George Robert Gissing (1857-1903) was educated at a Quaker boarding school in Alderley Edge, Cheshire, and at Owens College, Manchester, where he won several prizes and a Shakespeare Scholarship. His academic career came to an abrupt end when he was expelled from the college for theft and he spent a month in prison. He sailed to America, wandering for a year, before returning to England in 1877.
Almost immediately Gissing began to write novels, which were heavily influenced by the poverty and deprivation he witnessed in London, and by his own experience of alcoholism and mental health difficulties in two very troubled marriages.
His realist novels, such as Demos, The Nether World and New Grub Street, met with considerable critical success, although they would never bring Gissing financial security.
The John Rylands Library holds a complete collection of first editions of the novels of George Gissing. The printed collection was enhanced considerably by the purchase of the Chris Kohler collection, which includes a set of leather-bound prize volumes of Virgil, which Gissing received from Owens College; several signed presentation copies of his books; and a number of books owned by Gissing.
Pierre Coustillas Gissing Collection
Letter from George Gissing
The George Gissing Collections
The archive and manuscript collection, also collated by Kohler, has been fully catalogued, and includes a small amount of manuscript material, correspondence between Gissing and his family, correspondence and papers relating to the purchase of Gissing related material by collectors, a large number of photographs, and a small number of letters relating to Gissing’s expulsion from Owens College.
The John Rylands library holds three additional Gissing collections:
- The Anthony Petyt collection concerns Gissing-related material accumulated over 30 years by Petyt, who was a Trustee for the Gissing Trust in Wakefield
- The Paterson collection, which was amassed by the Scottish George Gissing scholar James Paterson
- The Coustillas Gissing Collection. Pierre Coustillas was a French academic and a huge admirer of Gissing. He was instrumental in publishing a biography of Gissing, collections of Gissing’s letters, and co-founding the Gissing Journal. Alongside his wife, Hélène, he amassed a huge collection of material relating to Gissing.
These collections are integral to a module for the MA in English Literature and American Studies at the University of Manchester, where students visit the John Rylands and consult material from the Gissing collections in our reading room, which are then used to complete their group assignment for the course.
Beyond New Grub Street
With funding from the John Rylands Research Institute, the John Rylands held a symposium in July entitled Beyond New Grub Street, on George Gissing. The symposium was a hybrid event, with speakers and attendees presenting both physically and virtually, and featured a Collection Encounter, where staff and students discussed and showcased material from the Gissing collections. It was intended to promote further scholarship, and also to encourage research which makes use of the archives.
In order to allow virtual participants at the symposium to gain experience of the collections, with assistance from Rachel Cynthia Valavan Vetrigo in the Library’s Student Team, we filmed the Collection Encounter with Dr. Ingrid Hanson and Dr. Mike Sanders, lecturers of the Gissing course, and their MA students. The film will also be used to advertise the module to prospective students.
The film was created using the Rylands’ newly refurbished equipment for providing virtual capacity at events, seminars, and providing access to our collections to those who are unable to visit the library in person. We had to do several takes to get started, but once our presenters got into their flow, and with Rachel’s support, it all went very smoothly.
We are delighted with the result, and hope it will offer encouragement to all to access the wealth of material available relating to the work of George Gissing at the library.
All images unless otherwise stated are copyright of the University of Manchester and can be used under the Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial-Share Alike Licence.
Great to see the Rylands’ Gissing collection expanding and younger generations of students clearly enthusiastic about his writing.
I bought my first copy of a Gissing novel nearly forty years ago in a well-stocked secondhand bookshop that used to exist within Manchester University Student Union building, i.e. in Owens College, effectively. The novel, appropriately, was “Born in Exile”. Its protagonist Godwin Peak’s intellect, energy and passion (the last chiefly for Sidwell Warricombe – “It was Sidwell or death”) left me thunderstruck.