Exploring the Shelley-Godwin Archive

For this week’s blog post, I’d like to share The Shelley-Godwin Archive, which can be found at: www.shelleygodwinarchive.org. This online resource offers a collection of digitized manuscripts written by Mary Wollstonecraft, William Godwin, Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, and Percy Bysshe Shelley. Its purpose is to “unite online for the first time the widely dispersed handwritten legacy of this uniquely gifted family of writers.” I think that this project is a compelling example of how XML can be used to make otherwise obscure manuscripts accessible to a wide audience, and to provide and encourage new critical interpretations of textual artifacts.

Julia Flanders describes TEI as a “foundationally collaborative technolog[y]” (73). She goes on to say that encoding standards such as TEI “presume the need and the desire to co-ordinate shared work, to generalize individual insight to a community, and to support the extension, critique, and re-use of ideas and techniques” (73).

I think that the Shelley-Godwin Archive invokes this collaborative spirit, as it reveals detailed information about its use of XML and encourages reader participation. The “About” section of the website provides ample information for scholars, students, and any individual who is interested in learning more about TEI and the specific encoding methods that the project uses. For manuscripts that have been encoded, XML transcriptions are available to the public. The goal of this project is to eventually include an XML-encoded transcription for each manuscript available in the collection. As the author of the “About” section states, “it is a rewarding act of scholarship that benefits a large community—and we hope that it will soon become a collaborative project undertaken by that community.”

When discussing TEI, the author refers specifically to the “Module for Transcription of Primary Resources,” and explains that the encoding of the manuscripts in their collection is based on these standards. They provide a table with detailed information about the specific tags that are used in their encoding processes. They also take this a step further and offer more detailed information about their encoding practices on Github: https://github.com/umd-mith/sga/blob/master/data/odd/shelley-godwin-page.odd. This is useful for anyone who wishes to understand the nuts and bolts of the XML code that the Shelley-Godwin Archive uses. The collection itself is beautifully presented and very user-friendly; the database is easy to navigate, and includes a detailed guide explaining how to use the technical features of the archive.

One specific example from the Shelley-Godwin Archive that I’d like to focus on is an excerpt from a draft of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein:

A screenshot of the manuscript in "Standard View"

The interface allows users to engage with the manuscript in multiple ways. The user has the option to view various transcriptions; for instance, one can select the “Reading Text,” which offers a straightforward transcription that is bereft of editorial commentary. The "Standard View" (shown in the image above) lies somewhere between the Reading Text and the XML transcription; it features editorial comments and specific textual characteristics (such as deletions, additions, etc.), but doesn't provide as much information about the text as the XML version does. Alternatively, the user can view the XML transcription (shown below), which displays the particular tags and editorial information involved in the encoding of the manuscript. The interface also effectively incorporates a digital facsimile of the manuscript; users have the option of viewing the facsimile independently or viewing it alongside one of the textual transcriptions.

An image of the same manuscript, but in "TEI" view

The editors have used XML to capture unique qualities of the text that would otherwise be lost in a straightforward transcription that focuses solely on content and ignores form. For instance, the different hands of Mary Shelley and Percy Bysshe Shelley are represented by the tags <handShift medium="pen" new="#mws"/> and <add hand="#pbs" place="superlinear">, respectively. These tags also specify other aspects of the manuscript, such as portions that have been edited and added in by Percy Bysshe Shelley. I think it's interesting that the XML transcription is able to retain, and perhaps reinterpret, these textual characteristics.

References:

"Encoding the S-GA." Shelley-Godwin Archive. Accessed October 13, 2016. http://shelleygodwinarchive.org/about/#encodingthesga

Flanders, J. (2012). "Collaboration and Dissent: Challenges of Collaborative Standards for Digital Humanities." In M. Deegan & W. McCarty (Eds.), Collaborative Research in the Digital Humanities. Burlington, VT: Ashgate.

Shelley, M. W. "Frankenstein, Volume I", in The Shelley-Godwin Archive, MS. Abinger c. 56, 1r. Retrieved from http://shelleygodwinarchive.org/sc/oxford/frankenstein/volume/i/#/p4/mode/xml

"Shelley-Godwin Archive: About." Shelley-Godwin Archive. Accessed October 13, 2016. http://shelleygodwinarchive.org/about