Nicolas Barker

Not to be confused with Nicholas Barker.

Nicolas John Barker OBE FBA FSA (born 1932) is a British historian of printing and books.^[2][3] He was Head of Conservation at the British Library from 1976 to 1992.

Barker preparing to give the Beatrice Warde Memorial Lecture, November 2022^[1]

Barker was editor of The Book Collector from 1965 to 2016^[4] and edited The Pleasures of Bibliophily: Fifty Years of the Book Collector, an Anthology. ^[5]

He was elected to the Roxburghe Club in 1970.^[6] In 2000 The Great Book of Thomas Trevilian. A Facsimile from the manuscript in the Wormsley Library. With a Study by Nicolas Barker was published for presentation to his fellow members of the Roxburghe Club.^[7][8] It was printed in red and black by Susan Shaw at the Merrion Press. Sir Paul Getty commissioned the reproduction.^[9]

He was elected a Fellow of the British Academy in 1998, and is also a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London. He held the Sandars Readership in Bibliography in 1999–2000 and lectured on "Type and type-founding in Britain 1485–1720".

In 2002, he was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire.^[10][11]

Barker gave the 2002 Panizzi Lecture at the British Library and was the A.S.W. Rosenbach Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania in 2002.

A bibliography of his work was published to mark his 80th birthday in 2012.^[12]

Selected works

• Barker, Nicolas. 1964. The Publications of the Roxburghe Club, 1814–1962. an Essay with a Bibliographical Table. Cambridge: Printed for presentation to members of the Roxburghe Club.
• Barker, Nicolas. 1968. "The Book as Artefact". The Book Collector 17 (no. 2), Summer: 143–150.
• Barker, Nicolas (1972). Stanley Morison. London: Macmillan.
• Barker, Nicolas, 1976. "Caxton's Quincentenary: Retrospect". The Book Collector 25 (no. 4), Winter: 455–480.
• Barker, Nicolas (1978). Bibliotheca Lindesiana: the Lives and Collections of Alexander William, 25th Earl of Crawford and 8th Earl of Balcarres, and James Ludovic, 26th Earl of Crawford and 9th Earl of Balcarres. London: for Presentation to the Roxburghe Club, and published by Bernard Quaritch
• Barker, Nicolas (1978). The Oxford University Press and the Spread of Learning, 1478–1978: An Illustrated History. Oxford England: Clarendon Press.
• Barker, Nicolas. (1985). "Libraries and the National Heritage: Two Views from Europe". The Book Collector 34 (no. 2): Summer: 145–172.
• Barker, Nicolas (1987). The Butterfly Books. An Enquiry into the Nature of Certain Twentieth Century Pamphlets. London: Bertram Rota.
• Barker, Nicolas (1988). Two East Anglian Picture Books.
• Barker, Nicolas (1989). Treasures of the British Library; compiled by Nicolas Barker and the curatorial staff of the British Library. New York: Harry N. Abrams ISBN 0-8109-1653-3
• Barker, Nicholas (1992). "The Author as Editor". The Book Collector 41 (no. 1), Spring: 9–27.
• Barker, Nicolas, and British Library (1993). A Potencie of Life : Books in Society : The Clark Lectures 1986–1987. London: British Library.
• Barker, Nicolas, and Basilius Besler. 1994. Hortus Eystettensis: The Bishop’s Garden and Besler's Magnificent Book. New York: H.N. Abrams.
• Barker, Nicolas. Grolier Club, Royal Oak Foundation, and Stinehour Press. (1999). Treasures from the Libraries of National Trust Country Houses. New York: Royal Oak Foundation & The Grolier Club.
• Barker, Nicolas (2000). The Great Book of Thomas Trevilian: A Facsimile of the Manuscript in the Wormsley Library. London: Published by Susan Shaw for presentation to the members of the Roxburghe Club.
• Barker, Nicolas Barker (2002). "Fifty Years On." (fifty years of The Book Collector). The Book Collector 51 (no. 4): Winter: 481–489.
• Barker, Nicolas (2003). Form and Meaning in the History of the Book. Selected Essays by Nicolas Barker. London: British Library.
• Barker, Nicolas (2003). The Pleasures of Bibliophily: Fifty Years of the Book Collector, an Anthology. Edited by Nicolas J. Barker. London: British Library; New Castle, Del.: Oak Knoll Press, 2003.
• John Carter; Nicolas Barker (2004). ABC for Book Collectors (8th ed.). Oak Knoll Press. ISBN 1584561122.
• Barker, Nicolas, and British Library (2005). Treasures of the British Library. London: British Library.
• Barker, Nicolas, "Introduction" in Cronenwett, Philip N., Kevin Osborn, and Samuel Allen Streit. 2007. Celebrating Research : Rare and Special Collections from the Membership of the Association of Research Libraries. Washington, DC: Association of Research Libraries.
• Barker, Nicolas. "Preface" in Wendorf, Richard. 2007. America’s Membership Libraries. 1st edn. New Castle, DE: Oak Knoll Press.
• Barker, Nicolas (2012). The Roxburghe Club: a bicentenary history. Cambridge: Roxburghe Club.
• Barker, Nicolas (2016). Visible Voices : Translating Verse into Script & Print, 3000 BC–AD 2000. 2016. Manchester: Carcanet.
• Barker, Nicolas (2019). At First, All Went Well ...: And Other Brief Lives. London: Bernard Quaritch.
• Barker, Nicolas (2019). The Pirie Library: A Short-Title Catalogue of the Collection of Robert S. Pirie: With Indexes of Provenances, Sources, Bindings, Armorials and Devices & a List of Prices. London: Bernard Quaritch.
• Barker, Nicolas (2020). Reginald Heber: A Letter from India.