The collection, purchased in 1973 from Mrs. B. R. Davis of Bristol, England, consists of the library of Mr. Bertram R. Davis, a well-known scholar and collector.
The collection centres on Robert Southey and Bristol and gives an overview of the social, political, and literary upheaval which gave birth to the Romantic movement and shaped the rest of the nineteenth century. The collection also contains material on Spain, Portugal and Brazil, Russia and Napoleon, France and the Revolution, as well as numerous works on travel in the British Isles and elsewhere. Also present is a selection of twentieth-century works which elucidate Bertram Davis' interests, friendships, and scholarly connections.
Almost all of Robert Southey's published works are represented, and almost all of these are in the first edition. The collection also contains 44 manuscript groups held in trust for an indefinite period, and Bertram Davis' extensive correspondence with twentieth-century scholars and critics such as R. D. Havens, E.H.W. Meyerstein, M.H. Fitzgerald, and E.L. Griggs.
The Doris Lewis Rare Book Room also holds a related archival collection, listed under Southey, Robert, 1774-1843.
The University of Waterloo has published a catalogue of the collection: Catalogue of the Bertram R. Davis "Robert Southey" Collection compiled by Jane Britton (1990).
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