This photograph of Michael Sadleir appeared with his obituary in the Sunday Times, January 23, 1958 (UCLA Library Special Collections).
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Sadleir’s wife and dogs in their 1935 Christmas Card (UCLA Library Special Collections)
Michael Sadleir, book collector, publisher, bibliographer, biographer, essayist and novelist was born in 1888 and lived until 1957.
He joined the publishing concern of Constable as a young man and by the 1950s was its Director. In addition to his success as a businessman, he filled his life with a great variety of book-related avocations. Fanny by Gaslight, a melodrama set in London in the 1870s, was his most popular novel. Translated into several languages, it was made into a movie in 1944, four years after publication. Produced by Anthony Asquith, it starred James Mason, Stewart Granger and Phyllis Calvin. At the same time, he wrote a definitive critical study of Anthony Trollope (Trollope: A Commentary), which helped revive Trollope’s reputation in the 20th century, as well as biographical works on Trollope, Bulwer-Lytton and Blessington-D’Orsay. His work as a bibliographer of Trollope and 19th century fiction in general turned academic attention to the book as physical object rather than text alone. He was a man with wide-ranging talents and abilities.
In this context, his most important role was that of a book collector. Prior to amassing his great collection of 19th century fiction, he had developed and sold a collection of French symbolist poets, a definitive Trollope collection, and a collection of Gothic novels now owned by the University of Virginia. For his collection of 19th century fiction alone, he amassed some 8,625 volumes of first editions and rare, mint condition books from major and minor 19th century writers. His two-volume XIX Century Fiction: A Bibliographical Record Based on His Own Collection is a renowned masterpiece of bibliography.
The UCLA Library purchased the 19th Century fiction collection in 1951. It is housed in UCLA Library Special Collections in the Bradford A. Booth Memorial Room, and it has been added to judiciously by rare book librarians since its arrival. These rare and perfect specimens of publishing are gems in the UCLA Library Collection.
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