Sadler and Sadleir
Scholar-Collectors

CAROL Z. ROTHKOPF

It is a paradox that Sir JVlichael Ernest Sadler (1861-1943) and
his son, Michael Thomas Harvey Sadleir (1888-1957), who
were so similar in so many ways, came confusingly to have dif¬
ferent surnames. Both were men of far-ranging interests in their
respective professions, education and publishing. In addition, both
were passionate collectors—the father of art and the son of books.
Indeed, anyone interested in looking for new insights into the
nature vs. nurture debate in heredity would likely find the lives
of this father and son a rewarding place to start. The description
Sadleir wrote of his father's art collecting in a memoir could be eas¬
ily reworded to describe Sadleir as a book collector:

... he had become the kind of collector he was destined to be—a
discoverer of neglected artists of the past, and an appreciator, ahead
of the market, of progressive painters of the present. His historical
and prophetic sense enabled him to recognise influences hitherto
ovedooked, and to foresee possibilities of permanent achievement in
the eccentricities of experimental work.

Something of this generosity of spirit and breadth of understand¬
ing is evident in the letters of both of these remarkable men in the
Rare Book and Manuscript Library. The Sadler/Sadleir letters are
vivid reminders of how the tireless exchange of ideas went on
between persons of similar interests in the era before direct dialing
made the art of correspondence all but obsolete.

Among Sir Michael Sadler's letters are some to such luminaries of
an earlier time at the University as Nobel Peace Prize-winner and
long-time president (1902-1943) Nicholas Murray Buder; George
Plimpton, a founder of the Friends of the Columbia Libraries; Allan
Nevins, the noted historian; and Brander Matthews, the first pro¬
fessor of dramatic literature at Columbia, or at any American uni¬
versity. Sadler's letters to these people are models of graciousness
mingled with judicious criticism, as when he asked Matthews if he
 

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