Tag Archives: Literature and Sport

Writer Don DeLillo speaks on campus this Thursday

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A page from the first draft of Don DeLillo's "Underworld."

A page from the first draft of Don DeLillo's "Underworld."

In conjunction with the Literature and Sport exhibition, Don DeLillo, author of Underworld, Pafko at the Wall, and End Zone, reads from his work on Thursday, July 25, at 7 p.m. in Jessen Auditorium in Homer Rainey Hall at The University of Texas at Austin. DeLillo’s archive resides at the Harry Ransom Center.

DeLillo is the author of 15 novels, including Falling Man, White Noise, and Libra. He has won the National Book Award, the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, the Jerusalem Prize for his complete body of work, and the William Dean Howells Medal from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, among other honors. This spring he was named the first recipient of the Library of Congress Prize for American Fiction.

The event is free and open to the public. Seating is limited, and doors open at 6:20 p.m. for Ransom Center members and at 6:30 p.m. for the general public.

Stop by the Ransom Center’s visitor desk and sign up for eNews between 5 and 6:30 p.m.* on Thursday, July 25 to receive a copy of Don DeLillo’s novel Underworld. Don DeLillo’s reading follows at 7 p.m at Jessen Auditorium.

Materials from the novel are highlighted in the exhibition Literature and Sport, on view through August 4.

*While supplies last, one book per person.

Closing Soon: Exhibition Showcases Literature About Baseball, Boxing, Football and Other Sports

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The exhibition "Literature and Sport" is on view at the Harry Ransom Center through August 4.

The exhibition "Literature and Sport" is on view at the Harry Ransom Center through August 4.

The exhibition Literature and Sport is on view at the Harry Ransom Center at The University of Texas at Austin through August 4.

The crack of the bat, the roar of the crowd, the sudden-death play, the crushing blow, the herculean feat, the insufferable star, the sweat, the triumph, the thrill. Sport holds a sacred place in western culture and literature. Writers as diverse as Ernest Hemingway, Willa Cather, Norman Mailer, Marianne Moore, Don DeLillo, Joyce Carol Oates, and David Foster Wallace have written about sport. But their works are no mere play-by-play accounts. The competition, spectacle, personal struggle, and exaggerated personalities so characteristic of sport offer writers the perfect backdrop upon which to look deeply into human nature and create literature that transcends sport itself.

This exhibition showcases the literature of sport through fiction, essays, poetry, and plays. Organized by sport, the exhibition highlights some of the finest examples of literary writing about baseball, football, boxing, tennis, cricket, and other sports. From Bernard Malamud’s The Natural to Norman Mailer’s The Fight, great literary works capture the appeal of sport and its ability to transform both the individual and society, all the while demonstrating through lyricism and verbal dexterity how writers elevate language to literature.

The Ransom Center is located at 21st and Guadalupe streets. The Ransom Center Gallerie are open Tuesdays through Fridays from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., with extended Thursday hours until 7 p.m. On Saturdays and Sundays the galleries are open from noon to 5 p.m. The galleries are closed on Mondays.

Free docent-led tours are offered Tuesdays at noon, Thursdays at 6 p.m., and Saturdays and Sundays at 2 p.m.

Megan Barnard, Assistant Director for Acquisitions and Administration, leads a tour of Literature and Sport on Wednesday, July 31, at 7 p.m.