All Rare Book School summer lectures are free, open to the public, and hosted on Grounds at the University of Virginia. Lectures begin at 5:30 p.m. and are followed by a reception. Monday lectures are held in Room 330 of UVA’s Edgar Shannon Library, and Wednesday lectures are held in the Auditorium of UVA’s Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library.

Recordings of this summer’s lectures will be made available later this year.

Please email contactRBS@virginia.edu with any questions.

• Jul
  21

  2025
  Books for Virginia 1620: America’s First Public Library? – The 2025 NEH-SHARP Living American History in Primary Documents Lecture

  Lecturer: E. M. Rose - Visiting Fellow, Murray Edwards College, Cambridge University
  UVA Edgar Shannon Library (Room 330) or Zoom • 5:30 p.m. ET
  
• Jul
  23

  2025
  Iconographic Disjunction in the Ruskin Psalter/Hours: A Flemish Illuminated Manuscript of ca. 1470–80

  Lecturer: James H. Marrow - Professor Emeritus of Art History, Princeton University
  UVA Special Collections (Auditorium) or Zoom • 5:30 p.m. ET
  
• Jul
  28

  2025
  Curious and Creative Women – The 2025 Women in Books Speaker Program

  Lecturer: Rachael DiEleuterio - Librarian & Archivist, Delaware Art Museum
  UVA Edgar Shannon Library (Room 330) or Zoom • 5:30 p.m. ET
  

Rare Book School sponsors and co-sponsors a range of programming at various times throughout the year, including activities at book fairs, symposia at UVA and other locations, and more. These include events organized by members of the Andrew W. Mellon Society of Fellows in Critical Bibliography at their home institutions.

• May
  22

  2025
  SoFCB Keynote Lecture: Transporting Visions, Transcending Boundaries

  Presented by: The Andrew W. Mellon Society of Fellows in Critical Bibliography at Rare Book School
  McNeil Center for Early American Studies, Lecture Hall, 3355 Woodland Walk, Philadelphia, PA 19104 • 9:15–10:45 am
  
• Mar
  5

  2025
  Bibliographic Performances and Surrogate Readings: Author Janelle Rebel in Conversation with Alison Fraser

  Presented by: The Andrew W. Mellon Society of Fellows in Critical Bibliography
  Zoom • 12:00–1:00 p.m. ET
  
• Feb
  11

  2025
  Faces of God: Author Murad Mumtaz in Conversation with Holly Shaffer on Images of Devotion in Indo-Muslim Painting, 1500-1800

  Presented by: The Andrew W. Mellon Society of Fellows in Critical Bibliography
  Zoom • 12:00–1:00 p.m. ET
  

Since 1992, Rare Book School has been responsible for a rotating series of exhibitions in the Dome Room of the Rotunda at the University of Virginia, many curated by UVA undergraduate and graduate students. The books and other materials shown in these exhibitions are drawn both from the RBS collections and from the UVA Library, supplemented by occasional loans by other institutions and individuals.

• May 19
  /
  Nov 12
  

  ends in
  2025
  Famous & Forgotten: The Game of Authors

  Curated by: Barbara Heritage & Zoe Langer
  Held by Rare Book School on the second floor of the Edgar Shannon Library of the University of Virginia
• Sep 28
  /
  Dec 23
  

  
  2022
  Building the Book from the Ancient World to the Present Day: Five Decades of Rare Book School & the Book Arts Press

  Curated by: Barbara Heritage & Ruth-Ellen St. Onge
  The Grolier Club, 47 East 60th Street, New York
• Jun 6
  /
  May 1
  

  
  2019
  Comics in Circuit

  Curated by: Ruth-Ellen St. Onge, Jennifer Camp, Elizabeth Dorton, Devon Shannahan, Katherine Smith, and Zach Tauscher
  Dome Room, UVA Rotunda