964 of these titles are included in Michaila Karampini-Iatrou’s catalogue¹, while the Onassis Foundation also acquired two more books:

1. GR-OF CA CL.3.332: G. Vrisimitzakis, Tragoudia tis Savoias, “Grammata” Publishing Company, Alexandria 1926
2. GR-OF CA CL.3.333: Thr. A. Kastanakis, Oi erimies tou iliocharou, “Dionysos” edition, Constantinople 1921

In the context of publishing and managing the material of the library in a digital environment, the group worked to highlight metadata, searchability and the interconnectivity of the items. The metadata for each item were sorted in specific fields of information, which are interoperable and lead to specific results (linked or not).
Based on the above, the user is able to search and find each item based on multiple criteria of each item: author, editor, publisher, translator, time or place of publication, language and thematic features.

Book arrangement system
In the digital collection, C. P. Cavafy’s books are divided into 12 categories:

1. Magazines and Periodicals in Modern Greek
2. Magazines and Periodicals in English
3. Books in Modern Greek
4. Books in Ancient Greek
5. Books in Latin
6. Sacred Texts
7. Books in English
8. Books in French
9. Books in German
10. Books in Italian
11. Geography and Travel
12. Dictionaries

Thus, the arrangement follows the categories devised by Michaila Karampini-Iatrou, as introduced in her book C. P. Cavafy Library², due to their historical value and wider use in the bibliography about the poet.

Regarding the documentation of the C. P. Cavafy library, the group attempted to describe the books as physical items and, at the same time, provide information about their content.

To achieve this, the group created fields that describe each item in detail and provide explanatory comments, as well as additional information about its contents. The fields are titled “Description”, “Comments” and “Bibliography”. The field “Description” provides the bibliological description of each item, following the standard of the Bibliology workshop “Philippos Iliou” (Benaki Museum): dimensions, pagination, description of endsheets at the front and back, as well as information about the illustration and the sale price. Furthermore, this field contains information about reading traces, bookplates, handwritten notes or inserts found in a given book. It should be noted that there are no descriptions for blank sheets without any information. The field titled “Comments” includes explanatory comments regarding the physical object, clarifications about the uncut or partially cut books, any references to Cavafy’s poems and links between items and/or with the Cavafy Archive, if any. Similarly, the field “Bibliography” contains references to relevant bibliography, when necessary.

Apart from the fields mentioning the contributors and creators of each book (author, publisher, series, translator, editor, former holder) and defining the imprint or the language of the publication, multiple access points of a literary interest (keywords) were created, which were grouped as follows:

1. Persons
2. Corporate bodies
3. Places of publication
4. Format
5. Motto
6. Reading traces
7. Imprint
8. Subjects
9. Related topics
10. Works by C. P. Cavafy

Keywords, as well as specific fields, serve as an index, in order to search for information about titles in the C. P. Cavafy library. Apart from the access points relating to the bibliographical details (for instance, book producers and places of publication), the user can search information about the format, book mottos, types of inserts found within each item and whether an item contains reading traces or not. At the same time, the user can find information about the subject features of a book. To describe the subject of a book, two access points were created. The first field is titled “Subjects” and aims to categorize the books, by determining the wider subject area each book belongs to (Modern Greek literature, foreign literature, etc.). The second field is titled “Related topics” and mostly pertains to specialized thematic features of the books (poetry, prose, studies, etc.), without enlarging upon the genre typology. With these access points, the user can search the titles of the library on the basis of their central subject, but also their individual topics. Lastly, the field “Works by C. P. Cavafy” contains those works of the poet that are published or referenced in each item.

The documentation and digitization methodology was mainly devised to facilitate the user and highlight general and special interests associated with the C. P. Cavafy library. More specifically, the basic information leading to the identification of the book were digitized, i.e. the front cover, the back cover, the endsheets at the front and back (title page, half-title page, preface, epilogue, introductory texts, tables of content, indices, appendices, colophon, glossary, advertisements). Along with the above, the handwritten and printed notes were also digitized, as were the motto, bookplates and seals, often found on the front cover and endsheets at the front. Blank endsheets at the front and back without any information were not digitized.

In order to draw Cavafy’s profile as a reader, the group placed much emphasis on reading traces found in the books of the library. Therefore, any underlining, marks and various notes found in each text were digitized.
Apart from all the above, pages containing C. P. Cavafy’s published poems, studies or references to the poet and his family were also digitized.

The inserts found between the pages of the books were photographed separately, and then presented at the end of each book. The spines of the books were digitized only if there is information on them (e.g., the price or the owner of the book). The inserts and handmade cases covering some books were also digitized both on recto and on verso.
When two titles are linked together, the print was photographed and described in its entirety, as it is considered one, single physical object, whereas in the detailed documentation the titles were described separately. At the same time, the connection between two items is included in the “Comments” field with a relevant hyperlink, referring to the second title of the item.

In cases of multiple copies of the same book, the pages of one item have been digitized, while for the rest of the titles, the similarity is noted in the field “Comments”, along with the respective codes. Hence, the user can refer to the respective identical book in order to see the common endsheets at the front and back.

Finally, for books that are uncut or partially cut, there has been no intervention on the physical item, so as to preserve the historical value of the library and the entire archive. Therefore, the uncut and partially cut parts of the books are described in detail in the field “Description” of each item with a relevant note in the field “Comments”, but they were not digitized. In this context, by juxtaposing the fields “Description” and “Comments”, the user can understand which uncut parts are contained in each book and the information included in the uncut pages.

Regarding the handwritten notes found in the pages of the books and inserts, the group re-transcribed all the handwritten notes and inserts. Where these handwritten notes had already been transcribed by other scholars in the past, the group cited their relevant study in the field “Bibliography”. Examples include transcriptions of written dedications and names by Karampini-Iatrou in 2003³ or the transcriptions of handwritten notes in the voluminous work by Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, carried out by Diana Haas in 1982⁴.

In taking up the task to re-transcribe the handwritten notes, the group followed a “diplomatic transcription” approach, that is, without intervening with corrections on the text, but preserving the punctuation and orthography of the original. Furthermore, the group followed the layout of the notes. When the Greek text featured polytonic orthography, the same orthography was used.

The transcriptions of the library include various instances of handwritten notes on printed text; some are additions, and others deletions or corrections of the printed text. The group decided to use various kinds of marking, so that each kind of intervention on the text can be distinguished (addition, deletion etc., see Transcription labels).

From the 966 titles in the library, the handwritten notes of two items were not transcribed: GR-OF CA CL.5.1 and GR-OF CA CL.6.8. The first one (GR-OF CA CL.5.1) includes scattered handwritten notes in Latin throughout, while the latter (GR-OF CA CL.6.8) contains handwritten notes in Hebrew.

For a brief bibliography see the Greek version of this page.

We owe special thanks to Amalia Pappa, who offered her guidance to the group for various methodological matters. Her contribution was a determining factor for many parts of this venture. We thank her for her attention to detail, the care she instilled in the project and her constant readiness in every inquiry we may have had.

A special thanks also to Christina Dounia for her advice and guidance. She was a valuable supporter in every stage of the C. P. Cavafy library documentation process, always eager to discuss with us and contribute in the resolution of methodological issues.

Michaila Karampini-Iatrou offered us her valuable advice on many of the books in the library. Knowing the material very well, she was able to assist us on many individual issues, and helped us view the library from multiple perspectives. A warm thanks for all the fruitful conversations!

Lastly, we would like to thank Konstantinos Chrysogelos (Assistant Professor at the University of Patras) for editing the transcriptions of the handwritten notes and for transcribing certain illegible handwritten notes from scratch.

¹ Michaila Karampini-Iatrou, C. P. Cavafy Library, Ermis, Athens 2003.

² Karampini-Iatrou, op. cit., p. η’.

³ Karampini-Iatrou, op. cit.s

⁴ See: Diana Haas, “Cavafy’s reading notes on Gibbon’s ‘Decline and Fall’“, Folia Neohellenica 4 (1982), p. 25-96.