Memoirs of the Countess D’Anois

Jenna’s project makes an intervention into traditional modes of descriptive bibliography by transferring the prefatory text from the 18th c to a 21st c medium in a way that – paradoxically - highlights the way material form influences our reading in a way traditional descriptive bibliography doesn’t. Looking at the D’Anois preface in its new context really vanishes the 18th c diction entirely and makes it seem almost like a contemporary commentary on feminism and celebrity culture. The description’s 1990s riot grrl zine aesthetic is quite relevant to the novel’s proto-feminist twist on the traditional prefatory apologia.

Traditional Description

[Murat, Henriette Julie de Castelnau, comtesse de.]. MEMOIRS OF THE COUNTESS D’ANOIS: WRITTEN BY HERSELF BEFORE HER RETIREMENT. IN TWO VOLUMES.

London: F. Noble and J. Noble, 1778.

I 243p; II 245p. 12mo.

Contents. Volume I. A1^r title, A1^v- A2^r Dedication, B1^r- L12^v text.

Volume II. A1^r title, B1^r- L13^rtext, L13^v- L14^v Advertisement.

Notes. Source location the British Library, London, England 1608/4505. Author of memoirs not actually the Countess d’Anois but Henriette Julie de Murat. List of ‘BOOKS printed for F. and J. Noble.’ at end of vol. 2. Stamp of the British Museum on page 2 and last page of both vol. 1. and vol. 2.

Bibliographer: Jenna Davis

Memoirs of the Countess D’Anois

Traditional Description

Experimental Description