This page provides practical information about the material held by the Rare Books and Special Collections unit of the ۲ݮƵ Library.
Rare Books and Special Collections houses many thousands of items ranging from published works to puppets, and is especially renowned for its holdings related to Canadiana, the history of printing, natural history, Enlightenment philosophy, and architecture.
On this page, you will find descriptions of the various named collections found at Rare Books and Special Collections, in addition to a number of thematic guides. Please note that this site is a work in progress and we recommend contacting us if you’d like to know more about a particular collection or related material. Our contact details can be found within individual collection descriptions and on the Rare Books & Special Collections staff page. Please also note that although we have placed collections into specific categories, we appreciate and encourage the potential diversity of usage that exists across disciplines and in a variety of contexts.
Additional to these named special collections is the Rare Books and Special Collections “main”, or general collection, which houses close to 100,000 published works representing a wide range of subject matters and print formats. Works in the main collection date from the 15th through to the 21st century and are printed in a variety of languages including French, German, Latin, Italian, Chinese, and Russian. Many of the works in the main collection are complementary to those housed within named special collections.
Browse by subject area:
Arts and Architecture
Canadian War Poster Collection
Architecture
Blackader-Lauterman Collection
John Bland Canadian Architecture Collection
Performing arts
Archival Collections and Manuscripts
Canadiana
Lawrence Lande Collection of Canadiana
Rodolphe Joubert Collection on French Canada
North West Company and merchant collections
Roy States Black History Collection
Guidebooks and settlement guides
Canadian literature
Ralph Gustafson Collection of Canadian Poetry
History of the Book
History of Ideas
Literature
Children's Literature Collection
Canadian literature
Ralph Gustafson Collection of Canadian Poetry
John and Myrna Metcalf Collection
Canadian booksellers’ and publishers' archives
British literature
Norman Friedman Rudyard Kipling Collection
Lawrence Lande William Blake Collection
Sir E.K. Chambers Shakespeare Collection
William Butler Yeats Collection
English literature manuscripts
French and German literature
Claude Prosper Jolyot de Crébillon (fils) Collection
Jean-Jacques Rousseau Collection
18th century French literature
18th century French dictionaries
French history and literature manuscripts
Jewish literature
Joe Fishstein Collection of Yiddish Poetry
Saul Shapiro Collection of Anglo-American Judaica
Popular literature
Maps
Regional and Political History
Canadian history (see Canadiana)
European and British history
United States history
Joseph N. Nathanson Collection of Lincolniana