On the 250th anniversary of Girard’s arrival in Philadelphia, join the Rosenbach for an afternoon seminar focused on the Bass Otis portrait and the story of Girard’s decision to cast his lot with the young American republic.

We’ll examine how William Davenant’s departures from (and additions to) Shakespeare’s original text transformed the tragedy for new audiences—and what these changes reveal about the play’s afterlife. 

Jewish activism before and during the American Revolution helped set the stage for the new United States’ Constitution. Paul Finkelman will discuss this important history of Jewish participation in the American Revolution. 

The public’s imagination about 19th-century poet Emily Dickinson has been wrong for over a century. However, Dickinson was far more audacious and lively than previously believed, a woman whose adventurous art and challenging ideas continue to resonate today. We‘ll study letters in her own handwriting, examine first editions of her works, and learn how her first editors reshaped her poetry to fit their own conceptions. We’ll also explore the myth of the Belle and learn more about the Modern Emily. 

Do you love discovering fascinating stories from history? Have you ever wanted to get up close and personal with museum and library collection objects, including rare books, manuscripts, paintings, and decorative arts? If so, then let the Rosenbach become your laboratory for study.   

In this hands-on class, you will learn to create dynamic booklets of your own, from the humble pamphlet to a single-sheet book to the French door zine. No prior zine-making experience is required. 

In this course, we will look together at these lithographs to examine Dalí’s unique take on the misadventures of the knight errant Don Quixote and his faithful sidekick Sancho Panza, exploring such topics as the magical potential of madness and the transformative capacities of the imagination.

Immersed in the elegant surroundings of the Rosenbach’s dining room, Rosenbach Delancey Society member and Scotch expert Rick Davis will guide guests through a tasting of four different Scotch whisky samples, with a focus on techniques to get the most out of each sample. While we move through our samples, Rick will offer an overview of what is (and is not) whisky and explore key points around production, storage, buying, and more.

In this three-part yoga series, we’ll explore her life and work through movement, breath, and reflection. Each session will weave selected poems into a gentle and meditative yoga sequence, inviting you to embody Dickinson’s themes of solitude, transformation, and wonder. Attendance of Session 1 is not required to join upcoming sessions. 

In this two-part class (Sunday, September 7^th and Sunday, September 14^th), attendees will be immersed in the centuries-old traditions of calligraphy and bookbinding. Students will study lettering traditions from around the world, including the Uncial script found in the Book of Kells and other early Irish manuscripts, while exploring how calligraphy interacts with the book format and creating their own exciting compositions.

In this hands-on bookmaking class, learn to craft your own card-keeper recipe book and exchange recipes (and the stories behind them) with your fellow attendees. You’ll leave with a feast’s worth of recipes to try and a whole new way to share the food that matters to you with the people who matter to you. 

In this hands-on class, you will learn to create dynamic booklets of your own, from the humble pamphlet to a single-sheet book to the French door zine. No prior zine-making experience is required. 

In this two-hour, immersive, hands-on workshop, distinguished local Irish American calligrapher and manuscript illuminator Susan Kelly vonMedicus will introduce you to Irish manuscript heritage and teach the Uncial script found in the Book of Kells and other early Irish manuscripts.

This engaging seminar, held in the Rosenbach’s historic house, will begin with a discussion of how slavery helped shape the Constitution, which ironically, was written in Pennsylvania–the first state in the nation and the first political jurisdiction in the Western World to take steps to end slavery.