The Imperial Public Library and Its Remote User D.V. Ulyaninsky in the Late 19th — Early 20th Centuries

Using epistolary sources from the archival documents department of the National Library of Russia (NLR), this article examines the relationship between Moscow bibliophile and bibliographer D.V. Ulyaninsky (1861—1918) and the Imperial Public Library (IPL, now the NLR) in St. Petersburg. This relationship lasted over 20 years (from 1892 to 1915). Ulyaninsky submitted requests for the acquisition of current and retrospective publications from the IPL, clarified bibliographic information, and subscribed to individual publications for temporary use. The library was very attentive to Ulyaninsky’s requests, fulfilling ones for the purchase of its own publications and answering reference and bibliographic questions. The bibliophile received by mail certain publications for temporary use, which were necessary for the preparation of his bibliographic projects. However, requests for copies of rare and old publications for reading remained unfulfilled. In their regard, the Imperial Public Library strictly adhered to a policy of prioritizing preservation. D.V. Ulyaninsky’s numerous attempts to acquire the editions and bookplates he was interested in from the Imperial Public Library’s duplicate collection were rejected. The sale of duplicates was not systematic at the Imperial Public Library in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and its management made no exceptions for the Moscow bibliophile.

Of interest is the gamble of D.V. Ulyaninsky, who was interested in acquiring one of the two copies of the first edition of A.N. Radishchev’s Journey from St. Petersburg to Moscow (St. Petersburg, 1790) held at the Imperial Public Library. Arbitrarily deciding that one of the copies could be considered a duplicate, the bibliophile twice proposed purchasing and exchanging it. The correspondence analyzed in the article allows us to reconstruct, at a micro level, the contacts between the IPL (the largest state book depository in pre-revolutionary Russia) and a user who lived in another city (Moscow) and was not a scholar or writer, but a bibliophile and amateur bibliographer.

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