Galileo's Library

Abstract

Galileo’s Library reunites more than 800 books and manuscripts that were in the personal library of Galileo Galilei (1564–1642) and his family. By revisiting existing letters, citations of authors in books that Galileo wrote, marginalia, inheritance lists, and auction catalogs, the chapters examine both what these documents say and what they omit in the story of the Galilei family libraries. Analytical perspectives from digital humanities, feminist data science, history of science, and literary analysis shed new light on Galileo’s role in book circulation, rediscover volumes with his annotations, describe the role of his daughter-in-law and grandson in the dispersal of the collection, and propose a new understanding of the role of comedy in his later years. With Galilean inspiration, the author proposes a telescopic reading of the data and data visualizations, a reading that prioritizes anomalies, resists inherited categories, looks for change over time, and emphasizes contextualization to see previously unseen trends and structures in this collection of books and manuscripts.