Special Collections & Archives

This collection exists to support children's literature studies at Roehampton and the work of the National Centre for Research in Children's Literature (NCRCL). It is a reference collection of about 3,000 critical, theoretical, bibliographical and reference works. The Collection also holds runs of approximately 40 specialist children's literature journals. The collection is for reference-only use.

Holdings

• Reference works su​ch as Children's Literature Review
• Books on the history of children’s literature
• Biography and autobiography of children’s authors and illustrators
• Children's books of historical interest and significance, mainly from the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. These include the Bratt​on Collection, the Street Children Collection and the Hammersmith and Fulham Collection.
• A number of newly published children’s books, usually prize winners, are added to the collection each year.
• Foreign books including contemporary picture books in Japanese and French as well as international translations into English
• Adaptations of children's books:  film, TV and audio.

The collection is located in the Special Collections section on the second floor of the Library. Parts of it are on open access and can be viewed during the Library opening hours, and some materials require supervised access;  please contact the Archivist​ to make an appointment.

Most books can be found via the Library catalogue except for the Hammersmith and Fulham Collection, linked below. 

A small number of key texts have been digitised and are available on our Roehampton Digital Library.