The Reading Experience Database 1450-1945
(RED)

General notes to help those filling in the RED record form

Please provide as much information as you can.

The RED Project team envisage the following:

You are reading copy of Boswell's London Journal 1762-1763 edited by Frederick A Pottle, in it you come across a reference to Sheridan reading a copy of Hamlet in a London Coffee Shop on the 9th April 1763. The RED Project team would like you to complete a Full RED Form giving them this information.

In this case:

the information about Hamlet would go into Section 1 - The Text Read
the information about Sheridan would go into Section 2 - The Reader or Listener
the information about you (as the supplier) and the book you were reading (Boswell's London Journal) would go into Section 3 - The Textual Evidence

However, if the data or time does not allow you to do more than give RED the minimum information please provide at least this minimum record by completing the Minimum RED Form.

A minimum record requires that you complete at least one of the fields in each of these required areas.

First area (about the Text being read).
1. Field 1.2 - Author name or
2. Field 1.3 - Title of Text or
3. Field 1.4 - Genre of Text or
4. Field 1.5 - Form of Text (MS) or
5. Field 1.6 - Form of Text (Print)
Second area (about the Reader).
1. Field 2.11 - Date of reading experience
Third area (about the evidence for the reading experience).
1. Field 3.2 - The Printed source or
2. Field 3.3 - The Manuscript source
Fourth area (about you).
1. Field 3.4 - Your name and
2. Field 3.5 - Your postal address

In Field 1.4 - Genre of Text

You may use up to 3 categories if the work is difficult to classify, `classics' means any text written before AD400.

In Field 3.1 - Textual Evidence

The field should contain the sentence or remark from your source that constitutes the evidence for the reading experience. If it is a marginal mark or comment please note it here.

If you are providing two or more reading experiences for the same reader and/or for the same text you need only enter that common information once on the first record form that you submit; on the subsequent forms you need only include the details that have changed (e.g. Samuel Pepys reading at different times five different parts of the Bible would have Pepys's details on the first form and the separate instances of reading listed on subsequent forms with a note that they refer to details submitted previously).

If exact dates are not available please approximate as well as possible (i.e. April 1763 ... 1763 ... 1760s ... 18th century ...).

Those contributing to RED will be given priority access once the database is made public; the greater the contribution the higher the priority.

You can contact the RED project via email to either R.H.Crone@open.ac.uk or Katie.Halsey@sas.ac.uk.