In my opinion, there are different forms of expression. Twenty years ago, I chose the strict opposite of words, my body. Then, I danced for eighteen years before stopping because there is a time for everything. During all this period, I discovered that plenty of famous ballets were based on literature: Romeo and Juliet, Sleeping Beauty, Don Quixote, Cinderella, Le Spectre de la Rose for instance. However, between dance and this Master Rare Book and Digital Humanities there was not just a step.
Actually, it is neither the love for books, literature, nor dancing which drove me to this Masters, but the love for History. After two-year undergraduate sciences to prepare the admission to engineering schools, I knew my place was not there. I had to join the university to study History, a passion since I was a little girl. The last year of my bachelor’s degree, I did an internship in the archive center in Dijon and it was truly exciting. Indeed, I particularly liked the contact with the old paper to tell History. It became obvious I had to participate in the conservation of those testimonies of the past.
Thanks to this Master, I will learn about many different fields to connect archives and now. Indeed, I study ancient languages, bibliography, paleography, transcription, and the book and writing culture to know books in their historical context. Also, and this is the richness of this program, I discover digital tools to highlight, communicate about, and preserve rare books. These tools are important because they allow to transmit culture of books to bibliophiles, historians, or curious people, and that is my desire for the future.
