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of 1910, T.E. Lawrence was elected to a Senior Demyship at Magdalen College, which supported him as a member of the British Museum/ Ashmolean archaeological dig at Carchemish, in northern Syria, until the war broke out in 1914. The college has always had a collection of Lawrenciana and this has now been enhanced by the acquisition of the library and archive of Jeremy Wilson. Wilson died in April 2017 and was obituarised magnificently by Ed Maggs in the columns of the book collector in our issue for Autumn 2017. He was Lawrence’s o Y cial biographer and knew every wrinkle of the man’s life. Lawrence of Arabia came out in 1989, the year after Wilson oversaw the Lawrence exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery. With his wife Nicole, he was co-owner and publisher of the Castle Hill Press. Their first book (‘momentous’ was Ed Maggs’s word) was the Oxford 1922 edition of Seven Pillars of Wisdom , a complete eye-opener for those familiar only with the ‘over-wrought’ prose of the o Y cial 1926 edition. Apparently, the exhibition will also touch upon the vivid exploits in Arabia of another Magdalen alumnus, Wilfred Thesiger. It bodes well. Lawrence of Arabia At Magdalen College, Oxford from 5 November 2018 to 1 May 2019 apropos philip roth in our last issue, Alan Taylor’s anecdote is rele- vant. As a young man he worked in the McDonald Road public library in Edinburgh. ‘One morning, a woman took me aside and asked if we had a copy of a book called The Complaint . I asked if she knew who the author was and she said ‘Portnoy’. When I retrieved it for her, I was told by the deputy branch librarian to put it in a brown paper bag. What an age of innocence it was.’ Ian Fleming’s brother, Richard, an eminent banker, had The Spy Who Loved Me wrapped in brown paper before taking it on a transat- lantic flight. Yes, those were very di V erent days. we moan and moan in Britain about the decline of the public li- brary, one of our most revered and worthy institutions. In the United States, which in this respect has a similar cultural history, the problem has been aired by making a movie: Ex Libris: the New York Public Library , producer and director Frederick Wiseman. It’s a remarkable achievement. At 3hrs 26m one can safely say that it covers the ground
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