Kenneth Hopkins library of 19th century poetry

For almost 40 years the British poet, novelist, and scholar Kenneth Hopkins (1914-1988) collected eighteenth and nineteenth century English poetry, often searching rural bookshops with such bookish companions as Edmund Blunden and Sir Rupert Hart-Davis. The result of his dedication is found in the collection of 5,000 volumes of English poetry from the past two centuries. The collection was formed not so much with an eye towards rarity as with attention to the more obscure figures as well as the key writers of each age. Thus, William Barnes is found alongside Robert Burns and Lord Byron, while Sara and Hartley Coleridge's works were brought together with those of Alexander Pope, Richard Hooker, and Charles Lamb. Elsewhere in the library such works as the rare first issue of Frederick Locker's Lyra Elegantiorum (1867) stand along with a book of tipped in press notices on Locker's ill-fated Lyra that bears his book plate. There are over 300 eighteenth century imprints in the Hopkins collections, all of which have been reported to the Eighteenth Century Short-Title Catalogue.

There is a small amount of laid in material that has been separated from the bibliographic collection.