New York Public Library Schiff Collection

By Raphael Cormack

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Finding pre-First World War Arabic printed books in European and American libraries is sometimes a complex business, involving navigating the online catalogs of different institutions, trying creative transliterations, and a good deal of luck. The major collections are well known – British Library, Bibliothèque national de France, Harvard, Yale, etc.. But, for a variety of reasons, people often overlook the New York Public Library, which had amassed one of the best (if not the best) collections of Middle Eastern books in America by the 1920s. In large part, this is because many of the books have not yet been uploaded to the online catalog and those that have been, can be quite hard to search because you need to have the transliteration right – e.g. it took me a long time to find the play لا اتزوج ولو شنقوني (la atzūj wa lū shankūnī). So, I hope it will be helpful if I provide a brief guide to using the Arabic books there, particularly those in the Schiff Collection.

History

The Schiff fund was set up in 1897 to help with the purchase of Semitic literature at the New York Public Library. It was split between the Dorot Jewish Division and the Oriental Division. From 1897 to 1914 Richard Gottheil, as head of the Oriental Division, used the money to acquire the NYPL’s core collection of Middle Eastern Books, assisted by Ida Pratt from 1901 onwards.* The collection eventually came to include many works in Persian, Armenian, Ottoman Turkish and more. But my focus here is on the Arabic material. From the early 1900s his primary (though not only) book dealer was the Cairo based J.B. Yahuda, who supplied institutions and individuals around the world including the Hungarian Orientalist Ignaz Golziher. J.B. Yahuda was also the brother of A.S. Yahuda, a scholar of classical literature, among many other things, whom Gottheil much admired. 

The rate of acquisition in the Oriental Division seems to have been highest in the 17 year period after 1897 but it continued for a while after. When Jacob Schiff died in 1920, he left a further $25,000 for the two divisions he had created, which was used to continue collecting, though at a slower rate.**

Collection

The approach to collecting appears to have been a little scattergun throughout this period. The majority of the books came from Cairo, Beirut, or the big centers of Arabic printing in Europe like Paris and Leiden, however there are also some works from North Africa, India, and New York. The spread of topics is broad too, including history, theology, literature (modern and classical), and politics, however it is probably most useful to people who work on Egypt. In general, they acquired contemporary material and, although there are a few books from earlier, the collection is richest in late 19^th and early 20^th century works. Of particular interest is the collection of small pamphlets produced cheaply for a popular market, which survive in very few other places.

One thing that stands out is the demonstrated interest in popular culture. There is a wealth of early 20^th century plays, folktales, siras and many interesting examples of Egyptian colloquial Arabic from the period. Gottheil also loved the Arabian Nights and bought several different editions in different languages (though not the first Bulaq edition in Arabic).

I was most interested in the plays so can give a brief cross section of this part of the collection. They have a good selection of the most famous Arabic plays of the late 19^th century including a lot of Najib al-Haddad, Ahmed Abu Khalil Qabbani (including his Antar and his Harun al-Rashid) and the (slightly less well known journalist and playwright) Mahmud Wasif. But they have more obscure ones, too. There are several historical plays including one about the Turco-Greek war and another about Abd al-Hamid and his attempts to overthrow the Turkish constitution. I was particularly surprised to find some early 20^th century colloquial Egyptian farces, which I had never heard of before including “I won’t get married even if they hang me”, “the thrusts of old women”, and “the beautiful girl of the summer resort.” If I were to pick one gem, it would be Hassan Marei’s play Dinshaway. Marei was a curious figure – legend at the time had it that he once escaped from a mental hospital disguised as a woman – who specialized in plays about current events. Dinshaway was his most famous and told the story of an incident in 1906, when a group of British soldiers on a pigeon hunt got into a fight with some Egyptians. One of the soldiers died and the British response was draconian: four of the villagers were executed and many more sent to prison. This incident soon became a nationalist rallying cry. When Marei attempted to stage a play about the events the British banned it but he managed to print some copies and distribute them. They are now extremely rare. I have been able to locate two copies in the world and one is in the New York Public Library.

I know less about the history of drama in Ottoman Turkish but there are many 19^th century play scripts in this language, too .

Navigating the collection

Actually laying your hands on the books in this collection is more of an art than a science. I was very lucky to be assisted by the research librarian Paul Friedman in the General Research Division, who gave me many of the tips I am about to pass on. 

Firstly, although many of the books haven’t made it to the online catalog yet, a good number have. Here is a list of the Arabic language books that have a “Schiff Collection” tag on the online catalog. 

But the best way to do it is still to look through the material that is in the New York Public Library itself.

The card catalogue (photocopied and bound in large volumes) is located on the top floor of the library just before you get to the Rose Reading Room. I have marked its rough location with a red arrow on the map. This has all the card entries for the old Oriental Division and therefore has both Arabic and non-Arabic material. It is organised both by topic and by author and is reasonably easy to navigate.

In addition to this, Ida Pratt (Gottheil’s assistant who we might imagine did a lot of the hard work in the Oriental Division) also compiled several bibliographies of the material. The fullest of these is a bibliography of works on Modern Egypt in the NYPL. There is a reprint on the library’s open shelves, located roughly where the blue arrow is on the map. She also produces bibliographies that were printed in the Bulletin of the New York Public Library, including one on Islamic Law and another on Arabic Poetry. A few other bibliographies also exist for, among other things, the Armenian collection and the Persian collection.

Once you have located a book you want to see, the fun begins. You can try searching the catalog again, with the help of new information like transliteration or the shelf mark. Often that will produce results. But if you cannot find the book on the online catalog do not despair. 

The first thing to do is try the microfilms. At some point in the 1970s, a lot of the shorter books (probably the ones that were at risk of falling apart) were put on microfilm. These microfilms have not been fully cataloged but are available to order and go through yourself. If you have a call number, the microfilms will probably have the same call number with *ZO-pv at the beginning. E.g. if the shelf mark is *OFC it may be on the *ZO-pv *OFC microfilm (the old style catalog allows you to search by call number in the drop down menu).

If you can’t find it there, you can ask the research staff at the library to help. A few books that I could not find were located on the shelves of the storage warehouse in Queens. This took a couple of weeks to get delivered but it did happen.

Location and Access

All these materials are accessible from the main NYPL building on 42^nd Street in Manhattan, The Schwarzman Building. It is easy for visiting researchers to get a temporary (3 month) library card. The official instructions just ask for a photo ID and proof of address (If I remember correctly, I brought my UK driving license which has an address and it served as both). It takes a few minutes and you can start using the library immediately.

* Encyclopaedia Iranica, Gottheil Richard James Horatio.

**Bulletin of the New York Public Library, vol. 25 (1921), 193–4. 

Raphael Cormack is a visiting researcher at Columbia University. His book Midnight in Cairo about the female stars of Cairo’s 1920s and 1930s nightlife is forthcoming in early 2021.