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A Farewell to Arms

World War I Film Series highlights films made during and about the First World War

May 5, 2014 - Gabrielle Inhofe

Film still from "A Farewell to Arms" (1932).

In conjunction with the current exhibition The World at War, 1914–1918, the Ransom Center, Austin Film Society, and Paramount Theatre are presenting a series of 13 films centered around World War I.

 

The films will be screened from May through July at the Ransom Center, Paramount Theatre, and Marchesa Hall & Theatre. Tonight, Grand Illusion (1937) will be screened at 7 p.m. at the Stateside Theater at the Paramount.

 

Other films in the series include All Quiet on the Western Front (1930), The African Queen (1951), The Big Parade (1925), Gallipoli (1981),  J’Accuse! (1919), Jules and Jim (1962), Paths of Glory (1957), The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943), Sergeant York (1941), A Farewell to Arms (1932), Shoulder Arms (1918), and Lawrence of Arabia (1962).

 

Screenings at the Ransom Center are free. Tickets are required for screenings at the Paramount and Marchesa Theatre and may be purchased at their box offices or on the Paramount website or the Austin Film Society’s website.

 

The Ransom Center’s Charles Nelson Prothro Theater has limited seating. Line forms upon arrival of the first person, and doors open 30 minutes in advance. Patrons are encouraged to visit the exhibition, which is open until 7 p.m. on Thursdays, before attending the screenings.

Image: Film still from A Farewell to Arms (1932).

Filed Under: Exhibitions + Events, Film Tagged With: A Farewell to Arms, All Quiet on the Western Front, Austin Film Society, Gallipoli, Grand Illusion, J’Accuse!, Jules and Jim, Lawrence of Arabia, Marchesa Hall and Theatre, Paramount Theatre, Paths of Glory, Sergeant York, Shoulder Arms, The African Queen, The Big Parade, The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp, World War I Film Series

Penguin and the Paperback Revolution

August 9, 2012 - Jean Cannon

Click on the four-way arrow in the bottom right-hand corner of the slideshow to convert into full-screen mode.

According to popular mythology, the publisher Allen Lane, founder of Penguin Books, formulated his idea for a press dedicated exclusively to paperbacks while visiting a railway station. Having spent the weekend visiting his friend Agatha Christie, the famed author of Murder on the Orient Express, Lane arrived at the Exeter railway station and realized he had forgotten his book. Frustrated and facing the boredom of a long train trip, Lane tried to buy a novel at the station but found that there was nothing available that he felt worth reading. Bookless for the next few hours, he sat on the train and planned a new line of cheap, pocket-sized, and travel-worthy books, which could be sold at railway stations, grocers, and department stores. Penguin Books—and the paperback revolution—were born.

While this version of Allen Lane’s epiphany may be slightly romanticized, there is no doubt that Penguin Books, launched in 1935, sparked a new phase of publishing that would change the printing industry irrevocably. Mass marketing of paperbacks not only brought classics to a wider audience but also brought pulp fiction—previously published in magazines—to the forefront of the book trade.

The Ransom Center’s book collection is known for first editions, many of them lush volumes with elaborate bindings. Perhaps lesser known is the fact that the Ransom Center also houses multiple volumes that illuminate the development of the paperback book trade in both America and Britain. Alongside important editions of Lane’s Penguins, the Center also houses Tauchnitz editions of paperbacks that pre-date Penguin, as well as the “penny dreadfuls” and dime novels that slowly developed into modern pulp fiction. This slideshow exhibits numerous items from the library’s collections that represent landmarks in the history of the paperback book trade.

"What Maisie Knew" by Henry James. Book cover design by Edward Gorey. 1954.
"What Maisie Knew" by Henry James. Book cover design by Edward Gorey. 1954.

Filed Under: Books + Manuscripts Tagged With: A Farewell to Arms, Agatha Christie, Albatross Verlag, Aldine Press, Aldus Manutius, Allen Ginsberg, Allen Lane, Anchor Books, Armed Services Editions Collection, Charles Dickens, City Lights Pocket Bookshop, D. H. Lawrence, Dante Alighieri, dime novels, E.O. Lorimer, Edith Sitwell, Edward Gorey, Erle Stanley Gardner, Ernest Hemingway, George Bernard Shaw, George Sala, Gold Medal Books, Golden Cockerell Press, Have Gat—Will Travel, Henry David Thoreau, Henry James, Howl and Other Poems, J. Dicks, Lady Chatterley’s Lover, Le terze rime di Dante, Malaeska the Indian Wife of the White Hunter, Mrs. Ann Stephens, Murder on the Orient Express, Oliver Twist, paperbacks, Penguin Books, Penguin Illustrated Classics, penny dreadfuls, Pocket Books, Publishing, pulp fiction, Richard S. Pranther, Robert Gibbings, Tauchnitz, Terrible Tales, The Case of the Velvet Claws, The Intelligent Woman’s Guide to Socialism Capitalism Sovietism & Fascism, The Pickwick Club, Walden, What Hitler Wants, What Maisie Knew

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