Richard McKeon Collection of Aristotle and Medieval and Renaissance Philosophy

The library formed by Richard McKeon reflected his conception of historical and philosophical interrelationships as well as his practical needs as a scholar for texts. He was an avid buyer of books from his high school days, and sixty-five years later he counted "some 40,000 volumes" in his working library.

As a graduate student, McKeon began to concentrate on works of philosophy and books on literature, history, and science which had a bearing on philosophy. Soon, however, his focus shifted "from subjects which had been sufficiently at the center of scholarly and philosophical attention to justify the publication of critically edited texts to subjects for which old books were the only sources available."

McKeon's pursuit of needed texts encompassed medieval philosophy, commentators and critics of the Aristotelian tradition, newly-discovered texts and translations of the Greek philosophers during the Renaissance, the liberal arts, early encyclopedias and other compilations of knowledge, and religion. His collection of nearly 1,800 rare books from the fifteenth through the eighteenth century contained important works in all these areas.

The McKeon Collection is currently in the process of being cataloged; a full listing of titles is available in the Special Collections Research Center. For further information, please contact:

Special Collections Research Center
University of Chicago Library
1100 E. 57th Street
Chicago, Illinois 60637
SpecialCollections@lib.uchicago.edu.