April 17, 2014, Filed Under: Books + Manuscripts, PhotographyDrawing parallels: Virginia Woolf’s “On Being Ill” and Julia Stephen’s “Notes from Sick Rooms” Quentin Bell’s biography of Virginia Woolf begins with a famous sentence: “Virginia Woolf was a Miss Stephen.” Her father, Sir Leslie Stephen, was an eminent critic and editor of the Dictionary of National Biography; his first wife was W. M. Thackeray’s daughter Minny. The second Mrs. Stephen, Woolf’s mother, was… read more
April 16, 2014, Filed Under: Books + Manuscripts, Research + TeachingJane Austen in Austin: A Regency display on view This year marks the 200th anniversary of the publication of Mansfield Park, Jane Austen’s most ambitious and controversial novel. To celebrate both the author and the cultural history behind this complex work, students in English Professor Janine Barchas’s fall 2013 graduate seminar curated two display cases relating to Austen and… read more
April 15, 2014, Filed Under: AuthorsMaterials from Peter Matthiessen’s archive on display in Ransom Center’s lobby To honor acclaimed novelist, naturalist, and wilderness writer Peter Matthiessen (1927–2014), the Ransom Center is highlighting materials from his archive in its lobby. Matthiessen was born in New York City to a well-to-do family and educated at Yale. Determined to pursue a writing career, Matthiessen moved to Paris where he… read more
April 15, 2014, Filed Under: Authors, Books + Manuscripts, Research + TeachingBiographer mines Ransom Center’s collections to uncover “The Unknown Henry Miller” Arthur Hoyle’s recent biography The Unknown Henry Miller: A Seeker in Big Sur was recently published by Skyhorse/Arcade. The biography recounts Miller’s career from its beginnings in Paris in the 1930s but focuses on his years living in Big Sur, California, from 1944 to 1961, during which he wrote many… read more
April 14, 2014, Filed Under: FilmFrom the Outside In: Elizabeth Taylor’s publicity photo for “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” The atria on the first floor of the Ransom Center are surrounded by windows featuring etched reproductions of images from the collections. The windows offer visitors a hint of the cultural treasures to be discovered inside. From the Outside In is a series that highlights some of these images and… read more
April 10, 2014, Filed Under: Art, Digital Collections, Exhibitions + EventsExplore World War I propaganda posters online The Ransom Center recently launched a new platform of digital collections on its website, which includes the World War I poster collection. More than 120 items from that collection, including the posters highlighted in this blog post, can be viewed on the new platform. Some of these posters can also… read more
