With the first chapter of Bleak House, penned in 1852, Charles Dickens helped introduce dinosaurs to popular culture: “As much mud in the streets as if the waters had but newly retired from the face of the earth, and it would not be wonderful to meet a Megalosaurus, forty feet or so, waddling like an elephantine lizard up Holborn Hill.” With this passing reference, Dickens set in motion a cultural fascination with monstrous lizards that would transcend mere paleontology.
The “Bibliosaurus! Dinosaurs in the Popular Imagination” exhibition at the Regenstein Library explores the transition of dinosaurs from subjects of intense scientific inquiry to iconic figures in popular culture. The exhibition features children’s books, journal articles, movie posters, artworks, and even Barbie dolls, unraveling the multifaceted ways that dinosaurs have captured and permeated our quotidian lives over the past two centuries.
The drawings and posters featured in “Bibliosaurus!” span over 120 years, crafted by some of the most influential practitioners of various mediums. Originally published in diverse forms and contexts and illustrated in the most dramatic and artistically bold ways, these exhibits illuminate how dinosaurs have shaped art and, in turn, how artists have reshaped the public’s perception of dinosaurs.
The exhibition includes The World Around Us: Prehistoric Animals, a seventy-two-page comic book from 1927 that helped provide insight about dinosaurs to a young audience. Nearby, viewers can find illustrations and soundtracks reproduced from the media surrounding Godzilla, a popular, fictional Jurassic-age reptile that is described to be a combination of Tyrannosaurus, Iguanodon, Stegosaurus, and an alligator. Even art from The Flintstones makes an appearance in the exhibit.
Deepening the rich tapestry of dinosaur fascination, the exhibit explains how every state in the United States has adopted a state fossil, with each one telling a unique paleontological story. From Colorado’s Stegosaurus to South Dakota’s Triceratops, these fossils have become symbolic representations of the prehistoric heritage within each state. Illinois, in particular, boasts a distinctive creature as its state fossil: Tullimonstrum gregarium, a 300 million-year-old invertebrate found nowhere else in the world.
The journey from scientific curiosities to the cultural icons of dinosaurs can be witnessed in the “Bibliosaurus!” exhibition. Dinosaurs are no longer confined to the yellowing pages of dusty research journals, as they were in the 18th and early 19th century. Instead, as the exhibition amusingly expresses, Bibliosaurus, “that imaginary creature made of paper and ink,” is all around us. Infiltrating our daily lives in the most random places like décor, clothing, and various media, dinosaurs are no longer trapped within the confines of historical records and scientific publications. They are back and ready to conquer the planet in an unexpected, yet undeniably overwhelming fashion: the once fearsome giants that roamed the Earth are now beloved symbols woven into the fabric of our modern existence. Millions of years after their extinction, their footsteps leave indelible, forever fossilized marks on our cultures; dinosaurs are present and will never go extinct in our imaginations.
